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“What earlier generations held as sacred, remains sacred and great for us too…” Pope Benedict XVI (7 July 2007)

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Views from the Choir Loft

Does Watershed Make A Difference?

Jeff Ostrowski · September 13, 2017

4450 picture S YOU KNOW, all of us here at Watershed are volunteers. We have no staff and no salaries. Every so often, my fellow bloggers and I wonder if we are making an impact on the “real world.”

Here’s something powerful we recently received from Maryland:

Dear Corpus Christi Watershed,

I wanted to send a note to tell you what an incredible blessing your webpage and blog have been to me.

I am a vocalist and have been all my life. I am very studied, though I have no formal degree in music (in high school, thinking I’d never pay the bills with music, I got a degree in something else that makes no money and required a Master’s degree for employment!). I am an educator by trade. When I had my first child, I quit working full time but was asked shortly after to cantor at my parish—I wasn’t even fully Catholic at the time! Through much prayer, I discerned God was calling me to lead my parish’s music program when our brand new pastor came to our parish in 2013. I was hired as a part-time music director in early 2014 (right before finishing RCIA and being received into the Church at Easter Vigil).

For the past 3.5 years, I have been systematically implementing much of the good advice and practice I’ve gleaned from reading Views from the Choir Loft and endlessly exploring the Watershed website. Formerly our parish had folk Masses, Breaking Bread Missals, a volunteer choir that didn’t formally practice, and cantors only at big events. Now we have mostly organ-led Masses every weekend and feast, a more traditional Missal and Hymnal—allowing us to implement the communion antiphon—a regularly meeting and practicing choir, and (last year) we regularly sang in 2-part harmonies!

This past spring, you re-posted the Polyphonic rehearsal videos on Facebook and I knew I had to take advantage of that golden resource. Our county’s deanery planned a Fatima pilgrimage: a celebration the 13th of the month for six straight months at a different parish around the county. I knew when I saw those rehearsal videos that we had to utilize them for our turn (which was tonight).

I have an all-female choir of about 8 dedicated women who sing every Sunday. During Christmas and Easter I convene a “festival choir” and get a few more volunteers to make our bigger Masses more special. So, I recruited another 15 men and women to join us for tonight’s Mass, using music almost entirely from your page:

—Guerrero’s Missa Iste Sanctus

—Hymn to Mary

—Hail, Holy Queen

—A communion antiphon for the Marian Mass we chose that Richard Rice whipped up for me when I cried for help on the CMAA page a few days ago!

—Filled out the time with a few well known Marian and Eucharistic hymns.

We had about 250-300 in attendance (full for our little parish). It was a huge success! My pastor was blown away at the beauty of the Mass setting by Guerrero. The people in attendance were just floored by how the 4-part choir enhanced the Mass. To quote our priest and echoed by others, they felt “like we were in heaven.” One older gentleman and his wife approached me after Mass and thanked me for the pleasant surprise. He said “I already knew I was going to witness the miracle of the Blessed Sacrament tonight, but never did I think I’d open a program and see the MISSA ISTE SANCTUS.”

I just cannot thank you enough for how much your ministry has helped me grow and helped me introduce my parish to the incredible sounds that the human voice is capable of. I hope you’ll share some of my story on your blog and social media to encourage others to get out of their comfort zone and try beautiful things in their liturgies! My only regret is that with the stress of the night, I didn’t get any video or audio to send to Jeff Ostrowski so he could he could hear how all his soprano singing was worth it—to see little old ladies and scared young tenors singing sacred polyphony for the first time in their lives!


For whatever reason, these last two weeks have been full of heavy crosses.

A letter like this was so gratifying to receive!

Opinions by blog authors do not necessarily represent the views of Corpus Christi Watershed.

Filed Under: Articles Last Updated: January 1, 2020

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About Jeff Ostrowski

Jeff Ostrowski holds his B.M. in Music Theory from the University of Kansas (2004). He resides with his wife and children in Los Angeles.—(Read full biography).

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Corpus Christi Watershed

Quick Thoughts

    “Glory To God” • (For Choir + Congregation)
    I wish to thank everyone for the nice comments I received vis-à-vis my Glory To God setting for Choir & Congregation. A gentleman with a musical doctorate from Indiana University wrote: “Love this setting so much. And I will pray, as you asked, for your return to composition more fully. You are very very good.” A female choir director wrote: “I love your harmonizations, your musicality, and the wonderful interplay you have with dissonance and consonance in your music. So fun to listen to, and great for intellect, heart, and soul!”
    —Jeff Ostrowski
    William Byrd • “Mass for Five Voices”
    Our volunteer choir is learning the “Sanctus” from William Byrd’s Mass for Five Voices. You can hear a short excerpt (recorded last Sunday) but please ignore the sound of babies crying: Mp3 recording. We still have work to do—but we’re on the right track. Once we have some of the tuning issues fixed, I desire to use it as an example proving volunteers can sing complicated polyphony.
    —Jeff Ostrowski
    “Baptism” • A Unique Hymn
    Father Christopher Phillips is the founding Pastor of Our Lady of the Atonement Catholic Church. One of his hymns is unique and (in my humble opinion) quite beautiful. His hymn is basically a prayer to the Holy Trinity but also speaks of Baptism and the Holy Eucharist. It would be an ideal Communion hymn on Trinity Sunday or the feast of the Baptism of the Lord. You can hear live recording from last Sunday by clicking here.
    —Jeff Ostrowski

Random Quote

Don Fernando de las Infantas wrote to the Pope, trying to get him to stop Palestrina from corrupting all the plainsong editions: “The errors which certain musicians, in all good faith, think they have found in plainchant are not errors at all, but on the contrary contain some of the most beautiful musical passages ever written.”

— Don Fernando de las Infantas (1578 A.D.)

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Corpus Christi Watershed is a 501(c)3 public charity dedicated to exploring and embodying as our calling the relationship of religion, culture, and the arts. This non-profit organization employs the creative media in service of theology, the Church, and Christian culture for the enrichment and enjoyment of the public.