As they walked in, I had my retreatants (7th grade students) sit quietly as I played "Lo, How A Rose 'Ere Blooming" by Sufjan Stevens. It seems Mr. Stevens put out a Christmas album a few years ago with EVERY CHRISTMAS SONG EVER (and some of them were actually well-done) on it, and this was a good one. After that, as I explained what it is which were were doing, I played "He's Got The Whole World In His Hands" by Mahalia Jackson and explained how rock and roll came from gospel music. However, the point of the activity wasn't to listen to "church-y" music but to listen to see the universality of feeling, emotion, and sense that music in general brings. This universal joining force that lies in all of us is the greater power which can be called God.
So, I went on giving examples. We listened to:
"Life In Technicolor" (the instrumental version) by Coldplay to exemplify drive and repetion
"Concerto In F Minor for Violin, String Orchestra and Continuo, Op. 8, No. 4, RV 297, "L'inverno" (Winter): I. Allegro Non Molto" by Joshua Bell to exemplify minor keys
"Concerto In E Major for Violin, String Orchestra and Continuo, Op. 8, No. 1, RV 269, "La Primavera" (Spring): I. Allegro" by Joshua Bell to exemplify resolution and major keys amongst other things
"40" (Live) by U2 to exemplify religious lyrics used in "pop" music
"The Cave" by Mumford and Sons to exemplify soulful imagery and non-religious/religious imagery
During each of the songs I had students draw pictures or write phrases to illustrate the feelings or thought they had. The universality was apparent when the students had just slightly different versions of each other's illustrations. I call that a little bit of God.
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