It’s MLK weekend.
It’s been two weeks now of preparation with our Unity Choir and along the way, I’ve been lucky to receive a few gifts that I wanted to share with all of you.
The music we make in the Unity Choir is special alchemy of improvisation, laughter, worship, blues, soul, folk and spontaneous, combustible joy. What we sounded like Monday at rehearsal morphs into something else by Tuesday which will take on a new color on Friday and yet another on Sunday (weather permitting of course!)
But the secret to really going deep is to resist the temptation to question it, to challenge it or to mess with it too much. We are not after perfection, we are after the moment and staying in the moment for as long as possible. We are also seeking full participation. Once you enter Beth Am (Friday, 7;30 pm) or Zion Baptist (Sunday, 10:30 AM) you are part of the Choir. You are invited to participate, to sing, improvise, let go and be. As Sly Stone sings, “You Can Make It If You Try.” So Try.
So here are the gifts I received. I hope they might inspire you, move you, and make you think.
- Thanks to Mark Nobel for sharing this story on Carlos Santana. Whether you like Santana’s music or not, he is an undisputable force of the guitar and he chanels something fierce in his music. To appreciate how he channels the divine spirit, read this article and especially the fourth paragraph. The Amidah will never sound the same to me.
- Thanks to Sam Zolten for sharing this beautiful article entitled, “God is Everywhere Present in All Things.” A meditation on the art of hearing God in music secular and ‘religious’ and embracing the sacred space in between
My conclusion: We must stay engaged with one another and stay connected.
It will not always be comfortable and Kum-bah-yah. I’m grateful every day that our Unity Choir and our Unity Weekend brings us together each year (and many times besides), and I pray that our fellowships and friendships continue to transcend politics and take us to a higher place.
-Harold
