Rev. Dr. C. Michael Hawn is University Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Church Music at Southern Methodist University (SMU) and director of the Sacred Music program at Perkins School of Theology. He is a graduate of Wheaton College and Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. His writings include more than 500 scholarly articles, columns, and books. He is a fellow of the Hymn Society in the United States and Canada. Prior to SMU, he taught at two Baptist seminaries and served four congregations as Minister of Music. He has traveled to 40 countries on six continents studying world Christian music and liturgy and serving as visiting professor in African and Asian seminaries. An ordained Baptist minister, he is a leader in ecumenical assemblies.
Last Updated: September 10, 2025
The following conversation was recorded at Symposium 2003, the conference on worship and the arts held at Calvin College each January. Participating in the conversation were several giants in the field of global song for Christian worship who have much to offer Western Christians from their years of ministry throughout the world:
The gospel came to us as a potted plant. We have to break the pot and set the plant in our own soil. — D. T. Niles
This is the second of Hawn’s three-part series on global music. MUSIC IN COMMUNITY: CONVERSATIONS WITH A WEST AFRICAN "TALKING DRUM" INSTRUCTOR [The] community dimension is perhaps the essential aspect of African music. . . . [Africans] do not want to distinguish the audience from the musicians at a musical event. (1) —John Miller Chernoff
The setting is a Protestant church in Havana, Cuba. The sanctuary is packed on this hot, humid June Sunday afternoon. Following the reading of la palabra de Dios (the Word of God), the pastor delivers the sermon. He speaks of esperanza (hope) and la paz de Cristo (the peace of Christ) during this “special time”—a euphemism used by Fidel Castro to refer to Cuba’s crumbling economy and the resulting suffering of the people.
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