APRIL 2021 N
PM was blessed to welcome Jennifer Kluge as our new Executive Director in January of 2021. With her broad base of experience and
her passion for music, Jennifer has jumped into her new role with both feet. Undaunted by the myriad challenges of the position, she is eager and grateful to be a part of all that NPM stands for.
Jennifer was generous enough to spend some time chatting with me about the journey that brought her to NPM, some lessons she’s learned along the way, her doctoral dissertation (in the works!), and what she and her husband John—and their Chesapeake Bay Retriever Mako—like to do in their spare time.
ND: Jennifer, why don’t you tell me a little bit about how you first got involved in music ministry?
Jennifer Kluge: Music has always been a part of my life. My grandmother was my very first piano teacher when I was about five. I was jealous when my older sister was allowed to take lessons from my grandmother, who was a very accomplished pianist herself, and I couldn’t take them. I thought this was terribly unfair. I asked her, “Can I take piano lessons from you, too?” and the next week, I went to my lesson with my sister. So music has been a part of my life since then, though I never quite mastered the piano. I always enjoyed singing but never really had an opportunity to perform with any type of group until college. I went to George Washington and we had a robust Newman Center with a choir, so I sang regularly there. When I studied abroad in Ireland, there was also a choir, made up of students from all over the globe. I also had the opportunity to take some voice lessons at GW. As I went into the working world and eventually settled here in the greater DC area, I decided it was time for me to officially join a choir and put this past love and past experience into practice in a more tangible way. Since 2011, I’ve sung regularly with my church choir— I’ve been exposed to so many different types of music that I wouldn’t normally have had the opportunity to sing, and that’s what I’ve loved about it. It’s deepened my life in a devotional way, and in a musical way, too, refining both my vocal and theory skills. In fact, on Gaudete Sunday 2020, I served as cantor for the very first time, so that was very exciting.
ND: Tat can be a tough transition to make, from being a singer in a choir to singing as a cantor. Do you have any advice for people reading this article—something that might help them, from your experience?
Jennifer Kluge: I was actually very lucky. Our choir director, long before the pandemic, had started inviting individual choir members to intone the psalm response. So it was eight or twelve bars of music for you to pluck up the courage to sing on your own. And I had done that; I knew I could do that. When she offered me the opportunity to be a cantor, I realized two things: one, I’ve been singing for a long time. I know I have the skills. Two, I had to trust in my own skills and not let the nerves get the better of me. And that’s when I told myself, take that nice deep breath, not only so that you have the air, but to calm yourself down to be able to do it, and I just kept telling myself to breathe. And I got through it. I was pleased, and more importantly, my director was pleased. When in doubt, breathe!
ND: You mentioned that you had studied abroad in Ireland. What was that like?
Jennifer Kluge: Tat was an amazing experience. I didn’t know a soul when I got there, and that part of the experience that has stayed with me—basically, we were all in big apartment complexes and then subdivided into groups. In my particular group there were eight of us, and there was only one other American. Te rest of the students were from throughout Ireland. Tat part of the experience was terrific, because we’re still in touch with each other today. In fact, we had planned
33
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52
