Performed by members of VOICES 21C (featuring Sam Fishman on drums)

The creative response for the Choral Commons Podcast entitled “Liberation Theology, Poverty, and the Choir” is a compilation of questions, ideas, call and response, and declarations, all through the medium of a musical soundscape journey that aims to, in short, “build a movement.” The piece begins with a trio of singers, each overlapping one another with their improvisations on the text “Jesus was a poor man,” which was a statement that was mentioned quite a bit in this podcast episode, and seemed to exemplify what The Poor People’s Campaign stands for.

The piece takes the listener through a sea of drones and improvisatory statements that originate from the dialogue between Yara Allen and Charon Hribar: “the sacred in the secular”; “how do we build community?”; “music was a part of who I was”; “a choir of impacted voices”; and, “will you lead a song?” among others. At the same time, in the depths of the drones and improvisatory layers, the thread of “building a movement” is pretty consistent throughout the piece--this was not necessarily intentional, but I think it speaks a lot to the driving force behind Yara’s and Charon’s backgrounds and ongoing work in the field of theomusicology.

The closing section starts off with a question and an answer: Question - How do we build community? Answer - Music can build our connectedness...music can build...*build a movement*. From there, the drums are reintroduced in a more vibrant way, giving us the energy to join together in harmony and in strength to sing a few lines of Mi Única, a song that is actually from the The Poor People’s Campaign Songbook and was performed by VOICES 21C in March 2020 at the ACDA conference in Rochester, NY.

Project Participants:
Lauren Extrom - Michael Genese - Chris Clark - Michael Leonard - Krystal Morin - Jesse Colford
- Judy Zuckerman - Olivia de Geofroy - Sam Fishman

creative youth development

resources on justice-centered praxis