Guestsplaining: Fr. Isaiah & J.J. Wright on How Music Connects Us | Fr. Gregory Pine
January 21, 2025
Fr. Gregory: This is Father Gregory Pine and welcome to Godsplaining. Thanks to all those who support us. If you enjoyed the show, please consider making a monthly donation on Patreon. Be sure to like and subscribe to Godsplaining wherever you listen to your podcasts. For this episode of Guestsplaining, I’m delighted to be joined by JJ Wright and Father Isaiah. Thanks so much for joining.
J.J.: Glad to be here.
Fr. Isaiah: Thanks, Fr. Gregory.
Fr. Gregory: All right. Party on here we go. So many people will know you from the musical stylings that they have encountered on the internet or elsewhere. But for those who don’t, would you say a word of introduction? Maybe first, Father Isaiah and then JJ.
Fr. Isaiah: Yeah, my name is Father Isaiah. I’m with the Franciscans of the Renewal. I live in New York and I love music and I’ve been playing music with the friars since I joined and I enjoy singer/songwriter type music and Mariachi on the side.
Fr. Gregory: (laughing)
J.J.: Nice.
Fr. Isaiah: It’s not in the album.
J.J.: My name’s…Well, we all have our hobbies, right? My name’s JJ Wright. I am the director of the University of Notre Dame Folk Choir in South Bend, Indiana. And I’m a jazz pianist and a composer and a producer and love to do anything having to do with music.
Fr. Gregory: Beautiful. Okay, so the Spanish theme, it does come up here and there, insofar as you know, you got the Poco a Poco album, you got the Poco a Poco podcast. But also, maybe this is just an opportunity to ask an introductory question. Like, when was the most raucous or otherwise memorable mariachi event of your life? Because you’ve got like the subway you’ve got like Our Lady of Guadalupe precessions you’ve got like missions that you all have in central I mean there are opportunities so raucous mariachi memories.
Fr. Isaiah: Yes most recently Our Lady Guadalupe and potentially soon to be posadas events this Advent coming coming to a little house near you. But yes. The Cathedral St. Patrick’s in New York, Our Lady Guadalupe two years ago was the best mariachi party I’ve ever seen in my life.
Fr. Gregory: I was recently invited to Our Lady of Guadalupe party at a local parish where I will sometimes say Mass. And there’s just like there’s an email communication where the pastor communicated to all those concerned by the events like this was the entirety of the subject was “Dancing will stop by 1 a.m.”
Fr. Isaiah: (laughs) Too good.
Fr. Gregory: It’s like an email to a bunch of like priests, religious and church functionaries. It’s like guys, I know you’re asking the dance till three in the morning, but it simply can’t happen this year. You know, not again. (laughing) Okay, but moving on to subjects of further interest or further subjects of interest, you are engaged together in this project. So, singing, songwriting and producing. Can you tell us a little bit about it? And maybe for those who are interested in the origin story, kind of how the thing came together.
Fr. Isaiah: Yeah, actually I love how it came together. That’s probably my favorite part of the whole project. JJ and I met from 2011, 12, 11, working in one of our homeless shelters in the Bronx, J.J. was finishing up school in Manhattan and volunteering at night, cooking in our homeless shelter. And that’s kind of where the friendship started. And then definitely a mutual shared love for music. But I really love the gift of the friendship and how it began just serving our guests and our shelter. And over the years we stayed in touch and had an opportunity to collaborate on the Pocco a Poco album, but also just staying in touch over the years and kind of sharing some of the journey and new developments, what God was doing. And when I was in seminary, I reached out to JJ to ask if you’d be interested in helping collaborate on something very new to me, things are something I hadn’t really done in terms of the scope of the project and the sound of the project, and he very willingly, very readily jumped in to the pool and jumped on the adventure train for the whole journey, which grew to a bigger proportion than I had expected and quite a long journey, but a really grace filled one. But it really started, I’d say, in our homeless shelter in the Bronx serving frozen lasagnas to guests there. And so it was a great epic origin story and a good beginning.
J.J.: Yeah, that’s where I really learned how to cook, I think. You know, turn the oven on put in the lasagna. But that’s, that’s basically what we did on the album right we just yeah, that’s it.
Fr. Gregory: JJ, talk a little bit about… you’re a skilled musician. You know, you produce at a high level, a lot of Christian content, a lot of Catholic content. You know, it’s well intentioned, but historically, that be to say like within the last maybe 40 years, some of it’s been less than excellent. And I think people have a kind of negative association with religiously affiliated music because they assume that it’s going to be less well realized and less well produced, than your kind of equivalent secular music for lack of a better term. So, you know, some producers working in the secular space might be loath to get themselves involved in a project in the religious space, and yet here we are. So, talk to us a little bit about that, your motivations, your kind of inspirations. talk to us a little bit about that, your motivations, your kind of inspirations.
J.J.: Yeah, I think what Father Isaiah said is a great foundation for that question. Insofar as like, you know, the friendship was the first connection and I think that friendship has this ability to overcome all kinds of preferences that we might have when it comes to quality or what we deem as worthy of our devotion. And so the first and most important thing was to really try to for me at least was to try to honor what Father Isaiah had discerned and learned about from God, I think during his journey of his vocation, because so much of, I mean, all of the songs are really kind of telling the story of what it meant for Father Isaiah to discern that his life was to be a priest. And so that felt like a big responsibility to me. And so because anytime we’re dealing with something so personal, tender, vulnerable, we want to give the honor back to God because of how beautiful we perceive the message to be, especially when it’s about where our path in life leads. So, you know, when it comes to quality, I don’t know, I’ve always thought, “Father Isaiah’s music has just been “incredibly well done.” I think he writes beautiful songs. And I think they’re from the heart. And they’re super relatable, which makes them fun to live with and to walk with. And so I just really hoped that I could add something to what was already great, which, you know, the listeners can decide for themselves, I suppose. But that’s really the foundation for why we made this project, I think.
Fr. Gregory: Yeah. I’m thinking too, like, so we’re in a kind of weird moment. Maybe it’s a normal moment. All moments are weird. We’re in the midst of a kind of weird moment where folks are beyond kind of cancel culture. You know, so like the things that one does, whether in real life or on the internet are no longer as high stakes as they once were, and so people are getting themselves involved in kind of weird collaborations. I’m thinking here like the Hallowap, you know, it’s like Gwen Stefani is telling me to use the Hallowap. And I think that you just, you’re interfacing with that message in a kind of interesting way, because you’re like, wow, five years ago, what would I have thought of this now? What do I think about this?” Or like the “Luce” mascot, you know, people reacted in wildly different ways to Luce. Some people are like, “This is trashola. This debases the faith.” And other people are like, “She’s kind of cute. You know, I can’t help. I just can’t help saying she’s kind of cute.” So you’re working in a kind of interesting space here because you’re producing music, which isn’t just like in every instance, like this is identifiably Christian music. Obviously it’s inspired by your Christian life, by your baptism, by your confirmation, by your ordination. It wells up from within. You testify to the Lord whom you know and love. The lyrics are God-centered or like God-explicit in many instances. And yet the sound is one where people are, they’re just accustomed to turn on the radio and hear a similar sound. And so what’s it like operating in the midst of a kind of genre mashup or operating in a place where people might be less well disposed to easily peg or easily identify what exactly is going on on your music? I don’t know, maybe Father Isaiah if you have some thoughts.
Fr. Isaiah: I would say that’s part of what I find the joy working with JJ as a producer is, is that he’s a collaborator and there’s no, there’s no walls, there’s no boundaries to who that is. I mean, the amount of people that got drawn into the project was an incredible blessing. and I like that. It gives us a fresh perspective and it helps it create something that’s real to the human heart because you’re drawing in a lot of different people from very different experiences. I think that’s Catholic. I think that ultimately that’s just Catholic. We’re in dialogue with the world and we’re in dialogue with human hearts and people all over the spectrum of life and it’s a joy to be able and music is such a connector to me. It’s so imbued with God in that sense because when you’re playing music with people you’ve never met before and all of a sudden you connect. I mean to me that that community normally comes from the Holy Spirit, you can’t create that. Who does that? How does that happen? And I think JJ’s a really– has a gift for stewarding that. I think that’s what he does. Is he stewards that. He brings the people together, and he can steward that kind of space where you can connect. But I hope it’s more of what the Church does. I mean, I think that that’s what we’re here for more and more and whether it’s music, art or evangelization, just creating a speaking space, a space to dialogue and to be able to share. And music’s great because it’s disarming. Everybody’s there, everybody’s hanging out, pick up an instrument, let’s play. And it’s really a rich space for that rich soil for that kind of thing. And I think JJ does a good job at creating a space where that can happen.
Fr. Gregory: Yeah, JJ, maybe talk a little bit about the set of skills, ’cause I think a lot of people at a certain distance from the music industry will think producer, I don’t really know what that means, but it probably involves pushing buttons on some keyboard somewhere and then whatever, outputting. But I think that within the industry, you probably understand it more after the manner of an artistry. And I think this word stewardship is a helpful one. The idea that you have creators, co-creator, sub-creators, stewards, patron-, you have all these different ways of relating to an art. So how do you conceive of your own agency in the project? What is it that you helped to bring out? What is it that you helped to bring to realization?
J.J.: Sure. Yeah, I think one of my teachers used to say, my conducting teacher, she used to say my conducting teacher she used to say like the best conductor is a is kind of a perfect melding between a traffic cop and a true artist and I would say that that is true for a producer too because a lot of production is really manning the details and tending to the simple things that, you know, musicians themselves tend to be less focused on because they’re focused in the sound waves. And so that part of it is big, but the other part is kind of what Fr. Isaiah was getting at too. It’s like, you know, can the space get created and is it possible for me to get out of the way for long enough that people’s hearts can speak? If that’s what I’m able to facilitate, I can almost guarantee that what the results are going to be worth hearing. They may not be someone’s preference or style or that type of thing, but we all have this inherent dignity as to speak some truth. And if we’re able to find that truth together, something else happens, like that truth can become amplified, especially in community. So, yeah, as a producer, I hope that I can, you know, do those types of things.
Fr. Gregory: That’s awesome. Okay, so we talked a little bit about the Pocco a Pocco project, which is, I mean, it’s been five, six years now, but you have a more recent album, so mysteries and medicines. I remember, I don’t remember exactly where I can counter to but I remember a conversation between somebody doing an interview and somebody being interviewed and the person being interviewed was an artist I think a poet and the person interviewing was like well, how do you sum it up? And the poet was like…”That’s the thing,” you know like it’s a poem. It’s as distilled as language gets. So I realized like asking about an album, it’s like that’s the point, the point is listening to the album because that’s the way in which to interface with the media is as it’s intended to be interfaced with. But maybe like talk around the album, maybe what led to it or what are you hoping to communicate in it or yeah, what is it, Father Isaiah?
Fr. Isaiah: Yeah, definitely it’s a journey. It’s meant to be kind of a walk through an experience. And J.J. really helped to steward that vision from the beginning trying to create sort of a storyline with different landscapes. But essentially it’s the story of conversion. I would say it’s the story of repentance, the story of the discovery of like the phrase joy bearing repentance, life giving repentance, like the good news of repentance. And it’s kind of walking through the landscapes, the different landscapes of what that experience is like. And there’s a lot of different kind of landscapes, some intimidating and some beautiful and some surprising. And so actually in the beginning, JJ said, why don’t we just like picture it? Like, give me colors, give me images, give me landscapes and it was kind of like painting a painting the journey of return basically to the Father. So I’d say that’s the heart of the story.
Fr. Gregory: Yeah, JJ, what do you say from your vantage?
J.J.: Yeah, definitely all of that. And I think that there’s also just like a lot of diversity in like style across the album, like which makes it really fun to listen to across the 10 songs. Like you’ve got things that are kind of more, you know, swingy, Jack Johnson-y, you know, kind of like spoken rap, you know, whatever you call that sprechgesang is what we call it in classical music. But the, next to that, you have these kind of like super hard hitting like more dance-y beats that I know, Father Isaiah loves, you know, (laughs) you know, four on the floor, bass drum type stuff. And then you have that next to something like [unintelligible] acoustic prayer of humility. And so I love the kind of ground that it trods in that, you know, once on you might be hearings, you know, these elaborate background vocals and the next song, you might be hearing mandolin kind of taking lead. And hopefully in that kind of mess of sound, there’s something that can speak to people. And maybe help open our ears to what Father Isaiah was able to hear first, which was that there is this joy, bearing repentance, this journey back to God that all of us are on and can continue to be invited to journey deeper into.
Fr. Gregory: Okay, so these are under-informed musical preferences, so take it with a grain of salt, but I think that like sometimes when artists get ambitious, specifically within and without their genre, when they try to, specifically within and without their genre, when they try to do something new, big, bold, varied, diverse, sometimes they lose their way. I think that’s how a lot of people feel about the Mumford album that followed, like “Sign No More” and “Babel,” they’re like, weird indie stuff that they don’t seem to have actually incorporated into their sound. And then it’s just like, “Ah.” But if you read, I mean, read, it’s clear that I typically interface with the written word. But if you like listen to Graceland for instance by Paul Simon here it’s just like working in a bunch of different genres in a kind of wide way which seems to hold together. And so it takes a certain like virtuosity, but it also takes a certain experience of those things and incorporation of that experience in your own life in order to hold it to get otherwise it’s just eclectic. And it’s like then people come and they pick and they choose, but you’re trying to communicate to them something of a whole experience. So maybe like, I don’t know, the people are asking, how do you hold that together in yourself? And it might be something as simple as like, I like this stuff. I hold these things together in my affections, but I don’t know if I’m the basis of that, if you have further thoughts, further things to share.
Fr. Isaiah: JJ, you wanna take that?
J.J.: Sure. Yeah, I’ll go first, but I really wanna hear your answer too, Father Isaiah. I think that you phrased the question in a lovely way, Fr. Gregory in that. There’s an inherent tension between what I’ve done and what I hope I can do. And so this is true personally, of course. And then maybe it’s amplified when we approach that question in [unk]. And because we’re not just sorting out what I hope I can do myself, we’re sorting out what does he hope he can do, what does she hope, you know. And so, I don’t know what the measure of, you know, eclecticism versus, you know, something that really jealous together would be except to say that that’s not, I think that’s outside of the realm of what we can control maybe. I think the thing we can control is honoring each other and listening and I know when I’m not listening, for sure, right? I might not know it at the exact time, but if I give myself a second to really discern my day or the way things are going, I can pretty well find out whether or not I’m hearing what’s happening around me. And so I think at least what I came to the table with, and I know, Father Isaiah came to the table with every time we talked was this desire to hear and listen to what the other person was bringing, because there’s certainly, we worked on this project for about three years, I think. And over the course of the years, people are going through all kinds of stuff, personally, over the course of the years, people are going through all kinds of stuff personally over the course of three years, ups and downs. The project has its own identity of ups and downs. And there’s over the course of three years, many agreements and many disagreements. And at the end of the day, I don’t think the measure of the project is based on how much we agreed or disagreed, but is on how much were we able to hear one another and honor that original intention.
Fr. Isaiah: Thank you, J.J. and one word you said that really resonates is you said there’s things that we can’t control. And I think for myself, the big takeaway from all of this is not to try to control that so much, but simply to try to kind of trust and try when it comes to musicianship, because that’s where you’re going to find the thing that you’ve never found before. And honestly, I think if J.J. wasn’t the producer, I don’t think I would have found that, because he was continually kind of pushing the bird out of the nest, like try to fly into a way you haven’t done before, like out of the nest of your comfort zone. And I really needed that. And I would just say my experience from this whole project is just a reminder that as artists, we tend to take ourselves way too seriously. And we kind of live in a hidden atheism in the sense that it’s my image, it’s my sound, it’s my baby to have to kind of ensure survival and well-being. And the truth is there’s a God and your sound or your artistry or all of that is like this tiny little collaboration in the gigantic ocean of God’s heart that He’s stewarding and He’s bringing to birth and I think we really have to Maybe as Christian artists. I’ll be speaking to that live like we believe in God as artists like it’s not mine None of this is mine. You know what and that’s for Saint Francis for us, it was never mine to begin with and so that can actually spark a freedom to try and to find something that you haven’t found before about yourself and the sound that God’s put into your heart. And I really think that JJ’s made that possible and it was the lesson for me in this project, like there was a couple of songs where things were discovered in it that I just never could have done if I just reduced myself to my sound, my comfort, my familiarity in terms of artistry and landscapes that I’m acquainted with in terms of soundscapes, if you want to call them that. And you got to try. And it’s okay. You’re not going to get it perfect, or you’re not going to totally know ahead of time what you’re going to get when you come out of that. But I think fear could really bind an artist to having to kind of keep yourself in a familiar space to the expense of discovering something really beautiful. And whether or not people resonate, you know, everybody understands that isn’t super important. We can live bound to that kind of thing. And I’m just grateful, some of the places we discovered along the way. I just never could have done if I had stepped to what was familiar. So anyway, it was a big learning experience for me and in the best way. And just the need to let go of control and allow God to show you something new. That was the biggest blessing for me along the way.
Fr. Gregory: So I’m thinking specifically, you know, following that last question of your response about your life and your music under this rubric. Alright Father Gregory, you have preluded long enough now to deliver the goods. And so in the Christian tradition, the teaching is that when a man or a woman is consecrated in religious vows that every act of that person becomes a kind of act of worship, because vows are an act of religion and religion makes it such that what you do, you render to God as an oblation, like a sacrifice and offering of a certain sort. And so everything kind of comes under that. And in the tradition, some people will say like, well, and so far as your obedience or your superiors, now everything is a kind of act of obedience, but it’s more than that, because it’s not just a matter of obedience, it’s also chastity and poverty. So it’s like everything that you do now becomes the kind of offering of your poor, chaste and obedient heart, either by realization or by desperation. So you know, like you’re making music, some of which is more explicitly worshipful and some of which is less explicitly worshipful but there’s a sense in which it’s worshipful. So when you think kind of in your heart of hearts about the, you’re offering that you make to the Lord, you know, the oblation, the sacrifice, what is it that you want to give Him? Like, what is it that you want to present to him?
Fr. Isaiah: Wow. Thank you for that question. And thanksgiving. Just thanksgiving. Like honestly, I think of St. Paul, I love his line. He’s just bursting at the seams to see thanksgiving overflow. Like that’s what his heart is for the people. That’s why he wants the Gospel to spread. Is he just wants more thanksgiving. More and more and more thanksgiving. And honestly, that’s, I would say the only thing thing I really really want is that to see thanksgiving overflow in my heart and in others you know through ups and downs through everything but just that thanksgiving would permeate I think that’s that if there’s anything we need more of in this world it’s just thanksgiving and if usually if there’s anything lacking in the given situation it’s thanksgiving. So yes, thanksgiving would be what I’d like to give.
Fr. Gregory: Beautiful, um J.J. I’m thinking about you and thinking about the music industry, you know, like in any industry, there’s comparisons of a certain sort. You know, like I’m sure professional basketball players think about how their stats stack up to the stats of the next guy and they’re all trying to kind of carve out for themselves a space of competency and insofar as it’s clear to the one that he’s never gonna be the best you define himself by some subordinate excellence and says well on the best at you know doing this from the best to doing that because we’re all looking in a certain sense to be the best. We’re all we’re looking to have like something set of us that’s a lot of jewelry that’s praiseworthy that’s excellent It’s good so like something set of us that’s laudage, or that’s praise worthy, that’s excellent, it’s good. So you find rare people though, who have kind of gotten some distance from that comparative spirit, that competitive spirit, and they can kind of see themselves in the mystical body. I was talking to a basketball player the other day, and these are all my like images right now. He’s like, yeah, I think like, where do I fit? I set good picks, I defend the rim, I clean up around the goal. You know, it’s like, I love that. You know, it’s a be small to play your part. So in the mystical body, the musical mystical body, what part do you play? What role do you play? Like, where do you fit?
J.J.: I apologize for the long pause, but that’s a really good question. Maybe the best thing I can think of is like an instigator maybe. Like I got more ideas than I know what to do with and most of the time I can’t do them. And so I feel like if I can help spur on or encourage some things that might help people take another look at God, then maybe my job for that day has been complete.
Fr. Gregory: Beautiful. And another, like, I was thinking about this too in conversation with somebody recently, like, I think we’re all figuring out where we’re fitting the mystical body. I think like “I don’t know” is an acceptable answer. I have a friend, Father Bonaventure, who’ll often, you know, in preaching. They’ll say, you know, pose a question and then they’ll say short answer. I have no idea, long answer, the next 10 minutes. But don’t forget the short answer. Beautiful. Okay. As we kind of come to a conclusion here, can you maybe direct people where they can find the music or direct people how they can support the project or things that the folks are asking. What do the people need to know? Fr. Isaiah?
Fr. Isaiah: Yeah. It’s pretty much available in any favorite streaming platform and then our community has a YouTube channel as well but any streaming media at this point it’s available and just encourage people to reach out and listen, yeah it’d be a joy to share.
J.J.: And if you go to franciscanfriars.com that’s the TFR website and if people want to support the fires directly they can do it through that. There’s another website called monkmanual.com and that website you can access a physical CD if you would like to listen that way. We also created a couple journals for people to pray with as they listen or just look for more direction in life and you can get those through that monk manual website as well. So lots of places to go. But please do listen.
Fr. Gregory: Beautiful. Okay. And cognizant that this episode airs at the beginning of 2025, a couple of weeks after the day of recording, are there places where people can see you play music, make music?
Fr. Isaiah: To be determined, I’m not totally sure in the year ahead. I think in May, Catholic Underground, that’s about all I know off the top of my head, but that’s when I’m still waiting to hear myself. I don’t know myself honestly.
Fr. Gregory: I too, I’m a man accustomed to obedience. I’m going to go and he goes. Beautiful. Okay, well, thanks so much for taking the time. Yeah, thanks so much for occupying the place to sign to you in the mystical body, but together, you know, head members, we might constitute the one worshiping Christ. And so then turning to you, the listener, thanks so much for tuning into this episode of Godsplaining. Be sure to like and subscribe with on YouTube or your podcast app if you haven’t yet. We’re on social media. You can follow us on the various things. The woman who works for us and manages the channels is awesome. And like very whimsical and charming in her curation of content, we’re just like throwing bad, bad, bad video clips in her direction. She makes him somehow look decent beyond decent, in fact. So check it out. And then you can go to godsplaining.org for updates on upcoming events. So we have a couple of retreats. It’s a couple of Days of Recollection queued up, as well as, yeah, this pilgrimage trip to Rome for the Jubilee of Youth, culminating in the canonization of Blessed Pier Giorgio Frassati. So wild things on the horizon. And then, yeah, we’ll look forward to seeing you at the next opportunity. Okay, so know of our prayers for you. Please pray for us and we’ll look forward to chatting with you next time on Godsplaining.