I write on music and Christianity for a wide variety of audiences, from scholars to students, pastors to laypeople.
FOR GENERAL AUDIENCES
Jesus Shows Up in Discos, Honky-tonks, Blues Bars, and Strip Clubs
Based on my academic research on Jesus in secular pop songs, this article describes the ways non-Christian have explored Jesus’s prophetic messages in music from the past 50 years. Read it In the Dec. 2020 issue.
NEW: Read my series of Patheos blog articles about this research project here.
New Sacred Choral Music at the Grammys
An essay exploring the theological and spiritual dimensions of James Primosch’s “Mass for the Day of St Thomas Didymus” and Richard Danielpour’s “The Passion of Yeshua.” Read it in the Mar. 24, 2021 issue.
A Literary Bible Translation Changed My View of Scripture
An essay exploring the resonances between Biblical and artistic inspiration from the perspective of a contemporary composer. Read it in the online magazine “The Biblical Mind” from the Center for Hebraic Thought.
The Eschatological Vision of Sgt. Pepper’s
This essay for the online magazine ThinkChristian demonstrates how the epic-making Beatles record can help us understand God’s relationship to time - and how that relates to our lives as Christians.
Man or Amanuensis?
An essay in the edited volume Partnering With God, ed. Thomas J., Oord,. et al. Read it here.
Hidden Under a Bushel: Sufjan Stevens and the Problem of Christian Music
An essay exploring the classic indie album “Illinois” by Sufjan Stevens. Co-authored with American religious historian Randall J. Stephens. Read it here.
The Creational Structure of Kendrick Lamar’s Flow
In this piece for ThinkChristian I explain how Kendrick’s use of rhythm and rhyme helps us get a glimpse of God’s nature as Creator.
FOR ACADEMICS, CLERGY, AND EDUCATORS
Three recent articles for the Wabash Center for Teaching and Learning in Theology and Religion
More Than Worship: Sacred Music as a Resource for Teaching and Learning
In this article I discuss the unique ways that music can help students engage with Scripture and theology. Read it here.
Ruach: A Musical Exploration of The Spirit
An article about my 2017 string quartet Ruach, which creates a sonic environment that embodies the uncontainable and uncontrollable nature of the Holy Spirit. Read and listen here.
Theology in Sound and Motion
This essay describes the ways my composition Perichoresis presents a musical depiction of the Trinity, then describes how it can help us reimagine the way we understand our relationships with our students in the classroom.
Read it and listen here.
Rock of Ages: Jesus in American Popular Song, 1969-2019
My chapter appears in Christian Sacred Music in the Americas, ed. Shenton and Smolko, from Rowman & Littlefield (2021)
Read more about the research on the Rock of Ages website.
