Name: Sacred Bridge: Earth and Water
Start: 2026-04-14T19:00:00-05:00
Location: University of St. Thomas

Schoenecker Center Performance Hall, Schoenecker Science Center (not Schoenecker Hall North) - click here for map
University of St. Thomas 2210 Summit Ave., St. Paul, MN
Free and open to the public (registration required - click here: https://tommielink.stthomas.edu/event/11950979
Care for the earth and the sanctity of water are central motifs in David Jordan Harris and Nirmala Rajasekar’s new artistic co-creation, Sacred Bridge: Earth and Water. Building on more than a decade of musical collaboration, Harris and Rajasekar weave music, poetry, and folktales into a concert drawing on the deep pool of Sephardic piyyutim and kantigas and South Indian Carnatic ragas and improvisations.
Nirmala Rajasekar is a world-renowned Carnatic vainika (veena player), vocalist, and educator of South Indian Music. She has performed in venues throughout the world, including Carnegie Hall (New York), the United Nations (New York), Music Academy (Chennai), Musee Rietburg (Zurich), Mulgrave (Melbourne), and Chembur Fine Arts (Bombay). Nirmala is a recipient of many awards, including a Bush Artistic fellowship, McKnight fellowship, Rotary Vocational Excellence award, and Naadha Kala Vipanchee. She is a disciple of veteran veena Guru Prof. Kalapakam Swaminathan and has had vocal mentoring under Prof. Sitarama Sarma and Prof. T. R Subramaniam. For more than three decades she has become one of the veena’s best practitioners, performing it with utmost dedication, passion, and a deep love for the art. Nirmala is the founder and director of the Naadha Rasa Center for Music and is its artistic director. www.nirmalarajasekar.com
David Jordan Harris is co-founder and Artistic Director of Voices of Sepharad. He has pursued study and performance of Sephardic music throughout North America, Morocco, Greece, France, Israel, Turkey, Poland, Bosnia, and Spain. Integrating his skills as a singer, actor, and dancer, David has appeared as guest artist with Zorongo Flamenco, Katha Dance Theatre, Corning Dances and Company, Walker Art Center, Illusion Theater, Rose Ensemble, North Star Opera, Liz Lerman Dance Exchange, Guthrie Theater, Minnesota Opera, Lyra Baroque Orchestra, Ensemble Espan᷉ol, and In the Heart of the Beast Puppet and Mask Theatre. David has co-authored four plays and composed music for the film Romania 1941/Rwanda 1994. He was founding Executive Director of Rimon: The Minnesota Jewish Arts Council and has served as interfaith arts consultant for the Jay Phillips Center for Interreligious Studies at the University of St. Thomas since 2010. www.voicesofsepharad.com
The concert is co-produced by the Jay Phillips Center for Interreligious Studies at the University of St. Thomas and the Jay Phillips Center for Interfaith Learning at Saint John’s University. This showing is organized and hosted by the Jay Phillips Center for Interreligious Studies at the University of St. Thomas in the College of Arts and Sciences in collaboration with the Office of Sustainability Initiatives and the Claritas Initiative.