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Views from the Choir Loft

Music Conference in Rome (September 2018)

Fr. David Friel · July 7, 2018

HE VATICAN’S Pontifical Council for Culture (PCC) has announced that it is organizing another conference on sacred music this fall, in collaboration with the Pontifical Athenaeum Sant’Anselmo and the Pontifical Institute of Sacred Music. The PCC, which also organized a conference in March 2017, will host this event at Lumsa University in Rome.

The upcoming conference, scheduled for 13–15 September 2018, is entitled Church and Composers, Words and Sounds. The stated objective of this gathering is to consider the role of the composer in the life of the Church.

The announced program presents a wide range of speakers and topics, including:

“You heard the sound of words but saw no form:
there was only a voice (Dt 4:12)”

— Gianfranco Cardinal Ravasi
(President of the Pontifical Council for Culture)

“Historical Excursus: The Composing Style
of the Sistine Chapel for Papal Celebrations”

— Msgr. Massimo Palombella
(Director, Cappella Musicale Pontificia “Sistina”)

“Translations, Music and Composition”
— Archbishop Arthur Roche (Secretary, CDW)

“Composing for Christian Communities Today”
— John Rutter (Composer)

“Music and Philology”
— Thomas Forest Kelly
(Morton B. Knafel Research Professor of Music, Harvard University)

“Music and Formation” — Msgr. Vincenzo De Gregorio
(Head, Pontifical Institute of Sacred Music)

“‘I saw and heard the voices of many
around the throne’: the Pipe Organ”

— Simon Johnson
(Organist, St. Paul’s Cathedral, London)

“‘Praise him with the harp and . . . with the tambourine . . . ’
(Ps 150:3): Liturgical Inculturation and Musical Instruments”

— Fr. Olivier-Marie Sarr, OSB
(Liturgist, Pontifical Athenaeum Sant’Anselmo)

These proceedings are principally aimed at representatives of episcopal conferences and religious orders, musicians, curators of liturgical music, associations, and movements.

The three-day event will conclude with a concert in the Basilica Superiore at Assisi, within the context of the Francesco Siciliani Prize, an international competition for sacred music composition.

The March 2017 PCC conference was entitled Music and Church: Cult and Culture 50 Years after Musicam Sacram and included such speakers as Cardinal Ravasi, Michele Dall’Ongaro, Paul Inwood, Fr. Fergus Ryan, OP, and Fr. Jordi-A. Piqué, OSB. The acta of this conference have been published (Musica e Chiesa a 50 anni dalla Musicam Sacram) and are available here.

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

Filed Under: Articles Tagged With: Pontifical Institute Sacred Music Rome Last Updated: January 1, 2020

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About Fr. David Friel

Ordained in 2011, Father Friel served as Parochial Vicar at Saint Anselm Church in Northeast Philly before earning a doctorate in liturgical theology at The Catholic University of America. He presently serves as Vocation Director for the Archdiocese of Philadelphia.—(Read full biography).

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Quick Thoughts

19 May 2022 • “Trochee Trouble”

I’m still trying to decide how to visually present the “pure” Editio Vaticana scores, using what is (technically) the official rhythm of the Church. You can download my latest attempt, for this coming Sunday. Notice the “trochee trouble” as well as the old issue of neumes before the quilisma.

—Jeff Ostrowski
16 May 2022 • Harmonized Chant?

This year’s upcoming Sacred Music Symposium will demonstrate several ways to sing the CREDO at Mass. This is because—for many parishes—to sing a full-length polyphonic CREDO by Victoria or Palestrina is out of the question. Therefore, we show options that are halfway between plainsong and polyphony. You can hear my choir rehearsing a section that sounds like harmonized plainsong.

—Jeff Ostrowski
14 May 2022 • “Pure” Vatican Edition

As readers know, my choir has been singing from the “pure” Editio Vaticana. That is to say, the official rhythm which—technically—is the only rhythm allowed by the Church. I haven’t figured out how I want the scores to look, so in the meantime we’ve been using temporary scores that look like this. Stay tuned!

—Jeff Ostrowski

Random Quote

The local church should be conscious that church worship is not really the same as what we sing in a bar, or what we sing in a convention for youth.

— Francis Cardinal Arinze (2005)

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