Author Archives: SacredMusic

The CMAA is pleased to announced a 100-year anniversary edition of a great classic of exposition on the meaning, purpose, and practice of Catholic sacred music. Its author is Richard R. Terry, the great English choirmaster, director of music at Westminster Cathedral, and polyphony scholar of the late 19th century. His 1907 book is called: Catholic Church Music. It covers rubrics, makes a case for the old styles, explains what is wrong with contemporary music (in 1907!), provides a model for forming and training a choir, details the use of the organ, and provides fascinating historical detail to what happened to polyphony during the reign of Elizabeth.

Scott Turkington considers this book to be the single most important short work on Catholic choral music. The pace is quick and the book is remarkably entertaining. This is an invaluable work from a world-class, world-historic genius in the Catholic tradition. This softcover book is 218 pages.

Here it is in free download

Here it is in print.

Classes in chant and the famed Ward method will be offered by the International Centre for Ward Method Studies at the Benjamin T. Rome School of Music at the Catholic University of America. Classes run from June 25 to July 13, 2007, and can be taken for credit or non-credit. Offered on a rotational basis, this summer’s lineup includes:
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WARD METHOD – COURSE I
MTWRF 9:30am – 12:30 p.m.
MUS 543 : 3 credits; Tuition : $2,100
SMUS 543 : Non-credit workshop; Tuition : $500
Instructor : Nancy Fazio, M.F.A.Lower School music teacher, Stone Ridge School of the Sacred Heart, Bethesda, MD
Prerequisite: ability to sing on pitch.

WARD METHOD – COURSE II
MTWRF 1:30 – 4:30 p.m.
MUS 544 : 3 credits; Tuition : $ 2,100
SMUS 544 : Non-credit workshop; Tuition : $500
Instructor : Amy Zuberbueler, M.Mus.Ed. Director, Ward Centre, San Antonio, Texas
Prerequisite : successful completion of MUS 543 and consent of instructor/director; experience in teaching Ward I strongly recommended.

WARD METHOD – COURSE IV:
GREGORIAN CHANT PRACTICUM I
MTWRF 9:30am-12:30pm
MUS 547 : 3 credits; Tuition : $2,100
SMUS 547 : Non-credit workshop; Tuition : $500
Instructor : Scott Turkington, organist/choirmaster at St John the Evangelist Roman Catholic Church, Stamford, Conn..

More information available by writing.

We are so pleased to offer Music Third Year, by Justine Ward, as a free download and also in print. This completes the collection of classic Ward editions, the series based on the method that trained several generations of singers based on the Solesmes approach to chant. Justine Ward turned this into the foundation of a complete music education.

Music Third Year explores more complicated scales and introduces polyphonic singing with excerpts from the masters.

See the CMAA Shop for all titles in this series.

The English translation of the Apostolic Exhortation Sacramentum Caritatis has been revised. The initial translation, critiqued at Fr. Zuhlsdorf’s blog, said in paragraph 62 that international liturgies “could be” in Latin. The revised translation: “it is fitting that such liturgies be celebrated in Latin” – a revision that comes closer to reflecting the Latin text.

Here is the 1970 Missal edition of the Exsultet, prepared by Richard Rice.