Credo (in memory of Gordon Wright) I believe in the mystery of being, in the wholeness of life, and the spirit in all things. I believe in the tundra, in the forests, in the rivers, and the nameless mountains stretching to the sea. I believe in the music of the rising wind, the rushing water, and the

The Place Where You Go To Listen by John Luther Adams   “Songs are thoughts which are sung out with the breath when people let themselves be moved by a great force, and ordinary speech no longer suffices. When the words that we need shoot up of themselves, we have a new song.” — Orpingalik, a Netsilik elder They say

In Search of an Ecology of Music by John Luther Adams The science of ecology is a study of patterns. Ecology examines the intricate patterns that connect organisms and the environments in which they live. Beyond the particular patterns themselves, ecology considers the totality of patterns and the larger systems they create. An ecosystem is a network of patterns, a

Global Warming and Art (2003) by John Luther Adams   Some say the world will end by fire. Others say by ice. Here in Alaska, the land of snow and ice, we’re beginning to feel the fire.In the summer of 2000 the Iñupiat community of Barrow – the farthest north settlement on the mainland of North America – had its

Strange and Sacred Noise by John Luther Adams “Nothing essential happens in the absence of noise… in most cultures, the theme of noise lies at the origin of the religious idea… Music, then, constitutes communication with this primordial, threatening noise — prayer.” — Jacques Attali Sonic Geography My music has long been grounded in the physical, cultural and spiritual landscapes

Clouds of Forgetting, Clouds of Unknowing  by John Luther Adams “Love is most nearly itself When here and now cease to matter.” — T.S. Eliot Quantum physics has recently confirmed what shamans and mystics, poets and musicians have long known: the universe is more like music than like matter. It may well be that our most fundamental relationship to the