Csehy News & Notes (Volume 9, Issue 2 - Fall 2016)

would have been able to live out my faith
through music the same way.
Another wonderful aspect of Csehy is the
versatility of the program. It meets each person
in his or her walk with God and musical
journey, without sacrificing any bit of striving
towards excellence. Whether you are a master
of your instrument or just began today,
your teachers will encourage you and push
you so that you will be better by the end of
each week. Likewise, whether you grew up
in a Christian household or you just became
a believer today, Csehy will strengthen the
foundations of your faith while building you
up to serve Christ and his calling.
Finally, Csehy at its heart is a place full of
laughter and frisbee and games and excitement
and even the occasional prank. Some
of my favorite memories are from choir jokes,
frisbee tournaments, and the Csehy tradition
of serenading. In my second year at Csehy, I
woke up one morning and opened the shade
as usual. But a 60ft tree had suddenly grown
where the parking lot used to be! I ran out
into the hallway in confusion only to be further
confounded by the hallway being on my
right instead of where it should have been
on my left! A good friend of mine walked
over chuckling and said, “How is your new
room?” he joked, “We moved all your stuff
and you into it last night. You know, you are
a deep sleeper!”
Benjamin Shute - Faculty since 2007
When one hears a piece of music for the first time,
very likely the topmost question in his or her mind
is, “Do I like it?” But for a composer of Bach’s tradition,
at least as important as the subjective element
(“do I like it?”) is the idea that music has a degree
of objective meaning, representing something
about God and his creation and therefore having
the capacity to elucidate the gospel.
That probably has a lot to do with why Bach composed as he did, crafting
many of his works to have a degree of theological symbolism. In fact, several
years ago, I began to suspect that Bach’s collection of six sonatas and partitas
for solo violin has an overarching theological narrative. I was skeptical at first,
because people have been saying things like that for a while without convincing
evidence. But further analysis revealed correlations between the music
and the gospel narrative that overrode my skepticism and convinced me I
needed to make this analysis public. Two years later, I finally got to hold the
fruits of these labors in my hands in the form of a book published by Pickwick
Publications, “Sei Solo: Symbolum? - The Theology of J. S. Bach’s Solo Violin
Works.”
What I hope readers will gain from this book is an appreciation of the extent
to which Bach bent his extraordinary genius on communicating the riches of
the gospel. And by exploring Bach the theologian, as well as the extraordinarily
rich theological writings that shaped him, it is my hope that this little
book might help us transcend the confines of space and time to connect with
the church of ages past, with whom we share the great and timeless hope of
union with Christ, beginning now and coming to glorious fulfillment when he
returns to make all things new.
http://wipfandstock.com/sei-solo-symbolum.html