Authors: Tammy-Jo Mortensen

This issue is all about numbers. Musicians use numbers all the time, such as for time signatures, bar numbers, page numbers, intervals, top-40 charts, to name a few. And I’m sure if you’ve worked in any denomination long enough, you memorized many of the hymn numbers. There are even songs...

This Lent-Easter 2023 issue (Year A) explores extemporaneous prayer. According to the Oxford Canadian Dictionary, extemporaneous means “spoken or done without preparation.” Sometimes, as artists, we extemporize, too, don’t we? In music and some other art forms, this is called improvisation. Improvising means composing or performing on the spur of...

In past issues of Gathering, we have been featuring hymns from various cultures from Voices United. This began with Loraine McKenzie Shepherd’s lists of the cultures she catalogued, and then we continued compiling some more lists. In the Advent/Christmas/Epiphany 2022-2023 issue, we were planning to feature hymns with a German...

The focus of this Advent/Christmas/Epiphany issue is cultural appropriation. In the Music for Worship section of Gathering Pentecost 1 2021, we focused on Indigenous composers and music resources. I gained much wisdom from Cree and Dene songwriter Sherryl Sewepagaham a few years ago. She shared some customs from her Cree...