Join the CMAA
he Church Music Association of America (founded in 1874) is an association of Catholic musicians, and those who have a special interest in music and liturgy, active in advancing Gregorian chant, Renaissance polyphony, and other forms of sacred music, including new composition, for liturgical use.The CMAA’s purpose is the advancement of musica sacra in keeping with the norms established by competent ecclesiastical authority.
The CMAA is a non-profit educational organization, 501(c)(3). Contributions, for which we are very grateful, are tax-deductible to the full extent of the law. Your financial assistance helps teach and promote the cause of authentic sacred music in Catholic liturgy through workshops, publications, and other forms of support.
The CMAA is also seeking members, who receive the acclaimed journal Sacred Music and become part of a national network that is making a different on behalf of the beautiful and true in our times, in parish after parish. Who should join? You are reading this site because you are interested in sacred music, which means you should join.
You can join now with a $36 (minimum) per year contribution, but please consider a larger donation.
The CMAA was formed in 1964 as the Second Vatican Council drew to a close, as the coming together of the American Society of St. Cecilia (founded 1874) and the St. Gregory Society (founded 1913). Thus does it inherit the rich history of these organizations.
The amalgam in 1964 began a new chapter in the history of American Catholic music, alongside an affiliation with the Consociatio Internationalis Musicae Sacrae (Roma), established by Paul VI to shepherd musical developments in the U.S. following the Council.
The Church Music Association of America today provides support for all those interested in participating in the current revival of Gregorian chant and sacred polyphony in Catholic liturgy. It is the most active organization today in sponsoring new writing and scholarship in the tradition of sacred music. A good example of our work is the Communio Project that makes available authoritative editions of Gregorian Chant for parish use.
It is the sponsor of the leading music colloquium on sacred music in the English speaking world. It is the publisher of Sacred Music, the oldest continuously published journal of music in North America.
It makes possible a network of musicians, seminarians, and priests who are dedicated to the aesthetic and liturgical ideals of the Church.
You can help by printing and distributing this flyer in your parish.
Membership in the Church Music Association of America includes a subscription to Sacred Music. Single copies are $10. Send membership/subscription fees, and changes of address to the membership, circulation and advertising office.
- Officers and Board of Directors
- President: William Mahrt
- Vice-President: Horst Buchholz
- General Secretary: Rosemary Reninger
- Treasurer: William Stoops
- Chaplain: Rev. Father Robert Pasley
- Directors: Susan Treacy, Jeffrey Tucker, Scott Turkington
- Directors Emeriti: Rev. Father Ralph S. March, S.O.Cist; Kurt Poterack; Rev. Father Robet Pasley; Paul F. Salamunovich; Very Rev. Monsignor Richard J. Schuler
With its rich heritage and instinct for pushing onward even in difficult times, what does the CMAA have planned for the future? If you would like to invest for the long term in our work, consider this optimistic plan.
Our official goal in 1964 still applies: "The advancement of musica sacra in keeping with the norms established by competent ecclesiastical authority."
What this means is the fulfillment and implementation of Church teaching concerning music, which means the advancement of 1) Gregorian chant in liturgy, 2) traditional polyphony and music written in that tradition, and 3) other forms of sacred music for use in liturgy. To do this requires that a new generation be inspired to take up this difficult task, and that requires education on all levels, from cathedrals to the smallest parishes. Indeed, the task is more formidable today that in 1964 simply because so much knowledge has been lost in the intervening years.
The CMAA is uniquely positioned to take up this cause. The historical mandate of our organization is to do precisely this. The CMAA has the clarity of purpose and far-seeing ambition to do this work in our times on a national scale because the CMAA has gathered together individuals who have an understanding of what this means in its precise details, have the technical and artistic competence to bring to fulfillment the genuine goals of the liturgical reform, and have the drive, passion, and sophistication necessary to ensure that Benedict’s XVI "hermeneutic of continuity" applies not only to theology but also to Catholic liturgy and its music in particular.
In the near term, we have a number of projects facing us:
- We need to increase the circulation of Sacred Music, by means of advertising and national mails.
- The Colloquium needs to build on its past successes and grow for the future. There is every reason to be confident that we will have as many as 250-500 attendees in this and future years.
- We would like to print and mail Frequently Asked Questions on Sacred Music, a powerful tool for explaining the basics to the broadest possible audience.
- We need to put most Gregorian chant online. This site is already hosting the Graduale, the old Roman Missal, the Antiphonale, and 30 other texts. But they are in graphics format. We need all these in the form currently shown in the Communion Project of copyright-free, font-based editions. This project will take the chant to the next technological level after printing and sound reproduction, and make it available to the whole world.
- We need to commission new works. This fulfills one of CMAA’s institutional mandates, namely the fostering of new sacred music. Prize money in the area of $2,000+ would be needed to entice the best composers to write for Catholic liturgy. This is also critical to counter the influence of large commercial publishers who push music that is incompatible with liturgical sensibilities.
- Similarly, we would like to sponsor composition competitions at least every year.
- Workshops are essential, and not just once per year. The CMAA needs to have in place a package for parish workshops, and people in place who can travel for the weekend to lead them. The CMAA aspires to have a workshop somewhere in the country every two weeks, which means about 26 per year.
- There is a strong need to provide scholarships to the Colloquium. Currently the CMAA has no money available for this purpose, and yet we know that the need is there. The people who have access to parish funds are not always the people most interested in this repertoire. Others need financial assistance. There are also students and seminarians to consider. They are surely worth an institutional investment by the CMAA. And yet, for now, there are no funds available. We need to think in terms of a scholarship plan that makes at least 50 scholarships available, ideally paid out of the interest accrued from an endowed fund.
- We are working on a complete online library of writings on sacred music, but much needs to be done. The site already offers important books by Dom Johner in high quality scans. They are both in the professional quality we need to offer. But there are probably 100 more books on the topic of sacred music that are available to us in public domain.
- In the same way, CMAA needs an online audio library that can host public domain recordings of sacred music, chant lectures from the deep archive and current talks at the Colloquium. The bandwidth fees for hosting audio on this level can grow quite high.
- The CMAA library at St. Agnes Catholic Church in Minneapolis-St Paul, Minnesota, is in need of catalog so that a finder’s tool can be put on Musicasacra.com. The resources here are not only crucial for the CMAA but also for the whole of American music, its history and future. We need someone in the area to complete this task and do the technical work to put it online.
- Another book that needs to be in preparation, or at least put online in a downloadable form, should address the priests’ parts for sung Mass in Latin and in English. Right now resources for this are hard to come by, and many have observed that priests who attempt a fully sung Mass quite often end up having to make up parts as they go along. To put this together and make it available at no charge will require a great deal of expertise. We have that but putting this together will require time and resources, perhaps through another grant on the level of $30-40,000.
These are just some of the ideas—admittedly ambitious but still realistic—that need to be considered for a long-term view of the CMAA, so that it can fulfill its mission and serve as the leading Catholic music educator in this country. Even adding those, the budget reaches $250,000, which is tiny as compared with NPM or OCP, so say nothing of the USCCB.
And, again, concerning the goal, how much of a difference will these activities make? With prayer, enthusiasm, and truth and beauty on our side, the CMAA will provide the way out of dessert in which we’ve wandered for decades. People are desperate for answers today and pleading for the restoration of beauty and holiness in liturgical art. A practical vision such as the above can provide precisely what is needed.
Catholics can and should sing again, the song that is ever old and ever new, the song that grew up with the faith and continues to express its highest artistic ideals. We would like to ask for your support in fulfilling this dream.
