Carrie Newcomer
Carrie Newcomer is a songwriter, recording artist, performer, educator, poet, and activist whose work explores the places where music, spirituality, social justice, and the ordinary sacred meet. The Boston Globe has called her a “prairie mystic,” while Rolling Stone praised her as an artist who “asks all the right questions.”
In February 2027, Carrie will release her 21st album, Murmurations, through Thirty Tigers. The new collection explores how we find meaning, wonder, resilience, and joy in uncertain, beautiful, broken, and bewildering times. Rooted in our connection to one another and to the living world, the songs affirm what can still rise in the human spirit—sometimes against all odds—and sing. Mary Chapin Carpenter describes the album as work that speaks “to the spirit inside of us that never abandons its search for connection.”
Carrie’s nationally released recordings include A Great Wild Mercy, Until Now, The Point of Arrival, and The Beautiful Not Yet. Her song “I Should’ve Known Better” appeared on Nickel Creek’s Grammy-winning gold album This Side, and she received an Emmy Award for her PBS special An Evening with Carrie Newcomer.
She is also the author of three collections of poetry and essays—A Permeable Life, The Beautiful Not Yet, and Until Now—with a new collection, An Almanac of Wonders, scheduled for publication by Broadleaf Books in 2028. Her weekly Substack, A Gathering of Spirits, has become one of the platform’s most popular music offerings, combining songs, poetry, essays, video, and reflections on contemporary life.
Carrie has appeared on PBS Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly and Krista Tippett’s On Being and has performed and presented throughout the United States and internationally. At the invitation of the U.S. Embassy, she traveled to India as a cultural ambassador in 2009 and 2011, experiences that led to the interfaith recording Everything Is Everywhere with legendary sarod master Amjad Ali Khan. Her international work has also taken her to Kenya and the Middle East, where she performed in schools, spiritual communities, and hospitals serving people affected by HIV/AIDS.
Her longtime collaboration with author Parker J. Palmer includes The Growing Edge podcast, retreats, live events, and conversations exploring personal, vocational, spiritual, and social transformation. Spirituality & Health named Carrie and Parker among its spiritual leaders to watch for the coming decades. Carrie has also worked with ServiceSpace and numerous faith, interfaith, justice, health, hunger, and community organizations.
Carrie’s live appearances range from intimate concerts to large-scale presentations, often weaving together her resonant voice, poetic songwriting, storytelling, humor, and thoughtful reflection. Carrie is available for concerts, workshops, worship experiences, keynote presentations, retreats, and full weekend programs, creating spaces for audiences to consider what it means to live with greater attention, courage, compassion, and connection.
In a time of deep division and uncertainty, Carrie has become a distinctive voice for finding the connections that remain at the heart of the human story. She lives in the wooded hills of south-central Indiana with her husband and two shaggy rescue dogs.
CURRENT WORKSHOPS & RETREATS
TELLING OUR STORY IN SONG: A COMMUNITY EXPERIENCE
Day Workshop (90 minutes - 2hours)
In this fast paced and engaging workshop Carrie will invite participants to explore a topic creatively through the use of song. She will lead the group through the process of choosing a topic, creating the language, moving the language into music form, and by the end of the workshop have a finished song the group can sing together. This workshop requires absolutely no musical experience. This experience is a fun and exciting way to understand and embody new ideas and material. In a conference setting this experience is a wonderful way to creatively move the theme of the conference from head to heart, embodying the stories and ideas being discussed during the conference. This is a fast paced, guaranteed to make you smile experience, presented in a safe and welcoming atmosphere.
Note: Carrie will create a very simple MP3 version and a lyric/chord sheet of the song after the experience and send to group leader for distributing to participants.
This workshop can be a stand alone experience. When it is combined with one of Carrie’s other retreats it creates a full head & heart experience. The time needed for a combined experience is a minimum of 3 hours.
THE BEAUTIFUL NOT YET: SUSTAINABLE HOPE
Day Retreat (90 minutes - 2 hours)
Living into a sustainable hope is getting a bead on a true north and then walking toward it, living into love is a daily practice, our work for a better, kinder world is an orientation not a destination.
Hope is holding in creative tension, everything that is, with all that could and should be, andand each day taking action to lessen the distance between the two” Parker J. Palmer.
This day retreat led by singer songwriter, Carrie Newcomer, will explore maintaining hope and our ability to envision during times of individual and community challenge. Carrie will use music, poetry, reflective writing, reflection to explore the personal stories and practices that affirm that hope is sustained through individual and community action. Participants will consider the things that have helped them maintain hope in the past as well as ponder if those things are still available to us, and if so how do we access them, and explores how might we might hold our individual and community challenges with creative and life-giving tension, knowing that our work for the better world is not just a destination, but a daily orientation.
Possible Addition: Telling Our Story In Song: A Community Experience - See description below (Together a 3 hour retreat)
WHAT WE NEED IS HERE: LIFELINES, LAKES & THE LIVING POSSIBILITY WITHIN US & BETWEEN US
Day Retreat (90 minutes - 2 hours)
Join Quaker Songwriter/Poet/Author, Carrie Newcomer, as she invites us into the inner work that supports and deepens our outer walk in the world. In times that feel increasingly divisive and fractured, what helps us stay grounded, resilient and cultivates our threads of connection? Using music, poetry, story and reflection Carrie will lead participants through a series of experiences designed to affirm who we are, who we are becoming and the power of daily human size actions to create positive change.
Possible Addition: Telling Our Story In Song: A Community Experience - See description below (Together a 3 hour retreat)
A MAP OF THE JOURNEY IN PROCESS: CONVERSATIONS AT THE GROWING EDGE
Day Retreat (90 minutes - 2hours Retreat )
“Stories tell us of what we already knew and forgot and remind us of what we haven’t yet imagined.” – Anne L. Watson
This workshop is designed to be a warm, welcoming and creative exploration of our personal and collective journeys. Using music, visual art, poetry and openhearted conversation Carrie will honor the story of our history, reflect upon our current inner and outer experience, and envision our hopes for the future as we lean into our next growing edges. Carrie invites and welcomes anyone with or without previous experience in writing, songwriting or creative expression to exploring new ways of envisioning our own stories through a new creative and compassionate lens.
Possible Addition: Telling Our Story In Song: A Community Experience - See description below (Together a 3 hour retreat)
THE EXTRAORDINARY ORDINARY: WRITING AS THE PRACTICE OF PRESENCE
Day Retreat (90 minutes - 2 hours)
In this workshop Carrie leads participants through exercises that encourage paying attention to the small details, experiencing delight in small moments. Carrie will use small and large group conversation, music and poetry. This workshop welcomes those interested in songwriting, prose or poetry, or journaling as a reflective tool. All experience levels are welcome to explore.
THE EXTRAORDINARY ORDINARY: SONGWRITING & THE SMALL MOMENT WITH CARRIE NEWCOMER
Day Retreat (90 minutes - 2hours)
Carrie will lead songwriters through exercises and practices that focus on songwriting with attention to the small moment and detail. This workshop isdesigned for those wanting to expand deepen their songwriting practice with a nationally recognized performing songwriter and recording artist.
