In a recent panel discussion on music for the Orthodox Christian Studies Center of Fordham University, composer Benedict Sheehan made the observation that the publication of musical anthologies tends to solidify and codify generational snapshots of particular traditions, carrying authoritative weight for those who use it as a resource. These anthologies… put on the page […]
Blessed Art Thou among Women—a New Release by the PaTRAM Institute Singers, Peter Jermihov, Conductor Reviewed by Vladimir Morosan The liturgical tradition of the Orthodox Church is extremely rich with hymnography in honor of the Virgin Mary—the Most Holy Theotokos or Mother of God, as she is typically referred to. Virtually every complex of Orthodox […]
As a designer of Orthodox churches, I am frequently asked whether a proposed church building will have good acoustics. Acoustics is a complex matter that cannot always be catagorized as simply “good” or “bad”. In order to shed some light on this topic, I am going to discuss the various acoustical characteristics encountered in churches, […]
The Holy Liturgy in the Orthodox Church can be said to be the aspiration towards, if not the actualization of, a “complete work of art” – a synthesis of all the arts – whether it be music, painting, mosaic, embroidery, poetry, architecture, sculpture, choreography, rhetoric, etc., at the service of theology and divine worship. […]
At the Name of Jesus, every knee shall bow … and every tongue shall confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. —Phil. 2:10, 11 I You might remember the old song in which a man and woman argue about pronunciation. “You like potayto and I like potahto; you like tomayto and I like […]
The joke is at times heard that in the chapels of some of our seminaries, they “don’t worship but workshop.” The sense of this witticism is that what happens in their services is experimentation with rubrics, texts, service order, with an impulse towards “reform.” Over the course of this last summer, however, I was blessed […]
Liturgical Music in America Liturgical music is closely bound up with the people that sing it. Language, history, culture, experience, education, social class, all of these things shape the sound-world of worship. The people that founded Orthodox parishes in America more than a century ago—for the most part, immigrants from Russia, Greece, Eastern Europe, and […]
(This interview with Russian conductor Vladimir Gorbik was first published in Pravoslavie i sovremennost, the official journal of the Diocese of Saratov, Russia) As previously reported in the Orthodox Arts Journal, a new symphony orchestra has been established in Moscow under the direction of Vladimir Gorbik—chief choirmaster of the Holy Trinity-St. Sergius Representation (Podvorye) in […]
Recently, iconographer Aidan Hart published the thought-provoking essay “Hand and machine: Making liturgical furnishings”. Mr. Hart’s piece is part of an ongoing exploration by liturgical artists of the question of how technology has changed, and is continuing to change, our relationship to crafts that have up until recently been done by hand. Liturgical designer Andrew Gould has […]
In response to some important questions I’ve gotten about teaching kids to sing in church, I’ve asked my wife Maria Sheehan, a longtime music teacher, to write a guest post based on her experience. — Benedict Editor’s note: This article is republished from Benedict Sheehan’s blog, The Music Stand. *** I have been a vocal […]