Announcing Summer Chant Intensive 2015
Duquesne University – Pittsburgh, PA
June 23-26, 2015
The Chant Intensive lives up to its name: though no previous experience with chant is required, beginners and intermediate chanters should be prepared for full immersion from the start. You will learn or review how to read and fully navigate all aspects of traditional Gregorian notation (square notes) with a masterful teacher.
The course will also address correct Latin pronunciation, the sound and mystery of the eight Church modes, Psalm tones and their applications, questions concerning the rhythm of plainsong, and more. Compline will be sung to allow participants to experience the beauty of a portion of the sung Divine Office. Gregorian repertoire will be used for Divine Office, Mass and for a concert on Thursday evening.
The CMAA Summer Chant Intensive is intended for beginning and continuing students and all who love and appreciate the central role that chant plays as the prayerful song of the Roman Rite–not only at cathedrals and basilicas but in any parish. The conference will inspire and prepare participants to continue the renaissance of sacred music in our time, in both the ordinary and extraordinary forms of the Mass. In the years since the first CMAA Chant Intensive course was taught in 2008, hundreds of students have benefited from this in-depth course in Gregorian chant.
This summer’s course will be taught by instructor Wilko Brouwers, from the Netherlands, in one section including men and women. In addition to the sessions on chant, this year’s course will also offer breakout sessions by Dr. Ann Labounsky on organ improvisation, as well as a concert on Thursday evening combining chant and organ improvisation.
Breakout Detail
Organ Improvisation based on Gregorian Chant
Session 1 (Wednesday, June 24, 2015):
Demonstration of the modes and chant hymns on them with their harmonizations. Students with particular interest in this material will receive handouts prior to the first session.
Session 2 (Thursday, June 25, 2015):
Application of material from session one in simple improvisations for preludes, offertories, communions, and postludes based on the chant hymns used in the course.
Useful Links
Summer Chant Intensive 2015 Schedule
Course Description
General Information about the Hilton Garden Inn
Special Conference Rate at Hilton Garden Inn
Registration Form
Online registration and payment
Detailed Information about Duquesne’s Housing and Facilities
Maps of downtown Pittsburgh
Map of Duquesne University
Course Registration for Credit at Duquesne University
Downtown Made Easy in Pittsburgh
Transportation to and from the Pittsburgh airport
Instructions for Priests and Seminarians
Suitability Form for Priests
Suitability Form for Deacons
The intensive will begin on Tuesday afternoon, June 23rd, and conclude with a 12 p.m. chanted Votive Mass in the ordinary form on Friday, June 26 at the Duquesne University Chapel of the Holy Spirit. The sung Mass will include Mass Ordinaries and the Gregorian propers for a Votive Mass.
Registration Information
Mail-in and online registration can be completed now. To register by mail and pay by check, complete the registration form and mail to CMAA, PO Box 4344, Roswell, NM 88202. The discount code for members has been sent to our member list by email. Please contact Janet Gorbitz or Mary Weaver or call 505-263-6298 for questions about your member discount code if you have not received it.
Registration is Now Closed
Tuition includes all sessions and materials as well as snacks and Dinner on Tuesday. You will receive all course materials including the Parish Book of Chant upon arrival. The week’s events will culminate with Mass at the Duquesne University Chapel, after which an optional closing lunch will be served.
Early Registration (deadline: March 31) for CMAA members is $300, including nonrefundable deposit of $75. Non-member price is $350. Payment must be made in full by March 31 to receive this rate.
Regular Registration (deadline: May 31) for CMAA members is $350, including nonrefundable deposit of $75. Non-member price is $400. Payment must be made in full by May 31 to receive this rate.
Space is limited for this course, but late registrations will be accepted if space is available after 5/31/15. The late registration fee is $50. UPDATE: Registration is now closed.
Meal Plan
An optional meal plan is available that includes breakfast (Wednesday – Friday), Lunches (Wednesday – Thursday) and Dinner on Thursday for $85. Wednesday dinner is on your own.
An optional Final Lunch after the Friday Mass is available for $25.
Dormitory accommodations will be available again to CMAA program attendees this summer. With easy walking distance to classrooms, chapel, dining facilities and other campus amenities, the reasonable rates and convenience of Vickroy Hall (Address: 1345 Vickroy Street, Pittsburgh, PA 15219) will make the dorms very attractive to our registrants. Dorm rooms are arranged in a suite arrangement, with two rooms sharing a bath. Complimentary wi-fi will be available in the dormitories. Login and Password information to be provided. Registrants may choose either single or double occupancy in the dorms. Room rates are $50/night single occupancy or $40/night for double occupancy. Take a look at the general appearance and layout of the dorm rooms on this Dorm flyer. All residence halls are air-conditioned. The University is patrolled by sworn officers 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
On-campus parking is available in the Forbes Avenue Parking garage for all guests. The garage is covered and centrally located on campus. Guests may park in the garage on a cash basis or a parking permit may be established for their stay on campus. It is recommended that you park in the garage on cash basis when you arrive and then visit the parking office during regular office hours to purchase your parking pass for the duration of your stay.
Parking Rates
Rates subject to change, printed rates are not guaranteed.
Weekday Parking: $12.00
Evening and Weekend Parking (after 5pm): $ 6.00
For any participants with mobility issues, there is handicapped parking available at Duquesne University around campus. You can find out where those parking spaces are located by visiting the Duquesne University website here. These spaces do require the purchase of a surface parking pass at the parking office. Rates are the same for surface parking passes as for parking garage passes. Guests must have a handicapped tag or plate to make use of these surface tags.
Two payment options are available:
Payment by check, with $75 deposit due now and the balance due by March 31, 2015. If paying by check, please complete the registration form and send it with your deposit. Checks should be made payable to CMAA and mailed to CMAA Programs, P.O. Box 4344, Roswell, NM 88202. Add $25 if you need the special meals option.*
Accommodations and other information
Other Suggested Accommodations
HOTEL ACCOMMODATIONS are also available at the Hilton Garden Inn, University Place, 3454 Forbes Avenue, Pittsburgh, PA 15213, telephone: 1-412-683-2040. Rooms are available at the special conference price of $134 per room per night, plus tax, for single or double rooms, up to occupancy of four per room. Make your reservation before June 8th, 2015 to get the special group rate.
Amenities include free internet in all guest rooms and valet parking at $7 per day (discounted from $18/day). The property includes a business center with complimentary printing and printer, fitness center, full service restaurant, bar, complimentary beverage area and complimentary shuttle service within a 3-mile radius. This hotel is not within easy walking distance of Duquesne University, so guests staying at the Hilton should plan to use the hotel shuttle, public transportation or their own vehicle to attend the events on the Duquesne campus.
To register for hotel accommodations at this special rate, access our event reservation page.
Online Registration
Registration is now closed.
E-mail Janet Gorbitz or Mary Weaver or call 505-263-6298 for questions about your member discount code. If you sign up as a non-member, you will not receive your $50 discount.
Cancellation: Requests received in writing at the CMAA Office by June 8 will receive a refund less the nonrefundable $75 deposit. Refunds will be processed after the Chant Intensive course has concluded. Any requests for cancellation after June 8 will only be processed if a replacement from the waiting list is able to take your place. We expect this course to fill quickly, so don’t delay.
Faculty
Wilko Brouwers of the Netherlands will be the instructor for the Chant Intensive course this summer. He has taught both chant and polyphony at the CMAA Colloquia since 2004 and has developed a loyal following among CMAA program attendees. We are indeed fortunate that his schedule will allow him to also teach this course.
Wilko Brouwers has conducted the Monteverdi Kamerkoor Utrecht since 1989 and the Strijps Kamerkoor Eindhoven since 2004. He is also currently the director of the Gregorian Schola of St. Benedictus Abbey in Achel, Belgium, a post he has held for the last eight years. His original compositions have been published and recorded.
As a music educator, Wilko Brouwers teaches choral conducting at the Utrecht Art Center in the Netherlands. Internationally, he has taught workshops on Gregorian chant in Auburn, Alabama, Still River, Massachusetts, and Pamplona, Spain. Brouwers is the author of Stepping Tones, a method of sight reading for elementary schools and children’s choirs based on the Ward Method. His Words with Wings: Gregorian Chant for Children in Twenty Lessons has been published by the Church Music Association of America, with both student and teacher’s workbooks and demonstration CDs. Brouwers also writes on chant, music education, vocal training, and choral repertoire for a number of Dutch and European music journals.
Dr. Ann Labounsky is widely known, both in the United States and in Europe, as a virtuoso performer and improviser at the organ and particularly as a leading American disciple of Jean Langlais. From 1962 to 1964 she lived and studied in Paris as a Fulbright scholar. There, as an organ student of André Marchal and Jean Langlais, she immersed herself in the French organ tradition, studying many of Langlais’s organ compositions with the composer, and playing them for him on the organ at Sainte-Clotilde. In 1964, as Langlais’s student at the Schola Cantorum, she was awarded Diplôme de Virtuosité with Mention Maximum in both performance and improvisation, the first American organist to be so honored.
Labounsky has been a frequent concert performer on two continents, including a number of recitals on the organ at Sainte-Clotilde. Her performances have been broadcast over the French National Radio, as well as public radio stations in the United States. Her undergraduate and graduate degrees in organ were earned at the Eastman School of Music and the University of Michigan. She also holds the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Musicology from the University of Pittsburgh. She is the author of a biography of Langlais, Jean Langlais: The Man and His Music, (Amadeus Press, 2000). In celebration of the centennial of Jean Langlais in 2007, the Los Angeles Chapter of the American Guild of Organists produced a DVD entitled Life and Music of Jean Langlais for which she was the narrator and performer at the Pasadena Presbyterian Church in Pasadena, California.
Labounsky holds the position of Organ Artist in Residence at First Lutheran Church in Pittsburgh. For more information about Dr. Labounsky, visit her website.
Graduate and undergraduate music students may receive credit for their attendance at CMAA Colloquia and Chant Intensive courses.
Recommended Text, available for purchase at the course: Gregorian Missal or Graduale Romanum. Please bring your own copy or make plans to purchase one at registration.
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