Heart's Ease

Our age owes Sir John Tavener deep gratitude. His works cross both cultural and disciplinary boundaries. He illustrated how to deal with intense suffering and felt deeply for the suffering of the world. He stands as an icon representing a view of artistic expression as a way of generating hope and transcendence.

In Tavener's thinking, spirituality was closely tied to wellbeing and healing and this book considers the spiritual encounters that brought him 'heart's ease' and the communication of that experience to performers and listeners through his composition. The contributors to this book include scholars, musicians, theologians, medical practitioners, informed listeners and practitioners in religious traditions. It includes case study material, empirical studies, philosophical, theological and theoretical contributions along with accounts from lived experience of the spirituality generated by Tavener's music. This is set in the context of a world that sees spirituality sometimes coupled and sometimes uncoupled from religion.

The pattern of the book is an alternation between interludes and chapters illuminating different facets of the crystal of Tavener's creative work and the spirituality and 'heart's ease' it can offer.

Auteur

The Rev. Professor June Boyce-Tillman MBE, PhD, MA, LRAM, FRSA read music at Oxford University and is Professor Emerita of Applied Music at the University of Winchester and Extra-ordinary Professor at North West University, South Africa. She has published widely on music education and spirituality and is editing the series on Music and Spirituality for Peter Lang.

Associate Professor Anne-Marie Forbes PhD, MMus, MA, BMus, FRSPH leads the interdisciplinary programmes in Creative Arts and Health at the University of Tasmania. She has published widely in historical musicology, focussing on twentieth-century British and Australian music, sacred music and performativity.

Contenu

June Boyce-Tillman: Introduction - June Boyce-Tillman: 'To Be a Pilgrim' - the Spiritual Journey of John Tavener through his Music - Stephen B. Roberts: John Tavener's Musical Theology of Religions - Andrzej Kesiak: In Search of Truth: John Tavener's Transition from Western Culture to Eastern Tradition - June Boyce-Tillman: The Mystery of Faith - an Interview with John Tavener - Anne-Marie Forbes: Tavener and Taverner: Choral Perspectives on the Holy Trinity - Brian Inglis: 'Dumped Modernism'? The Interplay of Musical Construction and Spiritual Affect in John Tavener and his To a Child Dancing in the Wind - Neil Valentine: An Instrumentalist Embraces the Choral Tradition - Bart Seaton-Said: Critical Encounters with John Tavener's Requiem: 'Our glory lies where we cease to exist' - Matthew Barley: John Tavener's The Protecting Veil - a Performer's Reflections - Anne-Marie Forbes: Spiritual Echoes of Love: John Tavener's Three Hymns of George Herbert - Sir John Tavener: Mozart - a Celebration of an Unconscious Mystic - Alexander Lingas: John Tavener and the Search for an English Orthodox Musical Language - June Boyce-Tillman: Encomium for Sir John Tavener - Eduard Heyning: John Tavener and Sacred Silence - Jill Bunce: John Tavener and the Holy Spirit - Anna E. Röcker: Spirituality in Music as a Source of Wellbeing: Group Experiences and Client Statements on the Basis of the Music Therapy Method 'Guided Imagery and Music' with Music by John Tavener - James Atwell: Brief Reflections on Winchester Cathedral and the Music of Sir John Tavener.