EMQ » Jan – March 2025 » Volume 61 Issue 1

Waorani Worship Songs

Summary: God continues to work in the lives of the Waorani people of Ecuador. Recently, the community participated in a songwriting workshop to create new worship songs. Through translation challenges and cultural discoveries, we learned that authentic worship often means returning to traditional tunes while creating new meanings. Watch how God works when we let indigenous voices lead the way.

By Matt Connor and Rachelle Dell

The eastern jungle of Ecuador is home to about 3,000 Waorani people who traditionally lived as hunter-gatherers. Many have moved out to towns like Shell, on the edge of the jungle, forgoing their traditional lifestyles in favor of further education or increased opportunities. However, the majority of Waorani continue to live in isolated villages on their ancestral land in the rain forest.

Following the famous spearing of five missionaries in 1956, the Waorani first heard the gospel from missionaries who moved into their territory shortly afterwards. Upon hearing that God’s son was killed by humans and God extends forgiveness instead of insisting on revenge (as they had been doing), some individuals declared to their families, “I forbid you to avenge my death. I will live on God’s trail.”

The Waorani New Testament was completed in 1992, and most of the Waorani no longer engage in revenge killings, desiring to live at peace with their neighbors. Waorani Christians often say that if it had not been for the missionaries living with them “who knows what we would be like now.” While they continue to be grateful to those first missionaries, they often ask why the mission organizations continue to focus on the spearings in the 50s instead of what God is doing in their lives now.[i]

God is still at work in this community, and the church continues to mature. There is much to celebrate in what God is currently doing. For the past four years, I (Rachelle Dell) and my husband, Nate, have been meeting every Sunday with Waorani believers in Shell, Ecuador, a town near the traditional Waorani territory. I grew up with the Waorani, which has given me an understanding of Waorani context: its culture, music, and language.

The meeting uses a small songbook of 22 Waorani songs, most of which were composed by an American literacy worker who was part of the Waorani Bible translation team. Together with Waorani believers, we felt that it was time for new Waorani songs. We invited Matt Connor, a friend and ethnodoxologist working in Indonesia, to partner with us in a songwriting workshop for the Waorani. Matt has 10 years of experience conducting Scripture songwriting workshops in Indonesia.

Meñiwa Nenquimo, the leader of the Waorani meeting, graciously agreed to translate for Matt. During the workshop, the participants composed and recorded 15 songs that will be used in future Waorani Sunday meetings and made plans to continue writing more songs.

Abandoning Western Notions of Songwriting

Ethnodoxologists are trained to be very aware of musical differences, but the most important cultural differences often run so deep that they are almost invisible. In most Western cultures, songwriting is seen as a creative moment where an individual or group of individuals creates a new melody and lyrics. The new song is then written down and recorded, so it can be replicated in the future. This assumption can cause major confusion in many areas of the world where creation is understood in different ways.

After working as an ethnodoxologist for about five years in many different Indonesian cultures, I (Matt) moved to the eastern Indonesian province of Papua where I encountered a completely new way of looking at song composition. The Kosarek people,[ii] who live in the highlands of Papua, have a limited number of melodies from which to choose.^[iii]

When I led a Kosarek Scripture songwriting workshop in 2019, the songwriters wrote new lyrics to old tunes. Each tune had a specific meaning, so as soon as the tune started, everyone knew the topic of the song. The Kosarek have a specific tune for war, peace, history, etc.

The Waorani don’t create new tunes but rather compose or improvise new lyrics to old tunes, much like many Papuan groups. When we asked the Waorani participants to create new songs –unintentionally defined as new melody and new lyrics – the results were puzzling.

The songwriting teams worked hard at writing new songs, but the melodies were either vague and difficult for them to sing or exact replicas of other non-Waorani songs. Once it became clear that the Waorani don’t create new tunes, it became much easier for the participants to write songs, because we simply asked them to create new words to old tunes.

Many Western missionaries come from cultures that value innovative melodies. We often think reusing old tunes in music is boring. We should first remember that if we are truly successful in encouraging local musical expressions, the music may be so different from what we are accustomed to that we may not always enjoy it.

We should also recognize that all arts require both stable and malleable elements for successful communication.^[iv] Every artistic tradition has different elements that are stable and malleable. In the case of Papuan music, when the melody is very repetitive and predictable, the singers are able to improvise more quickly and participation is much easier.^[v]

Translation Problems

You may be wondering why we didn’t already know about the Waorani not creating new tunes by the second day of the workshop. On the first day of the workshop, we always explore local music. Unfortunately, the discussion about local music was fraught with misunderstanding, mostly because of translation issues.

I (Matt) was used to leading workshops in Indonesian, but I learned how quickly things can become complicated and misunderstood when using a translator. We didn’t discover until much later in the workshop that the Waorani word ämontamïni, loosely meaning “song,” has come to be associated with Quichua or Latin musical styles rather than traditional Waorani music. The Waorani word tode pe, “to chant and dance,” is more commonly used to mean traditional Waorani music.

It wasn’t until the fourth day of the five-day workshop that Rachelle began to wonder about these two words and discussed them with Meñiwa. I was teaching in English, and Meñiwa was translating the English words “song” or “music” as ämontamïni rather than tode pe. Things became much clearer when this misunderstanding was discovered. Then Meñiwa and I began understanding each other better.

Another major confusion was a result of our use of the English word “songwriting.” When native English speakers hear the word “songwriting” they don’t usually think of physically writing a song, but rather creating a song which may or may not be written down later. Meñiwa spent a few years in America, and his English is very good.

However, he translated “songwriting” using the Waorani word for “writing or carving” rather than creating. Most traditional Waorani song composition takes place at night while people sit in hammocks around the cooking fire.

The singer starts making up verses to one of the basic melodies and begins experimenting with sung speech and trying to make the lyrics rhyme. Songwriting workshops are already somewhat artificial, but if the participants are told to physically write a song without first creating them, it can feel very unnatural.

If you’re planning to use a translator to research an artistic tradition and encourage songwriting, it’s best to discuss specific key terms with your translator before the workshop even starts. We could have avoided a lot of confusion if we had done this with Meñiwa before ever starting the workshop.

Words that can easily cause problems include create, compose, song, and music. Once Meñiwa switched to using the term “to create or compose,” the participants were able to better understand.

Waorani Youth Live Between Worlds

We discovered that younger participants struggled more than older ones with composing songs. The rhythms, tunes, and repetitive nature of Waorani songs are very different from the music of other groups in Ecuador. In Ecuador’s stratified society, the Waorani inhabit the lowest rung. As a result, Waorani music is not generally respected outside the Waorani community.

Soon after Waorani contact with the outside world in the late 1950s, Quichua music began to take the place of traditional Waorani music. Quichua songs were often used in Waorani Christian gatherings and have been particularly popular with the teenagers and young adults in the villages who are trying to associate themselves more with other groups.

However, in those early days after first coming to Christ, few knew Spanish or Quichua. The songs had little meaning to them. Since Waorani music is so different from Quichua or Latin music, the Waorani also have difficulty singing outside-songs with any degree of proficiency. Recently there has been a movement to preserve Waorani music, language, dancing, and other traditions.

Most of the 20 young Waorani at the songwriting workshop were interested in learning traditional Waorani music. Five years ago, these same youth refused to even speak their own language. But after four years of meeting each Sunday and using only the Waorani Bible and Waorani worship songs, the youth have begun to use their own language again.

Although the Waorani youth have overcome some obstacles to using their own language, they still lack the proficiency in Waorani music to sing it well. As with many groups of young people today, the Waorani youth straddle two worlds – not particularly proficient in the language and musical expressions of either. Most of the younger participants at the workshop had been raised in towns like Shell, with limited exposure to traditional music. They listen primarily to Latino pop music and American or Australian worship music.

Their ability to learn Western tunes is limited, but they can heartily sing a traditional song once they hear it from an experienced singer. We encouraged them to create fusion from the two different kinds of music.[vi] Many of them came away from the workshop motivated to learn both traditional and outside music well enough to create fusion music.

Different Ways to Write a Scripture Song

During the 10 years I have lead Scripture songwriting workshops in Indonesia, most of the songs I’ve heard have been paraphrases or summaries of a portion of Scripture. My assumption was that the Waorani would follow this pattern.

On the fourth day of the week-long Waorani Scripture songwriting workshop, we asked the participants to put away their Bibles, pencils, and paper before creating their next Scripture song. The participants had been struggling to write songs, lacking the spontaneity and fun that usually accompanies songwriting workshops.

What puzzled us most was that Cawiya, the only experienced songwriter in the group, seemed to be having as much difficulty as everyone else. Cawiya was always making up songs, but for some reason he was now finding it difficult. After talking through the issue, we came up with a plan.

We asked Cawiya to just listen as Rachelle read the story of Peter walking on the water. After she had read the story twice, we asked Cawiya what the story meant to him and then encouraged him to create a song in response to the story. After a few minutes of explaining to us what the story meant to him, Cawiya broke into a beautiful song about the Spirit of God.

Cawiya responded to the story with a song that didn’t summarize the story or even reiterate what I (Matt) considered to be the main point of the passage. He sang a song about the Spirit of God being one, something that I never would have gleaned from this passage. We asked him if he could share his creative process with the rest of the group.

Cawiya’s song was simply a heartfelt response to the revelation of who God is and what Jesus did in this world. We then encouraged the participants to try composing a song in this way­­­ – without looking at their Bibles and without writing anything down.

A Rewarding Experience

Leading a songwriting workshop in Ecuador was so far out of our realm of experience. Matt and I (Rachelle) often felt like we were flying blind. Matt didn’t have the familiar Indonesian language and culture to help him communicate and make sense of what was happening. I and Meñiwa had never seen – much less led – a Scripture songwriting workshop.

Yet it also turned out to be one of the most educational and rewarding experiences of our work. Through it, Cawiya taught us that one way to write a Scripture song is simply to respond to God’s revelation. This fits so well into the pattern of revelation and response, which has been the backbone of Christian liturgy since the beginning of the church.^[vii]

More communities would benefit as we did from experiences like this. It celebrates local arts and culture and grows a community deeper in their faith with songs that will continue to reverberate praise to God for years to come.

Matt Connor (matt_connor@wycliffe.org) is a PhD candidate in the Worlds Arts program at Dallas International University. He has been working in Indonesia with Wycliffe Bible Translators for the past 20 years. He currently lives with his wife and four children in Papua, Indonesia where he leads Scripture songwriting workshops throughout the Indonesian archipelago.

Rachelle Dell (kigidell@gmail.com) lives and works in Shell, Ecuador. She was a missionary kid among the Waorani in Ecuador and continues to work with them. She and her husband run a training center for Indigenous groups. They have been missionaries for over 25 years.

[i] Many Waorani are distressed that this story from 70 years ago is still used to raise money for organizations that were either directly or indirectly involved. All of us in the mission community need to be more sensitive about how we communicate the work we do. For a balanced and well-researched history of Waorani contact with the mission community, see Long’s God in the Rainforest.

[ii] Find out more about the Kosarek people on the Joshua Project website:  https://joshuaproject.net/people_groups/print/15849/ID.

^[iii] Artur Simon, “Types and Functions of Music in the Eastern Highlands of West Irian,” Ethnomusicology 22, no. 3 (1978): 441–55.

^[iv] Brian Schrag, Artistic Dynamos: An Ethnography on Music in Central African Kingdoms, (Routledge, 2021).

^[v] Matt Connor, “Creativity, Liminality, and Metaphor in Songwriting,” Ethnodoxology 10 (2022): A61–A76.

[vi] I’ve often seen fusion music happen in workshops in Indonesia.

^[vii] Ron Man, Let Us Draw Near: Biblical Foundations of Worship, (Cascade Books, 2023).

EMQ, Volume 61, Issue 1. Copyright © 2025 by Missio Nexus. All rights reserved. Not to be reproduced or copied in any form without written permission from Missio Nexus. Email: EMQ@MissioNexus.org.