Transcript
Speaker: Praise the Lord! Praise Him with the sound of the trumpet. Praise Him with the lupin harp. Praise Him with timbrel and dance.
Speaker: Praise Him with st string instruments and flutes. Praise Him with loud cymbals. Praise Him with clashing cymbals. Let everything that has breath praise the Lord.
Speaker: Praise the Lord!
Speaker: Well, welcome everybody to the first interview of the Lute and Harp Podcast. I'm honored to be joined today by Steve Dunn. Steve is not a new name to many of you.
Speaker: He is currently serving as Associate Professor of Music at the University of Mobile, where he also serves as Department Chair for the Department of Music and as Director of Instrumental Studies.
Speaker: He has a strong background as director of instrumental music in churches, and ah he is also a prolific arranger for works for concert band, orchestra, choir, other mixed ensembles.
Speaker: We had a great time talking about his background in the church and in church music. how he has had the opportunity to work with college-age students over the past 12, 13 years.
Speaker: We also talked about how he has seen the influence in the culture of instrumental music in the church change and morph over the past several decades. And then he ended up with some wise words for those of you who may be participating in the instrumental programs in your church.
Speaker: I think you're all going to find this interview to be ah blessing and encouragement. Here we go.
Speaker: All right, Steve, welcome to the Luton Harp. It's good to have you here today. Thank you. It's great to be here and it's great to reconnect with Victor. It's been a minute or so. It has been. And you are just, what, 45 minutes up the road right in Fairhope, is that right? Yeah, well, in Spanish Forge, yeah. Spanish Forge, yeah, right there. And I think the last time we saw each other, though, was in Tyler, Texas. I believe it was the first time we saw each other in person at the Metro Instrumental Directors Conference. So that's pretty sad that we live that close. We saw each other so far away.
Speaker: ah Such is life in what we do, stay pretty busy. But as we've talked a little bit, this new podcast that I'm doing is designed with the hope that we can be an encouragement to church instrumentalists, to people who are currently serving in their churches, or maybe who need that little nudge to take their instrument and and become a part of their service.
Speaker: And so i know you've had kind of a ah a rich life in both church music, instrumental music, inside and outside of the church. I was wondering if we can maybe just take it back in time a little bit at first and just tell me a little bit of about your early life. Did you grow up in church? And if you did, but what type of church was it?
Speaker: Yeah, um I absolutely, i was, my mom was church pianist, church organist. She talks about practicing organ or being playing in church service when she was pregnant with me. And there were certain notes that I would kick to apparently, you know.
Speaker: So my dad was saved in his 20s as an adult, young adult, because of a a Baptist preacher who who influenced him. My mom was a Baptist preacher kid who planted churches in eastern Kentucky, West Virginia. You know, she grew up in coal mining towns and things like that. So I grew up in Baptist, Southern Baptist specifically, churches the whole time.
Speaker: Yeah. That was my whole experience. ah Where was this a exactly? Most of your childhood. but What part of the country was that? Oh, my goodness. Primarily Rome, Georgia, which is up in the northwest corner of Georgia.
Speaker: My dad went into ministry, though, about the time I turned 12. So we were in Louisville, Kentucky when he was in seminary. We were in Mobile for a handful of years while he was associate pastor church here and then back in back in Georgia about the time I started college. And off from there, I was college North Alabama and then I was in Kentucky as well, then Albuquerque, New Mexico, then Houston, ah Birmingham, you know, so covered some territory, all all Baptist connections through all those things too.
Speaker: So in that maybe in that first church in the Rome area for those first 12 years of your life in that in that area, do you remember much about what music was like in that church? Oh, yeah. What instruments were used? how did How did the service kind of go? Yeah, I mean, it was very traditional, what you would expect, you know, 60 years ago, 50 plus years ago in in church in the South.
Speaker: Choir was a big deal. i i came up in the big big children's choir programs, got out before I really got to be in some of the youth choir stuff, but that that particular church had a big choir program.
Speaker: There was not much instrumental. was pretty much piano, organ. Once in a while, you know, you pull in some trumpet players for something or or whatever, but it was there was not a whole lot of instrumental stuff outside of, you know, just piano and organ.
Speaker: But strong choir program, strong music program, that was a big part of growing up. Yeah, sounds sounds very familiar to a lot of church contacts, too. When when i grew up So when did you first start your mom? You said your mom was a was church pianist and organist. And so in some ways, as you said, you kind of started in the womb. But far as your personal study of music, when when did that start in your life and what brought you to studying music?
Speaker: Yeah, I was surrounded by music. my My mom was a school music teacher. And so there were a couple of times actually through the years when we moved when she was my elementary school music teacher, taught piano in the home.
Speaker: And so there was music all the time. And I i got interested and messed around the piano, started taking piano. Myself fairly young. My mom farmed me out because there was no way she was going to try to teach her own son. don't think she felt she had the patience for that.
Speaker: Started band in sixth grade. I was saved at age seven myself and felt called to ministry that same year. And so it had a few it took some years to figure out that music really was...
Speaker: already an all consuming love of mine about the only only skills that I had probably. and i was already experimenting with writing music, even as a as an elementary kid, it wasn't any good. But I was, you know, was I was playing well with it. And so yeah, I got started right away. i was I was messing around all that stuff early on.
Speaker: Yeah. Yeah. And that's quite a broad ah introduction to right if you're going through piano lessons and also be working in your children's choir and then bands. it It makes sense where your path is taken a lot in your life. We're just approaching a lot of different angles of music.
Speaker: So do you ever, do you remember the first time or at least the first time period in your life where you got to be a part of the music service, where you used your music abilities in, in a worship service at church?
Speaker: Yeah, I mean, I remember being part of choir, even as i had these images, even as ah as a very young kid singing as part of choir and church. When my dad went off to seminary, he became the pastor of a very, very small church in southern Indiana. I mean, you know, there were 441 people in the town you know So there were you know maybe 75 in the service. So my mom was the music director, and I suddenly was very involved in occasionally helping to lead, singing, playing trombone in services, even even at that point. you know that was
Speaker: you know So this is like sixth, seventh grade. I'm getting involved in a little bit more leadership kinds of kinds of stuff. I was in an unusual kind of setting compared to most people as far as that goes.
Speaker: What role do you think that your involvement in church music had in motivating your musical studies? I mean, when I was a young pianist, I actually pretty much started studying music because I wanted to play in my church. And so I think once I got to the point where I was able to play for youth group and play for the chorus as we sang and did some of those things, I mean, that was that was the the driving factor for me was to be able to kind of use it in that role. Was that a similar thing for you? did you feel...
Speaker: that those motivations were connected? Not so much. Connected maybe in different kinds of ways. It was around that time period I was talking about the small church in Indiana when I was sixth, seventh grade, somewhere around that time frame, when I really began to, and my parents really shepherded me through this process. They didn't they enforce anything. They just kind of shepherded me through to help me to understand that my calling to ministry was perhaps not so much to be a pastor, but in music and that that was the direction. And I was, I think the opportunity to kind of be involved in a more integral way helped me understand that there were possibilities in that direction, but also that that that was really where my giftings were and and my passions and
Speaker: So I think that that really kind of helped along the path in that in that direction, my involvement in the church, you know. So early on the really early involvement and in church music, both in a participatory way and early and pretty early as a leader as as well.
Speaker: Going forth from there, I know we have quite a bit of time to cover, but let's just do an overview of since then, what has life in church music looked like for you? You know, you don't have to maybe hit every single church, but what are just some different ways that you have found yourself serving in the life and role of of a church?
Speaker: Well, it was, I'm gonna not pick up too far after, it was in high school. Finishing up middle school, high school, my dad became associate pastor of ah of a large church here in Mobile that had an instrumental program.
Speaker: And so, as I said, I'd already started experimenting with writing some music and I had opportunity starting even like eighth or ninth grade to start doing some arranging for the instrumental program at the church.
Speaker: And you know then the music pastors ah along felt like you know this is something they would encourage that opportunity, went off to off to school, college and then seminary and was serving, you know, as a part-time person While in college, I had the opportunity to to help start an instrumental program at a church where my dad was was serving in North Georgia, not too far from where i was on campus and the author's seminary.
Speaker: And then full-time was when I hit Albuquerque, New Mexico. I was at Hoffmantown Church there for 12 and a half years, and I was really starting. I kind of had a fledgling instrumental music program, and I was there to kind of start that, to write a lot.
Speaker: I had a middle school choir du that I directed, so I extended my puberty for almost 10 years, which was i it was a great experience, but it was that's like kind of a young man's game, I think. One of my first jobs was a middle school orchestra teacher. and so ed Okay.
Speaker: ah Only for two years, though. I didn't last very long. In my journeys now, as I'm out about a lot of schools and things, my heroes are are middle school like band directors and and Yeah. folks because those are the ones who are starting starting the kids off and if you've got a great high school program i immediately want to find out who the middle school who to middle school because they're probably the heroes of ah great high school program yeah But I was at this church in Albuquerque for a long time.
Speaker: met my wife. We had our first two kids there. Went to Champion Forest Baptist Church in Houston, which was very, very large church and still is, i think. And instrumental music had multiple instrument instrumental ensembles that I was dealing with there.
Speaker: That was a little more my focus, a little bit of choral stuff, a lot of writing still. And then went from there to Shades Mountain Baptist Church in Birmingham for 10 a half years. And again, it was very much overseeing all the instrumental stuff that was going on, a lot of writing, little more involvement in some choral kinds of things and vocal. just and know Throughout all those eras, all the all the pastoral kinds of things as well.
Speaker: that you do. So I was visiting hospitals and caring for people and burying people and burying people and, you know, all of those things as well, which is, which is kind of what I felt my calling was really was, was the minister side and music was kind of the avenue for me to do that, you know, if you will.
Speaker: So many of these positions were at churches and these were your full-time positions up maybe through that point. And so yeah then currently you're at the University of Mobile serving as the director of instrumental studies there and as department chair, is that correct? Yes.
Speaker: Yeah. yeah yeah So I would assume now you have made some transition into your full-time job being more in in higher ed than in the church at the moment.
Speaker: Was that your first position outside, full-time position outside of a church or had that happened yeah happened at other points in your career? Yeah, it was. And I'm i'm in year 13 now.
Speaker: And we just wow last week had final exams for the fall semester. So I guess I'm halfway through. And in and in fact, if i if I live another month um you know and stay there, I will um will have officially been at the University Mobile the longest I've been any one place.
Speaker: It won't have taken me that long to to do that. Yeah, so we were in kind of ah transition season at the church in Birmingham. Things were good, and but I kind of felt like the Lord was stirring the nest, that that I had perhaps was reaching the end of my time there, you know, and I could have stayed on for years. relationships were good.
Speaker: And I had ah at a call from Ken Hughes, longtime friend, 20 years at that point, 30 now, who was who had preceded me at the University of Mobile couple of years, and another longtime church, church instrumental music guy. And he said they were looking to hire a band director at the University of Mobile, which is a Christian university.
Speaker: And he said, you know, your name came up and I thought, you know, there's nobody I think I'd rather work with than Steve Dunn. And so, what do you think? And my my wife was working part-time couple days a week, had a childcare preschool kind of thing at the church. And she happened to be there that day.
Speaker: And sometimes when she would do that, when she got off about noon, she'd drive around and pick me up and we'd run to Starbucks and have like a 20 minute date, you know, in the in the day and just kind of catch up on things. And so I called her and said, we need to chat.
Speaker: You know, we need to have one of these dates. And as we were talking about Kim was going to send me the job description, and she said, okay, do you really want to be a band director?
Speaker: And I said, in most circumstances, I would have to say no And I had just, in the stirring of the nest, I had just gone through this whole process with the Lord of just re- ah affirming that I had felt a call to ministry.
Speaker: And I said, but I feel like in this particular situation, it would still be very much music ministry. And so that's kind of that. And she said, okay, that's all I need to know. And we followed through the process. And the situation is different, obviously, because I'm teaching classes and I'm building syllabi and I'm having to keep up with grades and making sure we have teachers for all the various instruments and academic calendars and things, but because of the particular unique environment where we are, in many ways, I feel like ministry-wise, I've kind of moved from addition to multiplication in way, because now I am, you know, I'm working with those folks who are going to be the next group of ministers and teachers and business people out there, you know, so...
Speaker: it's been It's been a great thing. And I also am still, i am involved at First Baptist Fairhope, Alabama, and part-time there doing instrumental music.
Speaker: So I still have my hand in getting to be involved in a local church and and doing that every week and being those rehearsals and Sunday mornings and that kind of thing. So, yeah. it's It's kind of a have your cake and eat it too situation be yeah in a lot of ways. I kind of maybe went in the opposite direction that you did before coming here to Olive, where I served full time as a director of instrumental music.
Speaker: Before that, I was at a Christian university in Kentucky for several years teaching. And so, and I kind of maybe thought my life would go more in higher ed for a longer period of time. And and then God kind of moved the focus about five, six years ago towards the church and um out of that. But I can certainly under working in both fields.
Speaker: There is ministry work to be to be done for sure and built the the impact And while I was there, I got to also serve part time in a church. And, you know, it's just it's amazing to kind of see how God can feed multiple parts of your soul and and is capable of, you know, doing that if that's if that is what he would have you to do.
Speaker: So can you tell me just a little bit about University Mobile and what you had mentioned, its a as you said, it's Christian university and just a little bit about your school of music and um what kind of things are offered, what you do? Yeah, I you know i could talk ah i could talk ah a good while probably about University of Mobile. I really do.
Speaker: I very much love the University Mobile. It's a special place. We you know have the things that you would need to expect from ah an academiccam academic institution. I mean, it's well regarded. it it gets good ratings reviews year after year academically. I walk into any meeting with any faculty from any department and i'll look around and think, I i am the least worthy person in this room. you know There are just brilliant people around me. from one end of the campus to the other.
Speaker: And it's just great to see how much they also love the Lord. if We have couple of our sports teams, and we're small, and we have about 1,500 to 1,700 students.
Speaker: Sports teams have have been in national tournaments here in recent months, and then to be around them and hear them talking about doing Bible studies with their their athletes and praying with them and working with them through difficulties and standing in line for a faculty lunch with someone who's overall of the physics part of of what's going on teaching and to hear him talk about the Lord and and know how he cares for his students and things. So it's that kind of that kind of atmosphere all the way across. And you don't have to be a Christian to come to school there. and Many students are not when they when they come.
Speaker: But it's going to be, it's everywhere. And you have a really committed faculty. you have a Our president is very committed to God's words, brilliant guy, and foundationally that kind of thing. So there's there's that comfort in knowing that we're a good place there. And I have students who come into my office with needs and we pray together or, you know, we're we're talking about faith in the classroom.
Speaker: So I love that environment and the relationship between faculty and and students. The Alabama School of the Arts, it's like a really unique place. If you walk in at any given time you know during a week and and listen to rehearsals, you know you can walk into a room and you're listening to opera students ah preparing for the the next production.
Speaker: Then you can walk down the hall and you can listen to our gospel quartet rehearse. and go around the corner, and you can hear our Sympathetic Winds concert band stuff that I'm directing, and then maybe around Listen to Chorale, which is singing really at a high level, you know, some great literature, and then go around another corner, and you can hear our newest ensemble, Dunamis, which is focused on the Black gospel music tradition, and then you've got a group I direct, Well Survival, which is an all-girls Celtic band And so the kinds of music that that you hear is such a unique combination of things.
Speaker: You will get all the the serious classical stuff. Our piano department is is just wonderful. and i have an international Steinway artist who who runs that program. Ken Hughes is doing great work with jazz and with Ramcore, a brass percussion ensemble that tours and things.
Speaker: Lots of degrees. We're a small school, and yet we're the only school in the country with ah an online, fully online doctorate in vocal performance, for instance, as well as, you know, in-person graduate degrees and things like that.
Speaker: We get to do things that we really probably shouldn't be able to do. considering our size and those kind of things. but and sometimes the size is a challenge. we We're constantly in a recruiting side for instrumentalists, having to keep us on the radar. and I spend a lot time at schools and band camps and going to football games and hanging out with bands and festivals and conferences and things like that. you know But it it's just a great place.
Speaker: really, really is. I actually haven't been over to the campus at University of Mobile. I did my grad work at the University of South Alabama, and but I know so many of your faculty at University of Mobile, and I can just speak to the the quality of what they do. I think that when you say doing things that you shouldn't be able to do for your size, I mean, I think it it really says something about the faculty of of who's there. They're so active and just very stellar in what they do. We see them over here judging for events and doing teaching and outreach. And we've we've I've seen them in just so many different capacities. And I've always been quite impressed by all all of the faculty that you have there.
Speaker: So your your students um young people i think this is an interesting conversation earlier this year i went to germany with next level worship and got to do some teaching on church orchestras uh to a music conference over there and it was interesting was talking with the orchestra directors over in northwest area of germany they said that when they look at american church orchestras they find it amazing that there are so many older people who are involved in the orchestra And this is a struggle for them.
Speaker: And most of their church orchestras are made up of young people, very young people, teenagers to to young adults. and And they have a lot of them. Of course, coming maybe from my perspective, I looked at that and was like, and the problem is? mark um It seems like a great problem.
Speaker: um But I think what they ended up saying was problem is ultimately is they kind of lose um one, having some of the maturity and leadership of older Christians within the group. they they They sense a lack of that. But also as their young people get older, they get married and start their jobs and whatnot.
Speaker: They stop being a part of some of these other things. That's one of the things that they they just drop out of their life. So they they struggle with retention and keeping people involved in this for ah longer period.
Speaker: So it's just interesting to see in different contexts. But young people, I think for American context, it's a challenge. It's a challenge for us. We don't see as many of them involved.
Speaker: Do you sense at the University of Mobile that that they feel a connection between their musicianship and their faith? Or is do you sense more often than not, maybe that's something that you have to teach and encourage because it's more segmented and for many of them?
Speaker: Yeah. Yeah. We have a mix of that. We have, I'm chair of the music department, but one of the other departments in the Alabama School of the Arts is our School of Worship Leadership. So we have students who are coming into that who have an eye toward serving in ministry in some capacity, whether it's going to be in church leadership or maybe children's music, there's a track for that, or music business is and is an aspect of those kind of things. So they they come into the program with a ministry music
Speaker: mindset. And a lot of our students that come in, even if they're not specifically heading into the worship leadership program, have kind of that that mindset. We probably, know, we talk about there not being students who not Christians. We probably have a little higher percentage of students who are, who come into the into the music area, just because that's a little bit little bit more of an orientation for them.
Speaker: There are certainly students for whom they, you know, maybe they played in band in high school and they're, you know they're going to be a, you know, an IT major or, you know, English or something, but they want to keep on playing.
Speaker: For them, maybe there's not necessarily a strong connection, although some of them are still connected with with church, but there may be a little segmentation in some of those. So it's, we have a little scattering of that, I think.
Speaker: So you spent most of your career working in church music and with instrumental groups and all these churches, but now you spent 13 years, 13 and a half years within higher ed context, working with young people primarily.
Speaker: And so I would say that in that 13 and a half years, probably a lot of your perspective maybe has, has shifted or you've learned quite a bit about young people and how they functioned or seeing even how trends have gone over the past 13 years. Yeah.
Speaker: do you Do you have anything to say to church music leadership in regards to leading young people and maybe shepherding well ones who are already in involved? Or what is the way that we get and see more young people involved in our music ministry and and using their instrumental gifts within that context?
Speaker: Well, I mean, you'll... Most of these students are coming from church contexts now where the model is going to be a a worship band, worship team in front of them that's That's where most of them...
Speaker: That's their experience. There are some of them who come from churches that that also use a choir, and then additionally some who have seen an instrumental thing. I always have a ah couple of students who who participate in instrumental music at their church before coming to UN, but it's usually only a couple or a few. Yeah.
Speaker: Now, ironically, we've had several students who've come through our program who maybe didn't come from that background who are now at churches where they are leading instrumental music programs.
Speaker: You know, we've got a couple of Metro members now who come from that background. They didn't start there. And in fact, i I remember a conversation with one of those those guys a couple of years ago. where he said, you know, I said, I didn't grow up in church where choir was a thing. And i was like, why in the world you want to do that? he said, now that I've been working in a place with choir, I don't ever want to be anywhere that doesn't have choir anymore. He said, I don't know what I was thinking, but that that wasn't his experience.
Speaker: So there's nothing that is going to develop musicians and future leaders in the church like having some sort of music thing going on and starting with your kids.
Speaker: I don't know if, you know, like children's choir stuff is making any kind of comeback. And sometimes I feel like, you know, it's kind of gone away and start to come back and, you know, it's kind of mixed. But having kids in that kind of setting where they're singing together, where they're worshiping, where they're seeing a connection between church and that opportunity,
Speaker: You're going to develop that interest. You're going to develop that involvement and that engagement. And some of those, as they get older, could find a way into instrumental music or choral things. Or even even if you're just looking at trying to develop a worship band thing, still that is going to strengthen what what comes down the pipeline for you.
Speaker: Obviously, as somebody who thinks that instrumental music has a strong biblical background and and has ah has a real place in ministry, you know, allowing students the opportunity to use those, getting connected with, you local band directors, high school band directors or something, even just to, you know, if you don't have something to say, for this one Sunday, I want to put together a brass group or, you know,
Speaker: Can some of your folks come play for this or involve those things? Opens up possibilities. And, you know, just keep opening up opportunities and possibilities. whatever Whatever orientation you have as far as what music looks like, don't get stuck there.
Speaker: and keep Keep allowing yourself to grow and and just see what else might be out there and how you can engage more people. I love how you kind of got to what I think is a ah large heart of the matter very quickly, ah talking about kids and getting kids involved in some sort of of music capacity.
Speaker: We had a discussion at our Metro instrumental directors conference, and we were talking about some of the music programs that were in our churches. And actually a fair number of people shared that kids music had either greatly diminished or kind of had gone away post COVID. It was, it was one of those things that really like anything else, those trends were already happening and we were already seeing some of those things, but then COVID accelerated some things. Yeah.
Speaker: yeah It seems to me that we we dedicate a third of our service time, more or less, to music. And i think you'd be hard-pressed to find anybody who's involved in church leadership who would say that music has an insignificant role in what we do as as believers. But we then have seen just a drastic drop-off in training.
Speaker: And then we get to the point where we want young people, say college students or high schoolers or whatever, to be involved and to do things that require skill and and ability and some other things. And we're kind of shocked when they're not there. you know And I believe it is it is a key element is if if nothing else, if there's something that you want to see more college students and young people being involved in, look and say, are our kids doing it now?
Speaker: And if our kids aren't doing it now, we likely can't expect a lot you know from as they get older. Well, and and we would, that would make absolutely, absolute perfect sense if we were putting it in a context of anything else. For instance, if, you know, you have ah colleges that want to build a great sports team of some sort, or recruiting from high schools that have great sports teams, and those...
Speaker: Those schools that have great sports teams are working to have build a community where they're starting baseball or football or basketball whatever very, very early so that they can develop that culture and develop those skills.
Speaker: you know any Any community that's trying to to build a big program in their high school or whatever is going to start by doing the young kids. you know but they They understand it's not just going to appear out of nowhere.
Speaker: That applies to any kind of skill, and music certainly is is a skill that requires development over time.
Speaker: Man, y'all, isn't that so good? Steve is just so wise, and he has so much more to share as well. I decided to break this interview up into two different episodes, so be sure to check out episode two to hear the rest of our interview.
