Sufjan Stevens' Carrie & Lowell

<p><b>Upon the release of Sufjan Stevens’ seventh studio album, <i>Carrie & Lowell</i>, two divergent groups found themselves as strange bedfellows: the LGBTQIA+ community and American evangelical Christians. Both were united in praise for Stevens’ beautifully melancholic music.</b><br><br> Critically acclaimed as one of the best albums of 2015, the elegiac and intimate record about the death of Sufjan’s estranged mother reflects the musician’s own paradoxical posture—<i>Carrie & Lowell </i>is both sacred <i>and </i>profane, Christian <i>and</i> queer, traditional <i>and </i>progressive, despairing <i>and</i> hopeful. <br><br> Theologian and cultural critic Joel Mayward considers <i>Carrie & Lowell </i>as a mystical metamodern <i>memento mori</i>, Sufjan’s symphonic (as opposed to systematic) approach to the questions of mortality, sexuality, and God. Fusing critical observations with personal narrative, Mayward examines the unique audience reception of <i>Carrie & Lowell </i>and the questions it raises: in a world of division, how might Stevens’ affecting music act as a bridge of love between seemingly irreconcilable communities? As <i>Carrie & Lowell </i>reminds us of the painful truth that “we’re all gonna die,” perhaps it also offers a glimpse of transcendence and hope on this side of death.</p>