Jazz is about finding and sharing who you are. Betty Carter, Jazz Singer 1929-1998

I grew to see my affliction as my gift. When I sang, I soared. I saw my suffering as my salvation: I understood

God had put me in this strange little package for a reason. All I needed was the courage to be me. That courage took

a lifetime to develop. Jimmy Scott, Jazz Singer

‘He will wipe away every tear from their eyes’ Rev 21v4

‘When you’re working the spirit understands that you are serious and preparing to receive that information.Stay in the state of preparedness. You got to stay in the state of preparedness all the time.’ Wynton Marsalis, trumpeter

When we can play with the unconscious

concentration of a child, this

is art: prayer:

love.Madeleine

L’Engle,1996

‘Every human being is given the gift to create &that creativity manifests itself in trillions of ways.

Creativity is unruly. Like a dream - you can't control what comes to you. You only control what portion you choose to tell.’ Wynton Marsalis, trumpeter

Place your cares with God, because God cares for youI Peter 5:7

We improvise every time we say a sentence, but we are told that being creative is some mysterious thing possessed by a few; when in fact we are improvising all the time, creating all the time.(StephenNachmanovitch)

There are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who activates all of them in everyone. 1 Corinthians

12V6

"King spoke much the way a jazz musician plays, improvising from sketched chords that derive from hours of practice and performance. He could bend ideas and slide memorized passages through his trumpet of a voice with remarkable sensitivity to his audience” Michael Eric Dyson

If you believe in the beat, you don't need to worry about it. It's there. Always been there and always will. You don't have to follow it. Fact is, the beat sets you free. It's your security, your heartbeat, an expression of God, a gift. Time is a gift. Time is our life. I believe in God. Jimmy Scott, Jazz Singer

If we're in the moment, if we're truly rooted in what we're doing when we're doing it, we can work through all the bad stuff. In that sense, we can all be singers singing away our sadness.

Jimmy Scott, Jazz Singer

How do you talk to God?

My goal is to live the truly religious life and express it in my music. John Coltrane

My music is the spiritual expression of what I am - my faith, my knowledge, my being... I'd like to point out to people the divine music in a musical language that transcends words. I want to speak to their souls.John Coltrane

Elation. Elegance. Exaltation. All from God. Thank you God. Amen – John Coltrane ‘A love Supreme’

It is not the ear that hears,

that performs

the act of inner receptivity.

It is the total person who hears.M.C. Richards, 1962

This is not piano.

This is dreaming. Duke Ellington

Who is God to you?

You don't have to earn your creativity - you're born with it. All you have to do is tend to it & unleash it. Wynton Marsalis, trumpeter

Preaching is not sayingfirst. Preaching is, as it is for jazz, a matter of listening first.Kirk Byron Jones, 2004

‘Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit’I Corinthians 12v4

How do you pray?

How do you worship God?

Love the questions themselves.Rainer Marie Rilke

Dare to imagine a playful God.

How does the Spirit move you?

How do you pray when you don't have the words?

“What we have to express is already within us, is us, so the work of creativity is not a matter of making the material come, but of unblocking the obstacles to its natural flow” (Stephen Nachmanovitch/ Improv Violinist)