Fernando Berwig Silva

Credentials: BA, Universidade Estadual do Paraná, Brazil / MSM, Southern Methodist University /Ph.D., Southern Methodist University (Present)

Denomination: Lutheran

Specific Field: Religion and Culture

Biography:

Fernando Berwig Silva is a Ph.D. student in Religion and Culture at Southern Methodist University and a Brazilian composer. A drummer since his teenage years, Fernando has earned his Master of Sacred Music (MSM) from Perkins School of Theology and also holds a bachelor’s in Composition and Conducting from Paraná State University in Brazil. Berwig Silva has experience leading music in churches from diverse cultural backgrounds and has served three years as Coordinator of Arts Ministries at a Lutheran church in Brazil. He has premiered compositions at the intersection of church and concert music in Europe, the United States, and Brazil. Currently, Fernando is the Special Assistant to the Sacred Music Programs at Perkins School of Theology, and he also acts as a committee member for the Christian Congregational Music Conference that takes place biannually in Oxford, UK. His research engages with church music, decolonial, and Latin American scholarship; moreover, Berwig Silva is interested in understanding how ideas of race, ethnicity, and coloniality are expressed in music practices of Latin American diasporic Christian communities.