Monday, April 16, 2007
Report on “Singing God’s Song Faithfully” conference
Report from Greg Scheer from the “Singing God’s Song Faithfully” conference at Notre Dame University this past weekend:
What is good congregational singing? How do we train leaders to lead the assembly’s song well? These were the questions that occupied forty church musicians and scholars—including the CICW’s Bert Polman and Greg Scheer—at this weekend’s “Singing God’s Song Faithfully” conference.
Some of the presenters approached the question as music educators, laying out the principles that have guided their own church music programs. Paul Westermeyer, Carol Doran and Quentin Faulkner’s sessions addressed the power of liturgical music, the lack of music education in the larger society, and the splintering of the modern church’s song repertoire. Willem Speelman,
Frank Burch Brown and Tom Zelle used the fields of aesthetics, philosophy and communication theory to shed light on congregational singing. Especially compelling was Speelman’s comparison of verbal and musical communication. Music is vital to worship because it is a shared communication, in contrast to verbal communication, which is “oppositional discourse.” (It’s
complicated, but it is one of the few sound arguments I’ve heard for the value of music in worship.) We were also treated to a presentation on church architecture and its impact on congregational singing and an introduction to Jeanne Logan’s fabric art, which was beautiful even though it had little to do with congregational song. Conference host Charlotte Kroeker completed the
presentations with the initial findings from a survey she is conducting, which focuses on nine churches known for their healthy worship.
The question of congregational singing and song leading was perhaps best explored through the many worship services that were shared throughout the weekend. The conference organizers wisely arranged for morning and evening prayer to be held in a different space each time, allowing participants to experience the impact of different worship environments and acoustic characters. (Every dorm at Notre Dame has its own prayer chapel where daily mass is celebrated, so there were plenty of options.) Gail Walton, director of music at the Basilica of the Sacred Heart on Notre Dame’s campus did a fine job of overseeing these services. Especially meaningful was the evening prayer service led by her liturgical choir. The seamless flow of chant, hymns and choral anthems supported a service that opened our souls before God. I was also able to join the larger Notre Dame community in the 10am mass led by the liturgical choir and the 11:45am mass led by the folk choir. Both were rich worship experiences.
Like any conference, the question of singing God’s song faithfully was further discussed around dinner tables and during breaks. Most of the questions that arose had to do with the implicit assumptions of presenters. That is, most presenters seemed to assume that faithful congregational song had at its core historic hymnody and chant led by organ and choir in a liturgical context. But what of Pentecostal, Charismatic and Evangelical worship, which constitutes a huge segment of (and the largest growth in) the western and global church? The various branches of Christ’s Church need to hear each other’s voices and learn from one another. If we and the students we train for worship leadership pull away from each other, we will all be poorer.
Events • Interdisciplinary Application • Liturgical Arts • Music • (0) Comments • Permalink