Kindred Welcomes Our First Artist-in-Residence, Daniel Sperry

daniel sperryJune 16, 2013 — Kindred is honored to welcome Daniel Sperry as our first artist-in-residence. Sperry is an innovative, genre-stretching cellist, composer, and evocateur from Ashland, Oregon, who specializes in creating Musical Portraits for individuals as markers for special occasions and as gifts for loved ones. He performs all over the country in house concerts featuring these portraits, the poetry of Rumi, Hafiz and others along with his original music, opera arias, and standards.

Over the coming months, Sperry will be engaging with Kindred’s readers about their experiences, insights and passion for conscious living in an industrial culture that is becoming aware of its unsustainable worldview and opening to the possibilities of whole systems thinking, holistic wellness and integrative worldviews.

“Our readers are Cultural Creatives,” said Lisa Reagan, Kindred’s editor. “Who better to help Cutural Creative families shift further into living from their truth and bringing their higher vision of the world into our current culture than a working, committed and experienced artist? Daniel’s inspirational compositions speak a language of deep trust and heart wisdom that helps us to find our grounding within while moving this vision forward and outside of ourselves.

“As Daniel says in our audio interview, every artist has a ‘prompt’ to propel them forward into their creative process and for Cultural Creative parents who are seeking through authenticity to transform the world around us, our ‘prompt’ for entering into this creative process is our children. Using Daniel’s music and words, we can move our vision deeper into our bones and structures of our minds in a way that only vibration can.”

“When Lisa suggested the idea of my being the first artist-in-residence at Kindred, I noticed some threads coming together that had been wafting through the different spaces of my life for awhile,” says Sperry. “One was the idea that I had wanted my work with music and poetry to be connected to a purpose, to life, to the ordinary lives of the planet. As a cellist and composer, and spoken word artist, a lot of what I do can easily remain somewhere up around some cloud, to the left of the moon as it rises.

“So here was an opportunity to connect my creation to the quest we are on when we choose to raise a family, in the most conscious and creative way we can. And that excites me.”

Sperry’s first presentation to Kindred readers is a musical interpretation and reading of the poem, “Shoulders”, by the award-winning poet Naomi Shihab Nye.

“I’ve chosen Naomi’s poem, ‘Shoulders’, as the first contribution I will make of this artist-in-residency because it speaks directly to the connection between what we do as parents and the prospect of living in a world where we take care of each other in that same careful, and tender way,” said Sperry. “I’m not big on interpretation of poems; I will let her words speak for themselves.”

Sperry’s performance of “Shoulders” is a collaboration with his daughter, Ali Sperry, a singer-songwriter in Nashville, Tennessee.

“I’ve been wanting to include a few ‘sung’ lines in the pieces I create, and this was a great opportunity to do that. She makes me proud, of course, but all the more because her voice and her work are completely authentic to her. Yes, she had some kind of a model in her father, and her mother, but she has discovered her own special gift, in her own way, and it is even more exciting for me to wrap her performance on this piece into my first offering to the Kindred Community,” said Sperry.

Kindred readers are welcomed and encouraged to leave their responses to Sperry’s work on his pages or send your insights directly to us at info@kindredcommunity.org. We would especially be interested in your personal insights as a Cultural Creative as Sperry will be working towards presenting a virtual holiday concert in December to present his musical portrait of Kindred readers as Cultural Creatives!

DOWNLOAD AND LISTEN to Daniel Sperry’s first contribution to Kindred readers here.

DOWNLOAD AND LISTEN to Daniel Sperry and Lisa Reagan discover the connections between living life as an artist and conscious parenting as a Cultural Creative family.

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