T GIVES ME GREAT pleasure today to share with our readership about an exciting new adventure in the field of sacred music already underway in the Archdiocese of Kansas City, Kansas—the Catholic Academy of Sacred Music. But first, a bit of the story leading up to the Academy. As many of you know, I’m the Director of Music at MOST PURE HEART OF MARY CATHOLIC CHURCH in Topeka, Kansas, as well as the founder and director of the Most Pure Heart of Mary Schola Cantorum. The Schola Cantorum, already in its 14th year (!) has educated hundreds of students ages eight through eighteen, but serves children mainly from our parish and from the surrounding community. Over the years, I have heard from parents who wished they lived closer so their children could be a part of the choir. I have also heard from music directors and priests who wished they had something like this in their parishes and surrounding communities—but no one was available who could lead such an endeavor.
Founding the Academy (2 of 8) • Then in the summer of 2021 a homeschooling mother and father of a large family 30 minutes from my home asked if I would be willing to drive to their home and teach sacred music to their children, as well as to the children of a number of other homeschooling families in the area, and thus was brought together a rather large group of choral enthusiasts (and even a few choral un-enthusiasts, whose parents thought the experience would be good for them) who met weekly to tackle a little bit of this and a little bit of that, mostly Gregorian chant and very simple hymns and polyphony. Three years later around 100 people meet weekly to continue this adventure, which now includes folk-singing, music theory and aural training both in chant and modern notation and lots of fantastic sacred choral music. Four young men from the community take organ lessons and two of them already accompany their parish choir on occasion.
Founding the Academy (3 of 8) • I love this kind of work and have always felt so blessed that the good Lord has allowed me to “play” instead of work for my livelihood and has allowed me to indulge my long standing hobby of sacred music to the point of being paid for it. Of course this hobby involves hours of “researching” choirs all over the world thanks to the internet and YouTube, and long ago I realized just how amazing the English choral tradition is. This isn’t to say I don’t highly esteem the German tradition (which is also amazing) or American sacred music. If the music is good, by all means I want it. But what struck me so deeply about the English tradition was the English commitment to singing the daily liturgical round of Masses and Offices, absent almost entirely from other traditions who tend to stick to Sundays, Feast Days and the one off major celebrations. Westminster Cathedral and the Metropolitan Cathedral in Liverpool and many other Catholic (and of course Anglican) institutions in the UK take on an incredible burden when they make a commitment to such a liturgical life, and this is what impressed me so much.
Founding the Academy (4 of 8) • One such institution that quickly came to my attention was the Cathedral and Diocese of Leeds and its Schools Singing Programme, launched just over 20 years ago in an effort to bring music, and especially sacred music, to children all over its diocese. The diocese reaches more than 6,000 children weekly. The program is now being launched in all the dioceses throughout England and Scotland, and nationally works with 17,000 students weekly. I long harbored a desire to find out as much as possible about this program and bring it to my area in order to reach more children.
Founding the Academy (5 of 8) • It so happened that one of my first choristers graduated with a master degree in organ performance from Notre Dame in the summer of 2022 and returned to our parish to marry a lifelong friend, and the two happily decided to settle down not five blocks from the parish. Guided by another long long friend who works with non-profits, I launched the Catholic Academy of Sacred Music that same summer, partly so that I could raise funds in order to hire my former student to help me with the Schola Cantorum, but also with the plan in mind to eventually expand the work of the Schola Cantorum to other groups and parishes, to create a “Schools Singing Programme” right here in the midwest. Through the financial help of the newly formed Catholic Academy of Sacred Music, my assistant began working with me in October of 2022, her first priority being to develop a systematic manner of teaching sight-singing and ear training to our choristers. While I have always striven to teach these skills to choristers, I can’t claim to be the most systematic of people, and therefore my system wasn’t easy replicated by others, and to be honest it had some holes in it. We made great strides from 2022-2023 and continue to do so.
Founding the Academy (6 of 8) • In the late spring of 2023 I approached the board of directors of the Catholic Academy with the idea of visiting Leeds, England, to observe the Schools Singing Programme at work, and the board was excited to make it happen. Ben Saunders, head of the UK Schools Singing Programme was incredibly gracious and acceded to my request, and as a result, my assistant and I spent 2 weeks in England last June—one week in Leeds and one week in Liverpool, London and Cambridge. During our time in Leeds we met with Ben Saunders and Thomas Leech to discuss their work with the Schools Singing Programme and how they taught music to children in their various schools. They graciously shared everything the do (and how they do it) with us and spent time observing their teachers in various schools around the area. We also made our way to Choral Evensong at York, Durham and Ripon (click here for an account of the fantastic program at Ripon), as well as Choral Vespers and Benediction at the Oratory in York (I apologize to the good fathers in York for shamelessly walking out of their church with copies of their Vespers booklets, etc., smiling as I passed the priest and the sign that said materials were not to leave the church. Just know that they have been put to good use across the pond!)
Founding the Academy (7 of 8) • From there we made our way to the Metropolitan Cathedral in Liverpool, whose musicians do something similar to those in Leeds, teaching sacred music to youth across the archdiocese. We arrived in time to attend an archdiocesan Mass for 1,000 school children who take part in the music program. Afterward we spent the next day with Chris McElroy, director of music at the cathedral, discussing the cathedral choir and choristers, attending rehearsals and Masses, as well as a chorister audition.
Founding the Academy (8 of 8) • From Liverpool we made our way London, with a special afternoon trip to Cambridge. In London we heard Palestrina’s Missa Papae Marcaelli twice, first at Westminster Abbey on the Feast of Sts. Peter and Paul and the following Sunday at Westminster Cathedral. We also attended Mass at the Brompton Oratory (Charles Cole and the Oratory Schola Cantorum) and Choral Evensong at St. Paul’s. However, special mention must needs go to St. John’s College Choir, Cambridge. We queued for Evensong at St. John’s for two reasons:
(a) there was no Choral Evensong at King’s College during our time in Cambridge; and
(b) from everything I’ve ever read and heard, George Guest, the director of the choir at St. John’s from the mid 50s to the early 90s was arguably one of the greatest choirmasters to every draw breath in England, and I wanted to hear the choir he made famous.
As we made our way through the quadrangle to the chapel I recognized the buildings from pictures and interviews with George Guest I had seen, and the same happened as I entered the chapel—it all seemed slightly familiar. But what I will never forget is the moment the choir first gave voice. The sound was like nothing I had ever heard before—it wasn’t of this earth. This all sounds rather hyperbolic, but I assure the reader that whatever I write is an underestimation of the sound of St. John’s College Choir. My assistant and I both turned toward each other the first second we heard them, in amazement and in expectation for the rest we were about to hear and we weren’t disappointed. I chanced to walk past the choir director on my way out and mentioned how utterly incredible the choir was and he looked slightly surprised! Perhaps he has gotten so used to it that he has forgotten what mere mortals sound like!
What did we learn from the trip? • I believe the greatest lesson we learned from the trip is that we didn’t learn anything earth shattering. What I mean is that not only were we already pointed in the right direction, but we were also well along the path in terms of how we train our choristers and the sound we have developed in them. Yes, we can tweak many things we do and I am happy to say those things are already having a marvelous effect. At the same time, we have to learn to trust in the process. It takes time to create a great choral sound from scratch.
The Catholic Academy of Sacred Music is Fully Underway • Following our trip to England the CASM launched out to two completely new foundations within the archdiocese, one in Kansas City and the other in Atchison, home to the well known Benedictine College. We have also brought the Most Pure Heart of Mary Schola Cantorum as well as our Paxico choir under the auspices of the CASM, which allows us to work with around 200 children each week throughout the archdiocese. I can honestly say we now have our very own “Schools Singing Programme” in the state of Kansas, with plans to expand with a fifth group in the fall of 2024.
How We Work With Each Group • The Most Pure Heart of Mary Schola Cantorum is still our flagship program, which in all honesty functions like an English cathedral choir program. Choristers practice four times a week and sing weekly for Sunday Mass and four choral vespers throughout the week. These children can tackle almost anything one might find in the cathedral repertoire, from chant to 2oth century music, and are only held back from singing complete choral Masses because of the unfortunate and mistaken view that active participation on the part of the congregation requires them to sing every piece of music sung at Mass. As we return to a healthy view of “actual participation” within the sacred liturgy, our choristers will bring to life greater portions of Catholic sacred music. Work with the three other choirs follows a similar training program but at a slower pace due to the constraints of practice time and lighter performance schedules. Nevertheless, they are developing into fine groups of musicians, and each choir is taking on appropriate musical work within its parish. Every rehearsal is two hours long and follows a similar pattern. The first half hour involves singing real folk music simply for the enjoyment of it. I learned long ago that if we hope to have great choirs and great music in church, we have to build up musical societies, and building a stable repertoire of real folk music is the foundation of such a musical society. I also discovered that regular folk singing from an early age trains a child’s ear in such a way that those families who often sing at home generally produce children who not only match pitch, but who possess much better musical ears on average. The second half hour is devoted to sight-singing and ear training, using simple chants and hymns, both familiar as well as unknown, in order to build the choristers’ skills and confidence, while the last hour is devoted to rehearsing repertoire for various Masses and concerts.
Onward and Upward! • Last Sunday the Catholic Academy of Sacred Music presented its first concert in order to showcase the work that children can accomplish in a short matter of time, and I must say it was a resounding success, everything from Allegri’s MISERERE MEI to the 10-year-old boy playing Bach. I must say it was incredibly satisfying to watch in amazement as those in the audience realized what young people are capable of and I look forward to all the ways in which Our Lord will use the program for His glory in future.
Photographs courtesy of Mike Cerny.
