Would your parish choir or your school choir like to learn Gregorian Chant? If so, Saint Cecilia Academy at Saint Joseph Seminary in Yonkers, New York, is offering a 50% discount to all parishes and schools within the Diocese of Lansing for its summer courses teaching Gregorian Chant.
The Church of the Resurrection Parish and School in Lansing sent a member of staff on the summer courses last year when music teacher, Guine Christian, attended the course on “Teaching Gregorian Chant to Children”.
Now the Church of the Resurrection has a school schola that sings at Holy Mass within the parish each week. Here’s a little video featuring Guine and the children of the Shamrock Schola. Enjoy!
Gregorian Chant takes its name from Pope Saint Gregory the Great (c. 540 – 604). Among the many achievement of his papacy, Gregory revised the Roman Rite of the Mass and established a more uniform standard of music in church services, gathering chants – monophonic, unaccompanied sacred songs – from various regional traditions with the aim of organizing them into a more orderly whole for use by the entire Western Church. In posthumous recognition of his endeavors, this form of church music was later styled “Gregorian chant”.
The Second Vatican Council (1962 – 65) taught that “Gregorian chant, as proper to the Roman liturgy, should be given pride of place, other things being equal. Its melodies, contained in the "typical" editions, should be used, to the extent that this is possible,” adding that “Above all, the study and practice of Gregorian chant is to be promoted, because, with its special characteristics, it is a basis of great importance for the development of sacred music.”
• Interested? To find out more, contact Jeremy Priest, Director of the Office of Worship for the Diocese of Lansing, at jpriest@dioceseoflansing.org or go to Saint Joseph Seminary's website at: https://dunwoodie.edu/dunwoodie-music-classes