Creating in Community

At our last music teacher conference in July, our whole music education team was able to be together in person! Most of us live far away from each other, even those who live within Nepal, so it was really refreshing to be together in Ganga and Eileen’s home. One of our goals for the conference was to create together, an idea prompted by the Holy Spirit during a pre-conference brainstorming session. That might sound obvious for a bunch of creatives, but we tend to spend a lot of time doing teacher training at our conferences, so it wasn’t obvious for us!

One of CHI’s biggest long-term projects is creating a music curriculum for use at our two partner schools. So one of the ways we created together at this conference was by recording two songs from the songbook! As you can see in the video below (a behind-the-scenes look at recording one of the songs), all of us were involved. Members of the team had composed a draft of the song at last year’s conference, with Saphal having done ethnomusicology research by talking to a member of the Chaudhary people group. This year as we recorded, some of us played string instruments, some played percussion, some played guitar, and all of us sang. Together, we made something that we couldn’t have made alone. Watching the video back, it’s so fun to see all of the different skills and personalities coming together! 

I (Jessi) have been thinking a lot about Jesus and his disciples. He called people from various backgrounds: tax collectors, fishermen, and more. They all had different personalities, strengths, and weaknesses. But together with Jesus, they changed the world. As you watch this video, we hope it is an encouragement to see how God brings people together to serve others and bring beauty into the world!

https://video.wixstatic.com/video/5e669d_6853e6817d2a4fba9780af0db7d0dec5/480p/mp4/file.mp4