About me
Jean Cuanan-Nalam is a hymn writer, composer, arranger, guitarist, and church choir conductor, currently serving as Assistant Professor of Church Music at the Divinity School of Silliman University. She also conducts Ugkat, the school’s angklung ensemble, and leads workshops on music and worship in churches and conferences. Dr. Nalam earned her Bachelor and Master of Music in Music Education from Silliman University and completed her PhD in Church Music and Worship, with a concentration in Music Ministry, at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Texas, becoming the first Filipino to hold a doctorate in that field. Her dissertation, Hubad: Elena Maquiso’s Hymn Redrafting Methods Towards a Cebuano Model of Hymn Redrafting, reflects her lifelong advocacy for contextualized Cebuano church music. She has served as choir director in UCCP churches in Surigao, Negros, and Valencia, and has edited and co-edited several Cebuano hymn and choral collections, including Melody and Liturgy, Unang Huni, and Hinalad. Her research on Elena Maquiso was published in The Hymn: A Journal of Congregational Song (2021). Recognized as a Lovelace Scholar and a contributor to the Canterbury Dictionary of Hymnology, she is also founder of the radio ministry Manag-awit Kita sa Dios. Married to Jerome, she is mother to four children, all bearing Cebuano names.
