Michael Dodds - Playing Music
Michael Dodds - Playing Music
The Eddy Network Podcast Episode 159
One of the directions that I want The Eddy Network Podcast to go is towards conversations with people who are artists and creatives. When I made that decision, Michael Dodds was one of the first people I thought about.
I first knew Michael as the music director at the church where I grew up. We first met when we worked on my father’s memorial service in 2010. Since then, I have done three more memorial services with him. He approached each of those services with openness and the desire to honor the deceased.
When I decided to return to live in my hometown, I looked forward to the music at my church. Since he is also on the faculty at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts, I have seen how the church’s music has a level of sophistication unlike most of the churches where I have had involvement. It isn’t traditional as in old fashion. It is more about relating many historical worship styles to contemporary settings. The music transcends a pop sensibility to provide a deeper, more resonant connection to the human longing for connection to the transcendent.
As a result of the character and creativity of the music program at my church, I have joined the choir that Michael directs.
In this post, I include a video of three pieces of music that we discuss in the podcast.
A Piece for piano and voice of the Malcolm Guite poem, O Sapientia: A Sonnet
A short portion of John Contrane’s Giant Steps.
And I have a link below to the trailer for Blessed Unrest, the documentary on Michael’s life.
I hope you enjoy meeting Michael. Even more, I hope that you are inspired to broaden your experience of music to reach deep within to discover the beauty and harmony that is available to us.
Michael Dodds
University of North Carolina School of the Arts
Choral Symphony on Psalm 145 (I Will Exalt You, My God The King)
Blessed Unrest Documentary
Courtesy of River Run Film Festival
Blessed Unrest is a one-hour award-winning inspirational documentary by Bonnemaison about Michael Dodds’ story as a composer, including his childhood and youth in the Amazonian rain forest of Peru and studies in musicology at the Eastman School.
Purchase for $5 at: https://vimeo.com/ondemand/blessedunrest/792696588.
The film features Tony-winning actor Rosemary Harris and is framed by the metaphor of the labyrinth that also culminates Micheael’s book—incredibly beautifully filmed.
Author - From Modes to Keys in Early Modern Music Theory
The first chapter is available for free : https://academic-marketing.oup.com/c/1Xv5j8fN61uqY2V32boyG99jAm.
Discount code for 30% off is AAFLYG6 at https://global.oup.com/academic/product/from-modes-to-keys-in-early-modern-music-theory-9780199338153?cc=us&lang=en&#.
O Sapientia: A Sonnet
Charli Mills, soprano, with Owen Dodds, piano
O Sapientia: A Sonnet by Malcom Guite
I cannot think unless I have been thought,
Nor can I speak unless I have been spoken. I cannot teach except as I am taught,
Or break the bread except as I am broken.
O Mind behind the mind through which I seek,
O Light within the light by which I see, O Word beneath the words with which I speak,
O founding, unfound Wisdom, finding me,
O sounding Song whose depth is sounding me,
O Memory of time, reminding me,
My Ground of Being, always grounding me,
My Maker’s Bounding Line, defining me,
Come, hidden Wisdom, come with all you bring,
Come to me now, disguised as everything.
In this sonnet, Malcolm Guite responds to the first of the seven (or eight) great "O" antiphons leading up to Christmas Eve:
O Sapientia O Sapientia, quae ex ore Altissimi prodiisti,
attingens a fine usque ad finem,
fortiter suaviterque disponens omnia:
veni ad docendum nos viam prudentiae.
O Wisdom, coming forth from the mouth of the Most High,
reaching from one end to the other mightily,
and sweetly ordering all things:
Come and teach us the way of prudence.
For more about this poem and its poet, see https://malcolmguite.wordpress.com/ta...