Hearing Afresh: The Christian Resonances of Music in Worship and Culture — January 2020 Worship Seminar with Jeremy Begbie

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January 6-7, 2020—IWS Worship Seminar

Hearing Afresh: The Christian Resonances of Music in Worship and Culture will be taught by Dr. Jeremy Begbie. This event will take place during our winter on-campus intensive and is open to the public but requires registration.

Introducing Dr. Jeremy Begbie

Jeremy Begbie

Jeremy Begbie is Thomas A. Langford Distinguished Professor in Theology at Duke Divinity School. He is also Senior Member at Wolfson College, Cambridge, and an Affiliated Lecturer in the Faculty of Music at the University of Cambridge. He is Founding Director of Duke Initiatives in Theology and the Arts, one of the main aims of which is to foster theological-artistic links between Duke and Cambridge. Prior to his present appointment, he held a personal chair at the University of St Andrews and was Associate Principal of Ridley Hall, Cambridge.

Educated largely in Scotland, before studying theology at Aberdeen and Cambridge, he studied music and philosophy at Edinburgh University. Holding piano performing and teaching qualifications, he is also an oboist, and a Fellow of the Royal School of Church Music.  Begbie is an ordained minister of the Church of England, and served for a number of years as assistant pastor of a church in West London.

Dr. Begbie has published extensively, his particular interest being the interplay between the arts and theology, bringing to light the different ways they can illuminate and benefit each other. His books include A Peculiar Orthodoxy: Reflections on Theology and the Arts (Baker Academic, 2018), Redeeming Transcendence in the Arts: Bearing Witness to the Triune Go(Eerdmans, 2018), Music, Modernity, and God: Essays in Listening (Oxford University Press, 2014), Resounding Truth: Christian Wisdom in the World of Music (Baker Academic, 2007), and Theology, Music and Time (Cambridge University Press, 2000).

He tours widely as a speaker, specializing in multimedia performance-lectures. Recent engagements have included preaching, speaking and performing in universities and churches in North America, Hong Kong and Australia.

Bookstore Spotlight

Preview Dr. Begbie’s books in the IWS Bookstore.

Seminar Description

Hearing Afresh: The Christian Resonances of Music in Worship and Culture

The power of music to change hearts and minds is legendary. In these seminars, Dr. Begbie explores what it is about music that makes it so powerful a medium of habituating people to the dynamics of Christian faith, in worship and beyond. In the process, we will discover how we can experience more deeply, and think through more clearly, four key themes: hope, freedom, lament, and resurrection. In particular, the consequences for how we plan and practice music in worship will be drawn out.


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Seminar Schedule

Monday, January 6
7:30 a.m. Breakfast
8:30 a.m. Chapel
9:15 a.m. Seminar Session 1
The Sound of Hope, Part 1
10:30 a.m. Break
10:45 a.m. Seminar Session 2
The Sound of Hope, Part 2
12:00 p.m. Lunch (provided)
1:00 p.m. Seminar Session 3
The Sound of Freedom, Part 1
2:15 p.m. Break
2:30 p.m. Seminar Session 4
The Sound of Freedom, Part 2
3:45 p.m. Free
5:30 p.m. Dinner
6:30 p.m. Practicum Presentations
Tuesday, January 7
7:30 a.m. Breakfast
8:30 a.m. Chapel
9:15 a.m. Seminar Session 5
The Sound of Lament, Part 1
10:30 am Break
10:45 am Seminar Session 6
The Sound of Lament, Part 2
12:00 pm. Lunch (provided)
1:00 p.m. Seminar Session 7
The Sound of Resurrection, Part 1
2:15 p.m. Break
2:30 p.m. Seminar Session 8
The Sound of Resurrection, Part 2
3:45 p.m. Free
5:30 p.m. Dinner
6:30 p.m. Healing/Communion Service

Session Descriptions

DAY ONE

Session 1—
The Sound of Hope, Part 1

Music has considerable power to advance (as well as hinder) a true perception of the hope of the Gospel. This seminar will delve into the dynamic structure of music as it is played out in time, throwing into relief the extraordinary consonances between rhythm and metre on the one hand and the shape of Christian hope on the other.

Session 2—
The Sound of Hope, Part 2

This session will consider the implications of what we have found in the first seminar for worship and the Church’s engagement with our current cultures.

Session 3—
The Sound of Freedom, Part 1

This session will examine in depth a fundamental feature of our aural perception of music: its ability to provide an experience of overlapping sounds in the same “space,” which has enormous significance for the way we conceive freedom in the modern world.

Session 4—
The Sound of Freedom, Part 2

This session will draw out the implications of what we have found in the previous seminar for worship and the Church’s engagement with our current cultures.

DAY TWO

Session 5—
The Sound of Lament, Part 1

From the Church’s earliest days, music has been employed to help the Church lament. This seminar asks why this should be so. What is it about the practice of musical lament that makes it so suited as a medium of Christian lament in particular?

Session 6—
The Sound of Lament, Part 2

This session will consider the implications of what we have found in the first seminar for worship and the Church’s engagement with our current cultures.

Session 7—
The Sound of Resurrection, Part 1

What is it about the way music operates that makes it especially well-suited to mediating the dynamic of resurrection—both Christ’s and ours? In particular, how does the rootedness of singing in the body engender a foretaste of the world to come?

Session 8—
The Sound of Resurrection, Part 2

This session will consider the implications of what we have found in the first seminar for worship and the Church’s engagement with our current cultures.


Make it a Spiritual Retreat

You are welcome to craft your own schedule to incorporate additional time on campus to take in chapel sessions, visit classes, read and research in the library, or spend time alone in quiet meditation. You may plan to come early and stay longer if you’d like. Contact the IWS office. Let us know how we can help.

Registration

Full Seminar Cost: $200 (Early registration by Nov 15: $175)
One Day Only Cost: $100
Lunch is included in the registration fee.

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About the author

Alumni Director, Practicum Professor, and DWS graduate.

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