Repertoire selections at this year’s Sacred Music Colloquium in Salt Lake City are numerous and varied. The much-awaited music packet will be appearing online at MusicaSacra.com/colloquium in two weeks. In the meantime, a sneak preview is at hand; and what a sneak preview it is. Matthew Curtis of Choral Tracks, tenor and award-winning ensemble Chanticleer’s assistant music director, has made practice recordings for all the polyphonic works that will be performed at this year’s Colloquium. By clicking here, you will be able to listen to individual and combined vocal parts of the many Masses and motets you will be learning during your week in Salt Lake City; Monteverdi, Vierne, Morales, Elgar, Croce, and more. Choral Tracks is ingenious. How many times have you wished there were recordings available for your choir; practice recordings to help them get the job done just a bit quicker? Matthew Curtis provides you with just this – at a nominal fee! His voice is always warm, smooth, and his renditions are well balanced and meticulously recorded. His work is much more than functional. You may end up listening to the recordings just because they are beautiful. Bookmark this page at Choral Tracks and be ready to get busy singing once the music packet is released.
Sequence for Pentecost: Veni Sancte Spiritus
We sing a sequence this coming Sunday! If this will be your first time attempting the Latin, here’s a video to help you and your choir learn it:
Organ Crawl at Colloquium Includes Mormon Tabernacle
Starting at 7:30pm on Wednesday, June 27, an optional tour of local organs will center around the famous 1948 Aeolian-Skinner organ, with its iconic 1867 façade, in the Mormon Tabernacle. Considered one of the finest examples of “American classic” organ building, it is also one of the largest organs in the world with just over 200 ranks and 11,600+ pipes. Additional optional instruments to see at Temple Square are the monumental 2003 V/130 Schoenstein in the Conference Center, and the 1983 III/65 mechanical-action Sipe organ in the Assembly Hall.
Organ Music At Colloquium XXII
Below is a preview. There’s still time to register for the Sacred Music Colloquium if you want to be there to experience this great repertoire live.
Tuesday, June 26, 5:15 pm Mass
Jonathan Ryan, organist
Likely dating from the end of Bach’s Weimar period as court organist (1708-1717), the somber Fantasy & Fugue in C Minor, BWV 537 represents a growth in Bach’s free-form composition to include works of more poignancy than virtuosity. Indeed, the opening exclamatio figure of an ascending minor sixth that forms the imitative basis for the Fantasy yields a work of extraordinary surprises and highly forward-looking harmonies. The notable chromaticism of the Fantasy gives way to an exclusively chromatic secondary theme in the Fugue, heard first in the middle “B” section, and then in combination with the declamatory primary theme.
Also from the Weimar years, but around 1710, the Pièce d’Orgue, BWV 572, also termed “Preludio” and “Fantasie,” stands as a unique work in the Baroque organ repertoire. Not paired with a fugue, this étude in harmony consists of three sections, Très vitement-Gravement-Lentement, and perhaps owes its French title to the weighty middle Gravement section whose nearly endless deceptive cadences and chromaticism closely resemble the Grand Jeu movements of the French Baroque.
Thursday, June 28, 5:15 pm Mass
Ann Labounsky, organist
Like Nicolas DeGrigny, Jean Titelouze (1562-1633), spent most of his life outside of Paris and the court life in the smaller town of Rouen in Normandy where he was a priest and organist of the Cathedral . His entire opus comprises variations on eleven familiar Gregorian chant hymns (1624) and Magnificat settings (1626) which were performed in alternation between the choir and the organ. The style is exemplary of the vocal renaissance period yet idiomatic for the organ with well defined voice-leading and pedal parts that employ strict imitation and canon. Unlike his successors such as Couperin and DeGrigny, he was not influenced by the French court dances such as the minuet and gigue.
Friday, June 29, 5:15 pm Mass
Jonathan Ryan, organist
Eight years after completing his Second Symphony, Vierne, in the summer of 1911, returned to writing the Third of his Six Organ Symphonies. Demonstrating Vierne’s stylistic development at the time, the Troisième Symphonie in F-sharp Minor is noted for its comparatively compact yet memorable nature. Perhaps the emotional center of the work, the fourth of five movements, the sublime Adagio, hearkens back to César Franck in its soaring yet meditative melody, highly chromatic harmony, and frequently vague rhythm. The Finale, true to organ-symphony form, launches immediately as a quintessential, fiery toccata with its first, rhythmically charged theme heard at the outset surrounded by a restless accompaniment. The second theme, by contrast, is more lyrical, but seems unable to achieve any true lyricism in its turbulent surroundings. The first theme ultimately brings the movement to a thrilling conclusion in F-sharp Major.
Saturday, June 30, 11:00 am Mass
Doug O’Neil, organist
Marcel Dupré was famous for performing organ concerts throught the world, but also left a legacy of music suitable for the church. He composed Offrande à la Vierge (Offering to the Virgin) in 1944. The third movement is titled “Virgo mediatrix” and refers to Mary’s traditional role in the church as a mediator in salvation.
Charles Tournemire, unlike many of his contemporaries, concentrated his life’s work principally on music for the liturgy, culminating in his massive organ cycle L’Orgue Mystique for the liturgical year, specifically for use during the Mass, and almost entirely based on plainchant. Tournemire was also perhaps the first great organ improviser of the 20th century, and made many 78-RPM recordings of this art. His student Maurice Duruflé later transcribed five of these improvisations, selecting two free improvisations, and three based on plainchant: the hymn “Te Deum laudamus,” the Easter sequence “Victimae paschali laudes,” and this piece on the Marian hymn “Ave maris stella.” It is the legacy of a great musician fully and humbly devoted to his work for the church.
Sunday, July 1, 11:00 am Mass
Horst Buchholz, organist
Seemingly preceding the 20th-century minimalist movement by centuries, a chaconne centers itself around comparatively slim musical material, namely, a repeating harmonic progression, to create a series of continuous variations. One of Buxtehude’s three “ostinato” organ works, the Chaconne in C Minor utilizes a four-measure harmonic progression to yield a piece of extraordinary variety, intimacy, and drama, perhaps giving just insight to J.S. Bach’s captivation with the North German Baroque master.
Are You Singing the Creed?
How many parishes are actually singing the Creed? Directives say that the Creed is to be sung, yet I’ve rarely come upon a congregation that sings it regularly. My own parish does not. More often than not, when I have heard it, it has been in traditionally-minded parishes, and what is usually sung is Credo III. How about a really scientific survey – right here. Who is singing the Creed? In Latin? In English? And which one?
Chant and Improvisation in the Liturgy
Jenny Donelson, CMAA Academic Liaison, on an upcoming conference:
Esteemed organist and pedagogue Dr. Ann Labounsky and the music department at Duquesne are partnering with the CMAA to present a conference on the subject of improvisation:
The Aesthetics and Pedagogy of Charles Tournemire: Chant and Improvisation in the LiturgyOctober 21-23, 2012 at Duquesne University in Pittsburgh, PA
Our model? A man steeped in chant and the liturgical traditions of the Church: Charles Tournemire.
In his time, Tournemire’s work as an improviser was well-known throughout the world, and myriad students flocked to him to learn the craft. Being steeped in the French symphonic tradition, having studied Dom Guéranger’s Liturgical Year, served as organist for decades at Ste. Clotilde in Paris, and being keenly interested in the role of the organist as a theological commentator on the action of the liturgy, Tournemire’s shadow rightly extends to this day in his writings, recordings, and lineage of students.
The revitalization of sacred music in our time must take into account not only Gregorian chant and polyphonic choral music, but also the proper role of the organ at Mass, and this role essentially includes improvisation. It’s our hope that this conference will make a significant contribution towards understanding that role through the lens of Tournemire’s magnificent example.
The location? A city filled with a large number of wonderful organs and a wonderful cast of French organ scholars and experts. Pittsburgh is really an ideal location for a conference like this, thanks in no small part to the work and teaching of organists like Ann Labounsky and Robert Sutherland Lord. More information on attending the conference will be forthcoming in June, but for now we’re accepting proposals for papers and recitals that relate to the topic. More information on the conference and the submission process are available here.
The conference will explore the aesthetic, liturgical, theoretical, and technical principles of Tournemire’s improvisations and teachings on improvisation, the use of Gregorian chant in organ improvisation, the role of organ improvisations in the Catholic liturgy, and pedagogical approaches to teaching organ improvisation. It will include liturgies, opportunities for the study of improvisation at the organ, discussion groups, and recital programs and papers relating to the conference theme. Join us!
What Are The Numbers Telling Us?
Here are some statistics to keep you entertained on a Tuesday afternoon. As of today, May 8, the percentages of Colloquium registrations from each state in the U.S. looks like this (just some highlights): Utah, our host state, comes in at 6%; New York comes in at 3% (Come on folks, everyone else is making the trip west…); Florida comes in at 9% (Lots of Floridians!); California comes in at a whopping 22%; Nevada comes in at 8%; Illinois stands at 15%, and Texas comes in at 11%. Number of clergy registered (as of today): 12; Number of religious sisters: 4; Number of people named Jeffrey: 3; Number of people from outside the contiguous U.S.: 7; If you haven’t registered yet, consider taking your place in the pie chart! Registration for the Sacred Music Colloquium in Salt Lake City is open for twelve more days.