The Saint Cecilia Syndrome
A Memoir of Music and Faith
About The Saint Ceclia Syndrome
Carolyn Swallow is a hard-working musician of average ability who has struggled through three university degrees and a grueling apprenticeship in church music only to discover that the devotion she paid to music and the idolatry with which she regarded her music mentors was usurping the devotion she owed to God. In her search for truth and meaning, Swallow vicariously encounters Meher Baba, the Buddha, the Beats, the Bloomsbury Group, the Inklings and Rudolf Steiner before discovering a verse in the Apocrypha that changed her life.
About Carolyn Swallow
Swallow has a B.S. in Music Education from the University of Illinois, an M.A. in Music History from the University of Missouri, and an M.A. in Counseling Psychology from Norwich University. She taught at the college level while doing post-graduate work, served as an adjunct faculty member at a small college in South Carolina, and taught piano and stringed instruments in her home studio. She has worked as a Licensed Professional Counselor and has served numerous churches as organist and choir director. Swallow lives with her husband in a college town in the Coastal Plains region of South Carolina. She and her husband have two children and two grandchildren.