Sacred Choral Music in America

Pristine colonial meetinghouses, frontier brush arbors, African-American churches, rural singing schools and ornate urban cathedrals have all been seedbeds for the potent partnership of fervent faith and choral singing. During the last decades, in an understandable, yet ill-advised attempt at survival, much of the American church has forsaken this signature artform, replacing it with the accessible music of popular culture.

The result has been a tragic loss of choral music’s potential to shape a generation’s religious sensibilities and a serious weakening of the church’s ability to contribute to the culture’s aesthetic values. While choral music may flourish in many academic and civic institutions, it is in great peril within religious ones. So much so that, in professional circles, undesirable tonal execution is often described as “sounding like a church choir.”

The program of original American sacred music offered today is an attempt to pay homage to an indelible thread in the fabric of our country’s choral art. It is not, however, a mere pining for a bygone era. It is intended to be an expression of hope that contemporary church choirs may, too, aspire to fine music making.

It is a wistful encouragement to those involved in the rigors of music ministry that our labors are not in vain. The transcendent pathos which faith gives to church music—”the Word made flesh”—is our unique edge. We must not forsake our rich heritage and thereby abdicate the unmatched power of choral art to only the spires of academia.

from printed program notes during First Baptist Church, Asheville, NC choral presentation at 2002 ACDA (American Choral Director’s Association) conference.