Washington National Cathedral

The Sunday Forum: Critical Issues in the Light of Faith

The Very Rev. Samuel T. Lloyd III, host

Denyce Graves, mezzo soprano, joins Cathedral Dean Samuel T. Lloyd III to talk about her career and her faith.

Graves was raised in a very strict religious family. As a young girl growing up in Washington, D.C., she performed in a family singing group called the Inspirational Children of God. Graves also belonged to her church “bus ministry,” visiting neighborhood families to encourage parents to enroll their children in Sunday school. As one of her responsibilities, Graves sang to the children on the church bus.

Faith undergirds Graves’s career as an opera singer. Her career, her efforts to be sincere, the direction of her life, “All of that came from my upbringing in the church,” she says. “I too am greatly affected by the music that passes through me.... One of the challenges is for me to just get out of the way and allow the music to speak through me.”

Dean Lloyd asks about the use of God’s gifts in performing more secular musical works. “I knew that’s where we were going,” Graves chuckles. She tells of a time early in her career, when her mother traveled to see her sing the role of Carmen. The performance embarrassed and shocked her mother, who protested, “I raised you to be a good Christian girl!” Graves had some difficulty convincing her mother that the role was acceptable. The singer asserts that all uses of one’s gifts are to the glory of God. “Music is a language, she says. “It is the language of the soul.”

Many people remember Graves’s rendering of the Lord’s Prayer at the Cathedral service following the attacks of September 11, 2001. At the time, it was not widely known that she had withdrawn from performing and undergone voice surgery. Graves agreed to sing at the service despite trepidation. She prayed for God’s help as she prepared to return to singing at such a somber time in the nation’s history. “I was praying all the time as I always do,” she says. “There has not been a day of my life that has been without prayer, not one single day.”

About Denyce Graves

Denyce Graves, opera singer, performed the Lord’s Prayer at the Cathedral service following the attacks of September 11, 2001. Graves was raised in a very strict religious family. As a young girl growing up in Washington, D.C., she performed in a family singing group called the Inspirational Children of God.