Square Notes: The Sacred Music Podcast

Having worked in Catholic classical education for decades, Mark Langley knows the place of music in Catholic education, and has built schools in which every student is enabled to learn and sing chant and polyphonic works from the Church's sacred music treasury. Join us for a discussion about where music figures into the educational structure, and some problems in the modern conception of the nature of music that prevent Catholic education from giving music its proper due. Learn more about Mr. Langley and his work here: https://olwclassical.org/faculty/ Learn more about the Catholic Institute of Sacred Music here: http://catholicinstituteofsacredmusic.org/

Join us for a discussion with the Archbishop of San Francisco, Salvatore J. Cordileone, about principles every Catholic should learn so that they can think with the mind of the Church about sacred music. We discuss the purpose and nature of sacred music, how it sounds, what effect it has on us, and how it expresses time, culture, and emotions.  To learn more about the Catholic Institute of Sacred Music, please visit: http://catholicinstituteofsacredmusic.org/

Charles Cole joins us with clips from the recent release of the London Oratory Schola's album, Sacred Treasures of Venice. We discuss the crucial role played by Venetian music in the history of sacred choral music, and the particularly fertile atmosphere at St. Mark's Basilica in Venice at the end of the 16th century.  Learn more about the London Oratory Schola here: https://www.londonoratoryschola.com/ Purchase the new album here: https://www.hyperion-records.co.uk/dc.asp?dc=D_CDA68427  Learn more about the Catholic Institute of Sacred Music here: http://catholicinstituteofsacredmusic.org/

How does the experience of Mass on Sunday at a parish affect the lives of Catholics, and what role does music play in that experience? How does sacred music bridge the gap between people of different languages, ethnicities, and backgrounds? Why does the Church spend money on beautiful things instead of only on material goods for the poor? We tackle these questions and more in this interview with Bishop Michael C. Barber, SJ, bishop of Oakland, California.  To find out more about the music program at St. Patrick's Seminary and the Catholic Institute of Sacred Music, please visit http://catholicinstituteofsacredmusic.org/. 

Where did the chant editions we sing from now come from? What choices were made in the making of those editions? Are other variants of the melody possible? What are the rhythmic implications that can be gleaned from comparing the same melody in different manuscripts? Why do these questions matter to the modern Catholic singer of Gregorian chant? What's a healthy approach to integrating manuscript study and the singing of chant? We explore these questions and more with Dr. Charles Weaver, as he gives a preview of the "Advanced Seminar in Gregorian Chant: Historical Notation Survey and Manuscript Study" that he'll be teaching this summer, July 15–19, at the Catholic Institute of Sacred Music.  Find out more about the CISM summer courses here: http://catholicinstituteofsacredmusic.org/summer-courses/

Join us as we talk about the interaction between music notation and memory, and the impact of that interaction on the spiritual lives of singers of Gregorian chant. Our guest is Dr. Anna Maria Busse Berger, Distinguished Professor of Music, emeritus, from UCDavis, and we dive into some of the topics from the first few chapters of her book, Medieval Music and the Art of Memory. Find out more about Dr. Busse Berger here: https://arts.ucdavis.edu/faculty-profile/anna-maria-busse-berger Buy Dr. Busse Berger's book here: https://www.ucpress.edu/book/9780520314276/medieval-music-and-the-art-of-memory Learn more about the graduate coursework in sacred music at the Catholic Institute of Sacred Music here: http://catholicinstituteofsacredmusic.org/

Join us as we dive into the role that bells have played throughout the history of Christianity in warding off evil and storms, signaling significant temporal and spiritual moments, and the consecration of bells in the Pontificale Romanum. Learn about the manufacturing process and the engineering behind getting bells to sound beautiful, and discover how you might support the casting and hanging of new bells in your own church tower. Our guests are Fr. Christopher Gray of St. Mary of the Assumption in Park City, Utah, and Carl Scott Zimmerman, a campanologist and author at the extremely helpful website towerbells.org. Learn more about the Church's teachings on sacred music, and how to put them into practice, through the offerings of the Catholic Institute of Sacred Music. Sign up for an email list to stay up-to-date on our website: http://catholicinstituteofsacredmusic.org/

Join the editor of Adoremus Bulletin, Christopher Carstens, and Dr. Donelson-Nowicka as they chat about answers to some liturgical-musical questions: Can we use the organ or other instruments during Lent? During Advent? Where should the choir be placed in a church? Is there a list of songs that are (or are not) permitted? Can paraphrased psalms be used at Mass? Should cantors be vested? To go deeper in your study of the sacred liturgy and its music, check out our summer 2024 graduate classes or the upcoming online fall and spring 2024–2025 graduate course offerings of the Catholic Institute of Sacred Music: http://catholicinstituteofsacredmusic.org/.

What are 3 great warm-ups you'll be able to fit into your busy parish choir rehearsal schedule? What are 3 motets that most choirs don't do, but that are definitely worth learning? What are 3 polyphonic Mass Ordinaries my choir should learn? Prof. Christopher Berry, an adjunct professor of the Catholic Institute of Sacred Music answers these questions, and we chat about the answers in a preview of the Catholic Institute of Sacred Music's Choral Institute.  To learn more about the July 22–26 graduate-level Choral Institute and the audition requirements, visit http://catholicinstituteofsacredmusic.org/.

Get ready for Holy Week with an episode about Tenebrae. Frequent author for Magnificat and The Wanderer, as well as multiple books available through Ignatius Press, James Monti, joins us to discuss the structure of Tenebrae, the historical origins of the particular practices surrounding Tenebrae, and the profound meaning in the Lamentations of Jeremiah.  Learn more about the Catholic Institute of Sacred Music: http://catholicinstituteofsacredmusic.org/.

Budget crunch at your parish? Limited funding for your planned children's program? Join us for a discussion about fundraising strategies that are workable, easily manageable, and make it possible for you to build an amazing sacred music program. We also discuss models for a multi-parish children's sacred music program. Our guest is Dr. Lucas Tappan, the founder and president of the Catholic Academy of Sacred Music, founder and director of the Most Pure Heart of Mary Schola Cantorum, and the Director of Liturgy and Music for Most Pure Heart of Mary Catholic Church in Topeka, Kansas. Find out more about Dr. Tappan's work here: https://catholicacademyofsacredmusic.org/ Learn more about the "Teaching Gregorian Chant to Children" graduate course this summer, which prepares teachers to teach using the first level of the Ward Method of music instruction, by clicking here: http://catholicinstituteofsacredmusic.org/summer-courses/.

Join us as Dr. Mahrt explains the liturgical practices surrounding the Lady Mass, especially in medieval Salisbury Cathedral. We discuss the texts of the propers of Marian votive Masses as well as the tropes and chants of the Mass ordinary that developed from the daily Lady Mass. Dr. William Mahrt is a professor at Stanford University and serves on the faculty of the Catholic Institute of Sacred Music. He is the president of the Church Music Association of America and the editor of its journal, Sacred Music. Learn more about the Catholic Institute of Sacred Music and its summer graduate program here: https://catholicinstituteofsacredmusic.org/summer-courses/  Be sure especially to check out the class Dr. Mahrt is teaching July 15 to 19, 2024 on the Proper Chants of the Mass. 

What were the earliest language layers of the Roman rite, and how do we know? What is the relationship between liturgical language and everyday speech? When did the Roman rite switch from Greek to Latin? Find out the answers to these questions and more. Our guest is Fr. Nicholas Schneider, who holds a doctorate in sacred liturgy from the Atheneo St. Anselmo in Rome, and serves as an adjunct faculty member at the Catholic Institute of Sacred Music. He currently teaches as a Montessori guide for upper elementary students at Christ the King Catholic Montessori School in Mandan, ND. Learn more about the Catholic Institute of Sacred Music and its summer classes here: https://catholicinstituteofsacredmusic.org/summer-courses/

Join us as we discuss the expectations musicians and priests should have in working together, and some best practices for working out all the practical details. Our guest is Prof. Michael Olbash, director of sacred music at the Boston seminaries of St. John Seminary and Pope John XXIII Seminary. Learn more about the Catholic Institute of Sacred Music: http://catholicinstituteofsacredmusic.org/

As he works on finishing up his biography of French Catholic organist, improviser, and composer Charles Tournemire, Kevin Faulkner joins us to discuss Tournemire's studies with Franck, his career as an organist, his improvisations, a look at his overall compositional output, focusing on works for the organ, and how his monumental composition L'Orgue Mystique fits into the sung Mass.  To learn more about L'Orgue Mystique, check out the collection of essays entitled Mystic Modern: https://shop.musicasacra.com/product/mystic-modern-the-music-thought-and-legacy-of-charles-tournemire-eds-donelson-schloesser/ To learn more about the Organ Improvisation Seminar as part of the Catholic Institute of Sacred Music's Summer 2023 term, visit: https://catholicinstituteofsacredmusic.org/

Coming to you on April 25th, the Major Rogation Day, we're joined on this episode by Dr. Michael Foley, professor of patristics at Baylor University, to look at the origins of Rogation Days, as well as their meaning, liturgical and paraliturgical observances, and significance in our lives today.  Check out Dr. Foley's books here: https://michaelpfoley.info/my-writings Learn more about the Catholic Institute of Sacred Music's summer course, "History of the Roman Rite," July 24 to 28 here: https://catholicinstituteofsacredmusic.org/  

In the midst of Holy Week, we invite you to join Dr. William Mahrt (Stanford) for a tour in time through the lens of the Divine Office. We discuss theological thoughts on time by St. Augustine, natural vs. supernatural senses of time, the structure of the Divine Office throughout the course of one day, and the different intersecting cycles which make up the liturgical year. To learn more about this topic, check out Dr. Mahrt's summer 2023 advanced seminar on Chants of the Divine Office: https://catholicinstituteofsacredmusic.org/.

Looking for fresh ideas about how to take your parish choir to the next level, developing a repertoire of well-prepared polyphonic motets and ordinaries, helping your singers develop their technique and musicianship, and integrate it all into the bigger spiritual picture of the offering of one's very self united to the sacrifice of Christ on the cross? Prof. Christopher Berry of St. Stanislaus Oratory in Milwaukee tackles all these topics, with advice about warm-ups, how to get through a bunch of repertoire with limited rehearsal time, and which motets and masses to start with.  To learn more about or apply for this summer's Choral Institute at the Catholic Institute of Sacred Music, please visit: https://catholicinstituteofsacredmusic.org/.

We've combined two episodes here of another podcast, A Culture of Beauty with host Sequoia Sierra, in which our host, Dr. Jennifer Donelson-Nowicka was interviewed. She's talks a little bit about her experience of growing up Catholic and discovering the Church's teachings on music later in life, discusses some key concepts about that teaching and about beauty that she finds effective in helping other Catholics see the role of these things in the spiritual life, and gives an overview of the mission and offerings of the Catholic Institute of Sacred Music.  Learn more about the Catholic Institute of Sacred Music here: https://catholicinstituteofsacredmusic.org/ 

The medieval practice of the giving of children as oblates to monasteries affords valuable insights into education during the Middle Ages, as well as into the development of pedagogical techniques for teaching the liturgy, Latin, and sacred music to children. Join us for an episode in which Dr. Susan Boynton, Professor of Historical Musicology and Director of Medieval and Renaissance Studies at Columbia University, helps us understand the lives and place of children in medieval monasteries, what they sang in liturgies, and how they learned to sing this repertoire. The conversation also develops into a look at the training of children in cathedral schools. For more information about Dr. Boynton, see: https://music.columbia.edu/bios/susan-boynton To buy the book Young Choristers, 650–1700, a book co-edited by Dr. Boynton, visit: https://boydellandbrewer.com/9781843834137/young-choristers-650-1700/  For more information about the History and Principles of Sacred Music course being offered this summer at the Cat