“Please help me understand” by Aurelio Porfiri
  • MatthewRoth
    Posts: 2,336
    Aurelio Porfiri, who long ago contributed to Corpus Christi Watershed and who has worked in Macau for some time, wrote this article on a Substack blog. As of posting, it’s free to read by all; just hit “X” when the window promoting subscription appears.

    Frankly, I’m not sure to whom this is addressed. Porfiri does not understand the American context in particular. He’s Italian, living in a mixed Chinese-Portuguese context; there is English, sure, but less prominently than in Hong Kong. I don’t know if he has spent much if any time in the U.S.

    Obviously what passes for sacred music is not, although it is not always of equally bad quality in terms of vocal and instrumental performance — and that with things that can be kept in the church for liturgical services after cleaning house. I have a huge soft spot for the Proulx arrangement of “I am the Bread of Life”; it’s beautiful. (It’s not accessible by volunteers without a lot of work, to grant Porfiri something.) But why are we focusing on the best of performance in the general classical/early-music sphere versus stop? I also don’t wish to straw-man or set up silly comparisons, but the Vatican’s chant performance leaves a lot to be desired.

    Of course there are places where there is a high standard, but multiple groups coexist, and I would also argue both from experience and having heard it from others in sacred music who know a thing or two about program management, that you have to give parishioners ownership. If that’s only financial, so be it, but I find that having a clear budget and annual expectations, like the way that Fr Pasley structures the choral Masses, is the best, and then you have volunteers for the rest. You can’t not have volunteers and also hide being the professionals without making sacred music a true part of the parish.

    The rest of my comments are reformatted from a post that Peter Kwasniewski made on FB. He started with the part about why we don’t turn to the conservatories:

    1) because it’s hard for them to shut off their opera training even if they shut off vibrato. The sound of the best English choirs singing chant is not really what we expect from amateurs or with a mix of amateurs who are completely novice to singing when they come to sacred music and those who have some if not a lot of training. (I’ll agree to steel-man this over a comparison to the horrible Italian style of chant that’s also heavy on organ accompaniment for the easiest Gregorian ordinaries.)

    2) the non-Catholic problem. It is hard if not impossible to sustain a program if you are always dancing around the Catholic identity of the choir and of the fact that it’s not a performance. You can say “it’s not a place for soloists” without eliminating an earthly vision of what is going on.
    The director can be Catholic and a more or less serious one and still not get it.

    3) in the largest cities, and sometimes the not-so-large ones, we are going to wind up making not only the choir itself but parishes an affair for singles, for the wealthy who can afford help with their children, and double-income no kids types. Everyone but families with children. I am not always the biggest fan of certain families where the parents are around my age. They coddle the kids too much, but there should be at least a few if not all of the weeknight HDOs in a year where the sung TLM, for example, is chanted entirely. I am a fan of putting our money where our mouth is and starting earlier. 6 PM works here if we must have evening Mass. if it’s a Saturday, have Mass at 9 or even 8, and get it over with, allowing you to do polyphony more reasonably.

    This doesn’t address the main idealized (well, rather the opposite) situation. But it’s why even serious Catholics are like “lol, no”, and it’s at this point I can say too that “it’s because the Solesmes congregation sounds more like what amateurs can do than what pros do.”

    It also costs a lot, and you have to make the people participate financially by being very upfront and transparent, especially in the American context, or else they will never accept that it isn’t a performance. Fr Pasley’s choral Mass fund and budgeting precisely for each feast with a polyphonic or orchestral mass is the way to go.

    It costs a lot because we should pay people fairly for each practice and service, but also because it’s easy to let the choir size balloon. I know of a choir that can hardly function with a dozen+ members on a Sunday. The alto section keeps getting bigger and is hardly holding on because they struggle with the polyphony. When, frankly, they should have a paid quartet or octet on most Sundays if they don’t want to do that plus volunteers to augment them. (That is, either a quartet or octet, but if you need more, you get volunteers; the paid alto number is max 2!)

    Oh yeah and these people have better things to do which adds to the costs if you wish to keep people around and even to attract them in the first place.

    The other thing that gnaws at me is that “how much should we spend on pros, and how much of the choir should be professional, often non-Catholic or not aligned with church teaching” is a question that people agonize over given the problems: you have to sustain them. What happens if the money dries up? Your donor dies. You run down the endowment carelessly. You decide to leave, and a less charismatic or less experienced successor replaces you. Then you’ve got nothing. I’ve seen it happen. People are still somewhat choosy in church music once we get to the point where there are multiple churches in the same area paying multiple singers per week. For Catholics whose musical demands, for the TLM especially, are such that it is a great injustice to let the music cease if you no longer have anyone to sing adequately, this is unacceptable.
  • ServiamScores
    Posts: 2,897
    What happens if the money dries up? Your donor dies. You run down the endowment carelessly. You decide to leave, and a less charismatic or less experienced successor replaces you. Then you’ve got nothing. I’ve seen it happen.
    This is something that has always bothered me too. I've heard priests (and laymen) make cavalier comments about how the "program should be structured so it can run without you" etc. etc. This is almost never possible, imho. I know there are people who achieve it, but it's rare as hen's teeth. I have worked up programs that became relatively advanced and stable, but the moment I left, everything changed. They can change because of successor, or because of a new priest with a different agenda. (One program crumbled out from under me due to a new priest who fought my every move.) There are SO many variables that contribute to a program; they aren't just windup clocks that run on their own. One choir I had became relatively advanced and we were chanting propers every week (often in Latin for high days), singing a latin motet nearly every week, and even did polyphonic ordinaries a cappella for holy days. Then I had a massive number of people shift through the choir: 4 went away to college, two retired, one was away due to frequent college football games where her son was a starter, two people passed away, etc. etc. Next thing you know, this advanced group had lost so many people due to uncontrollable circumstances, we had to completely recalibrate. And this was while I was still at the helm and the very supportive priest was still pastor. It just... happens.
  • NihilNominisNihilNominis
    Posts: 1,023
    I would challenge the "cost" factor. I think that's just a question of budget priorities.

    At my current parish have a mixed pro and volunteer program (this was new territory for me). What I quickly realized after starting here, was what a steal professional singers really are. We have a far more active program than average, so our cost is higher (but it's a huge priority here), but take a hypothetical average parish setting:

    ~40 Sundays in the "choir season" - approx. academic year
    +7 holydays of obligation
    +3 days of Triduum
    + about 40 rehearsals (optional, though -- plenty of programs with a tight budget simply call early on Sundays and program accordingly).

    Say you hire four singers, and pay them $60 for rehearsal and $80 for a Sunday Mass, and say $150 for a feast day / triduum Mass. I know excellent programs with high-end singers who pay less per call than this.

    Per singer thats:

    $3,200 for Sundays
    $1,500 for holydays and Triduum
    $2,400 for rehearsals

    Per annum, you are talking $7,100 per singer, or $28,400 for the entire quartet.

    I realize we are all musicians here, so any amount of money over $15 seems extravagant and unattainable to us, but consider what a drop in the bucket that is compared to the operating expenses of a large or even medium-sized parish?

    It's less than a decent part-time salary for a single employee (and because each singer is very part-time, other employer-side expenses are reduced, too).

    And consider the value-add -- the principal Mass of the parish has a consistently extremely high standard of music -- this is the encounter most parishioners have with the parish and divine worship every week. The volunteers of the choir have a built-in mentorship relationship with experienced vocalists that can force-multiply any vocal pedagogy the director is attempting, and which make participation in the choir, if managed right, a more rewarding, more attractive ministry for volunteers.

    You can also enlist the singers, who have a rapport with the director and whose music is known and appreciated by the parishioners, to sing for weddings and funerals, at no additional cost to the parish, thus providing the opportunity to elevate some of the liturgical celebrations most significant in the lives of the faithful.

    It's very difficult to imagine a less-than-$30k per year part-time hire that would add that kind of value to the moments that are most central to a parish's life.
  • MatthewRoth
    Posts: 2,336
    Yes. But you want volunteers. You don’t hate parishioners. You can take negative feedback. I’ve met plenty of directors who hate volunteers, who hate any negative feedback, no matter how it’s expressed. They become nasty and vile to the point where people want nothing to do with the music.

    And in fact, your solution is what I’d propose!

    Another comment:
    [name redacted] are you faithful in the pews ready to engage in weekly rehearsals + music theory lessons to improve and learn? This would nonetheless require a professional to teach you (how many of you?), and you wouldn't still be able - nor are you actually required - to chant the propers of the Mass and vespers every sunday: you would need a professional for that, and for leading a chant schola.


    A) even pros are hard to keep around B) this attitude is vile. We have long run the show ourselves. Non-professionals and rank amateurs can learn, it’s just that they have different problems coming to sacred music than people who trained in a degree program. And I’ll take the former problems over the latter.

    Besides plenty of places manage to sing the propers well on their own (and Vespers! I have not needed a professional to teach Vespers, which the faithful also sing!).
    Thanked by 1NihilNominis
  • NihilNominisNihilNominis
    Posts: 1,023
    Yes. But you want volunteers. You don’t hate parishioners. You can take negative feedback. I’ve met plenty of directors who hate volunteers, who hate any negative feedback, no matter how it’s expressed. They become nasty and vile to the point where people want nothing to do with the music.


    Sad observations, but unfortunately sometimes true. I'm getting the rub of what you were aiming at!

    And in fact, your solution is what I’d propose!

    Another comment:

    [name redacted] are you faithful in the pews ready to engage in weekly rehearsals + music theory lessons to improve and learn? This would nonetheless require a professional to teach you (how many of you?), and you wouldn't still be able - nor are you actually required - to chant the propers of the Mass and vespers every sunday: you would need a professional for that, and for leading a chant schola.


    I think sometimes there's an overreaction to the "volunteerism" that manifests itself as very elitist. I began life as a volunteer singer and am grateful to those who were willing to teach me and bear with me.

    I believe in volunteers and what they are capable of. Plus, "volunteer" is just a pay status. We audition all singers, and are upfront about whether we think it is a good fit for their current ability level (The bar is not terribly high, and I have readymade suggestions I make as to other opportunities if it is not met -- I don't just toss the willing to the curb). But I have had and have volunteers with outstanding backgrounds and abilities who perhaps don't want the commitment of a paid position, or for other reasons just wish to be generous.

    A) even pros are hard to keep around B) this attitude is vile. We have long run the show ourselves. Non-professionals and rank amateurs can learn, it’s just that they have different problems coming to sacred music than people who trained in a degree program. And I’ll take the former problems over the latter.


    Yes, that was the other learning curve -- there's more musical training and, if you're fortunate enough to find them, of experience and artistry in the repertoire -- but choirs is choirs, and they have many of the same difficulties and the director's job is largely unchanged, even if you get to attempt more repertoire more frequently.

    Besides plenty of places manage to sing the propers well on their own (and Vespers! I have not needed a professional to teach Vespers, which the faithful also sing!).


    Correct! As my lovely volunteers did at my last parish. It's a different set of expectations and goals, but very doable to make a respectable and edifying program.
    Thanked by 2MatthewRoth CHGiffen
  • davido
    Posts: 947
    I read the whole Porfiri article, and I don’t think Porfiri is addressing straw man arguments at all. I think he has international experience and is addressing the problem as he has seen it all over the globe. Maybe the USA is a little different from Rome and Hong Kong, but I have experienced all the issues he points out at parishes within 2 hours from my home and even in the parish music program that I run. Legacy cantors that can’t sing. A priest that will lay out thousands on youth group conferences but won’t pay additional musicians. An attitude that whatever the volunteers provide is acceptable.
    But I don’t blame the priests or the parish structure. The problem is the liturgy, which offers no opportunity for prayer apart from a volunteer led service with whoever-stepped-forward as the lector-cantor-server-usher. The old liturgy had minimum standards. The NO does not.

    Excellent music should be offered at cathedrals or large churches. But there is not room in the NO liturgy for excellent music. Everything has to be participatory, even -and especially - in cathedrals.
  • MatthewRoth
    Posts: 2,336
    Sure. But it’s a straw man to set up “professional (European) choirs” versus “bad choirs that also do bad music” when you can answer his question by focusing on why NihilNominis does what he does and why I have long had an aversion to pro directors who were not very professional after all and who were a cancer. Yeah, volunteers can be toxic too, but it’s bad when you bring in pros who are not faithful Catholics as they ought to be, and you’re running a huge risk. We all know this, and it’s silly to pretend otherwise. Even the process of reading CVs and cover letters is exhausting because of this.
    Thanked by 1NihilNominis
  • a_f_hawkins
    Posts: 3,472
    there is not room in the NO liturgy for excellent music

    Please clarify - are you saying Westminster Cathedral, to name one place I know, does not have excellent music?
    Thanked by 2IanW Liam
  • FSSPmusic
    Posts: 286
    In many contexts, excellence attracts excellence: people hear excellent choral singing, want to be a part of it, and will make some sacrifices to do so. Yet many of us are doing our absolute best with the resources we have and our music programs still don't grow. If we're working in an EF context, we have a very musically demanding liturgy, even for the professional singers. Say we're doing six movements of a polyphonic Mass, two motets, and full Gregorian propers. It's an awful lot of complicated music compared to what some of the best mainline Protestant church choirs are doing on a weekly basis, which is perhaps two anthems, a few choral responses, and several hymns in parts. The problem is often not only a shortage of volunteers but also of qualified professional singers. Understandably we would prefer to keep our choirs all Catholic, but not if that means a considerable reduction in musical quality. A lot of professional singers aren't "Catholic," and those who are may not be practicing and/or come with issues ranging from cohabitation to promiscuity to assorted addictions to Planned Parenthood activism. I've seen it all! Where do we draw the line? Does a practicing Catholic mean one who goes to confession and Communion once a year as required, a daily communicant with a dozen homeschooled children, or somewhere in between? Let us not be too quick to pass judgment on the spiritual lives of others. This is a bit of a digression, but I've encountered similar difficulties when parishioners ask for teacher recommendations. I'm in a metro area of nearly five million and, after almost nine years here, I'm not sure I know a local voice, organ, or piano teacher who fits the criteria of "practicing Catholic aligned with Church teaching" as I would understand it. (My apologies if I've forgotten any local colleagues who happen to read this!) If people want that, they're going to have to become it themselves I'm afraid. But if they want to learn musical technique and take responsibility for their own religious formation, there are plenty of competent teachers around for that.

    Most of us here have read Thomas Day's Why Catholics Can't Sing. It's an enjoyable cultural analysis of some of the problems with Catholic music in the United States. An inconsistent, apathetic, or downright hostile attitude toward congregational singing is a big part of our problem in comparison with the Protestant churches. Catholics who belong in the choir loft never discover that they have lovely voices because nobody ever hears them sing, and those who enjoy singing but don't have lovely voices . . . well, they often wind up in unauditioned parish choirs because they're too self-conscious to sing in the nave when only perhaps 15% (and that may be generous!) of the people around them are participating in what is supposed to be congregational singing. There is also a prevalent mentality that Mass is what happens at the altar and that whatever we do is just background music not to be taken too seriously. Furthermore, in EF parishes one is liable to encounter weird ideas about chant versus polyphony, strong opinions about organ playing and accompaniment, and even the notion that female singers should be replaced with boys choirs, which is expressed by people with no concept of what kind of training and resources that would entail (and oblivious to the reality that there are only six boys in the children's choir and no parish school to draw from). Finally, regarding European versus American contexts, don't underestimate the role acoustics play in the perception of musical quality. Hearing some of those European choirs in a carpeted church with a ten-foot ceiling might be as revealing as hearing a mediocre American parish choir in a Romanesque basilica.

    So, how do we attract talented, devout, reliable singers to our choir lofts? When you figure it out, please let us know! In the meantime, don't neglect your children's choir, and if your parish has a school, try to work with the music teacher to instill a love of a the right kind of church music in the young Catholics.
  • MatthewRoth
    Posts: 2,336
    Well, that gets to my point even if we don’t necessarily agree on where to draw the line. He asks this question, seemingly without realizing that even in the best case, we may not be able to rely on professionals for whatever reason, good, bad, and sometimes very ugly.

    I know that this means more work, but I’m personally fine with keeping the group that does motets and the most complicated masses for the major Sundays and feasts separate from the schola and a group that is mostly or exclusively volunteers, ideally that supplies motets on most Sundays (if you take most of July and August off, you still have at least one Mass per month even if not necessarily on Sundays for your pros, although October may leave a gap if you don’t do the external solemnity of the Rosary and are in NO world with CTK in November instead).

    That way, there is a certain ritual purity for the propers.

    As to attracting volunteers, I can’t say that there is a secret sauce, but I’ve met a couple of people who were basically from the community, or at least card-carrying trads, in a way that allowed them to make impassioned pleas for singers that were successful.

    I don’t know what to do in cases where you don’t have enough pros to make that work or where it’s just too much for the DM.

    I agree, it’s a bit frustrating that non-musicians have strong ideas. It’s a little more tolerable when these people are also singing with me, although the organ mostly wins out so far. (I am actually relieved to have a motet during Mass, and my only regret is not having more feasts where we can sing Masses IV and IX, lest they be displaced by polyphony entirely.) I’m not sufficiently Anglophilic to want boys’ choirs, and I take the point: it’s a lot of resources.
  • jcr
    Posts: 141
    I have served as a paid singer in a couple of places and have served as a DM in a dozen more. I have never been a DM where the church could or would hire professional singers. I have had some pretty well trained and experienced singers among my volunteers some of the time in my church work. I have noticed, and had pointed out to me by musicians who had pros to supplement their volunteers, that if one hires singers, then the volunteer singers who have solo capabilities or other musical virtues will not always stay on. A wise and experienced MD, for whom I sang for several seasons, said that the personalities and attitudes of the professionals was the key to keeping these people. He would hire a slightly less beautiful voice in favor of a humble singer with a respectful {of the volunteers} attitude.

    The commitment level of the average volunteer has deteriorated over the years of my career. This is a cultural thing and shows up in the Church as much as anywhere else. There are many reasons for this, but the aging of the singers in the loft has left us with grandparents who, if they want to see their grandchildren, absent themselves often to travel to far-away places. I have heard, "You can't expect people to show up every rehearsal evening and every Sunday morning!" However, I can remember a time when you could and they did and it wasn't just in rare situations. They wanted to be there because it was important to them. It seems that convincing singers that it is important, a high calling to which they may be called, is a part of the problem. I would add that I believe that the problem with the parishes spending the money to hire some singers is rooted in the same issue. The pastor, committees, etc. don't think it matters enough to spend any money on it in many cases.