Jonathan McNair has taught at the University for over 20 years. Photo by Angela Foster.
While the spring 2026 semester may have just come to a close, it’s been a busy time of year for Ruth S. Holmberg Professor of American Music Jonathan McNair.
On May 19, the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga Department of Music professor traveled to Providence, Rhode Island, to hear his musical composition, “Redemption Suite,” and additional pieces performed by the Marian Anderson String Quartet.
As part of the “Face to Face” program at the Brown University Churchill House, the quartet’s performance grappled with the university’s history of slavery.
He explained that the commissioned composition deals with grief, specifically the loss of a child to slave traders, the greed of the slave traders, the shame of the victims, and ultimately a search for healing.
“We’re going to take what was broken and we’re going to try to make it whole and make it better. That’s what this music is about,” McNair said. “They also played two movements from ‘Follow the Drinking Gourd’ and ‘There is a Balm in Gilead.’ It was a powerful show.”
McNair will soon be heading back to the Northeast. On Tuesday, June 9, his composition, “These Three,” will be performed at Christ & St. Stephen’s Church in New York City as part of the On The Move! Program performed by the North/South Chamber Orchestra. The piece was commissioned in memory of Christian Sinclair Rushing, an urban designer whose love for Chattanooga helped shape downtown development.
In a letter Rushing sent to his team, he quoted 1 Corinthians 13:13, “So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love (ESV).”
McNair wanted to incorporate the sentiment into the music.
“I thought he loved Chattanooga,” McNair said. “He loved his team. He had faith in them. He had faith that the urban center could be revitalized. He had hope for that. And those are three powerful words in a lot of scenarios.
“I wanted to write music that would capture the urban energy, also this hopeful vision and be somewhat of an elegy. There’s a lot of upbeat stuff, but then there’s also this kind of lyrical slower, and then it gets into the intensity of feeling the grief … So the music covers a lot of territory. It unites those various parts after all of that so that we end with this sort of ascending into the clouds in a peaceful way.”
While the piece is deeply rooted in Chattanooga’s history, McNair believes its impact can be felt across the globe.
“The cool thing about music, and this is true with poetry and art as well, is that even if it’s like a local thing, it can have a more global application,” he said. “It’s certainly possible for pieces of music to be tied so tightly to a particular time or event that it can be difficult to find the relevance at another time.
“However, it’s also very, very possible that it can apply to everyone. Who doesn’t need some hope? Who doesn’t need some love? Who doesn’t need to have faith that things are going to be OK?”
On Thursday, July 2, McNair’s piece, “Beachspring,” will be performed by the Chattanooga Symphony and Opera during the annual Pops on the River Independence Day celebration. The composition was commissioned for Ballet Tennessee over 20 years ago.
“It is Americana in terms of the American hymn tune, and it also pulls in elements of Native American music,” he said, describing the piece. “It’s just beautiful. It’s just nice to listen to. It gets really big and triumphant.”
The opportunity to see his music performed isn’t lost on McNair.
“It’s affirming, exciting, rewarding, fulfilling and it makes me want to do it more,” McNair said.
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