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Local professional chorale honors the Virgin Mary
By Rebecca Bostic, rbostic@catholicsun.org
December 18, 2008
It’s not uncommon to honor the Blessed Mother this time of year.
There’s the Dec. 8 Feast of the Immaculate Conception. There’s the Dec. 12 Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe. And there’s the constant recognition of the Virgin Mary as the theotokos, the God-bearer, who gave birth to our Savior on Christmas.
And then there’s the Phoenix Chorale, a non-profit group of singers with no religious affiliation. The chorale has been nominated for two Grammys for “Spotless Rose: Hymns to the Virgin Mary.” The album is a collection of 15 classical songs directed by Charles Bruffy.
Although the Phoenix Chorale has sung religiously themed music before, the Marian devotion showcased on this album began with “Electa” — one of the main pieces on the album that was written for conductor Charles Bruffy.
Once the choir decided to record “Electa,” “we wanted to surround it with other Marian pieces,” said Joel Rinsema, executive director of the Phoenix Chorale. Although there are many musical albums featuring Marian texts, “with this album we strove to find 20th and 21st century settings of some of the same age-old texts.”
The album features 15 tracks of music of Marian devotion written by seven international writers. Beautifully performed and flawlessly recorded, “Spotless Rose: Hymns to the Virgin Mary” showcases the beautiful and rich sound of the Phoenix Chorale.
Formerly the Phoenix Bach Choir, the Phoenix Chorale has performed in Phoenix for 50 years. The chorale has previously been nominated for Grammy awards and is nominated for four this year, one for “Best Classical Album of the Year” and another for “Best Small Ensemble.” Both are from “Spotless Rose: Hymns to the Virgin Mary.”
“When we record our discs, and when we perform for our public, we are trying to elevate what we do to a world class level,” Rinsema said. “We are not going for Grammys or accolades — those are the result of our hard work to be a world class arts organization.”
The Phoenix Chorale is nominated for two other Grammys for their previous album “Rheinberger: Sacred Choral Works,” a collection of similarly religiously themed music.
Although the chorale is not religiously affiliated, it often features songs of a religious nature.
“Much of the world’s great choral music was written for the Church, and so we do perform quite a bit of religious music, but that is not the focus of our repertoire offerings,” Rinsema said. “Choral music is probably one of the most spiritual, personal art forms, so it is sometimes difficult to separate spirituality from religion, but we try to accomplish this on a regular basis.”
Although that is true of the Phoenix Chorale as an organization, for Matthew Scott, a baritone in the chorale and traditional cantor and choral consultant at Ss. Simon and Jude Cathedral, the religious-based nature of the chorale selections is meaningful to his faith.
“For the past 1,000 years and more, the Catholic faith has been the dominant force behind the composition of music,” Scott said. “Composers have always written only their very best for the Blessed Virgin — any composer who writes anything for choir at some point writes an ‘Ave Maria.’ So in choosing Mary as the central pillar of the recording project, Mr. Bruffy had a tremendous amount of music to choose from.”
Although the choir is not faith-based and most of the choir members are of a Protestant background, Rinsema thinks that “overall, there grew a greater appreciation for the veneration of Mary,” he said.
As a Catholic, Scott enlivened the music selection with the inspiration of his faith.
“It would be impossible to approach this music without faith,” Scott said. “Every singer in the room, whether they would call it faith or not, experienced something of Our Lady’s presence.”
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