Polly Cornelius performs at book reading with Terry Tempest Williams in Minnesota

Polly Butler Cornelius was invited to perform this winter alongside award-winning author and conservationist Terry Tempest Williams.This event was sponsored by Common Good Books, and held March 11 at the Weyerhauser Chapel on the campus of Macalester College in Saint Paul, Minn.

Tempest Williams read from and discussed her new book, When Women Were Birds, and Cornelius, along with percussionists Heather Barringer and Erick Barsness, performed composer Steve Heitzeg’s Wild Mercy. A setting of Terry Tempest WIlliams’ poem, Wild Mercy was written in honor of the Arctic National WIldlife Refuge. The critically acclaimed piece is scored for soprano, Yupik frame drum and two Beluga Whale jawbones.