The Saint Cecilia Society for the Preservation and Restoration of Gregorian Chant and Peking Opera is a group of men who sing before their friends with all their might. We understand that plainchant is prayer. But, we also know that the nature and purpose of prayer has changed in this most secular of all worlds. Most members of the group don't pray, meditate, or levitate, but we have found that chanting evokes feelings not unlike those found in great meals, a good basketball game, a very hot Japanese bath, encounters with stunning natural wonders, good sex, creative ideas that work, a first-rate conversation, and in all of the mind boggling experiences we are capable of enjoying. What some saw as spirituality in the past has evolved into stress reduction, relaxation exercises, mind expansion, left brain functioning, a substitute for alcohol and other mind destroying/altering drugs. Some say we are just a men's group sorting out our individual and collective neuroses, as well as solving the problems of the world in the process. Surely that is part of why we get together to sing. But here has to be more to keep us at it for almost 25 years now. While few of us are trained in music, we have, over the years, learned something about the music. The simple pleasure of singing with friends is reason enough to chant. We only sing chant, and Lou Harrison's Mass for St. Cecilia's Day, both are challenging intellectually and at the some time strangely satisfying in a twisted way. We are transported to another state when the chanting works, as it sometimes does when we listen carefully to each other and sing softly as one voice, one might even call it an out of brain experience.
One Sunday afternoon in October l974 our founder heard a voice address him, on his car radio, during a time out in the second quarter of a San Francisco 49er football game. The voice was deep, but was of no specific gender (It could have been God, however the consensus of the group is that it was St. Cecilia herself, besides we all know God is dead). "Frank," the voice said, " it is your task in life to restore Gregorian Chant to pre-eminence among world musics. And while you are at it, lend a hand to Peking Opera which has been abused by the Gang of Four. In fact, all endangered musics deserve preservation and restoration. You may do this in any way you like, preferably without the offices of the Roman Catholic Church, or any church for that matter. If you should choose to build a stone chapel to sing in, do so. And you don't need permission from the planning department. So, get to work in your unobtrusive way and prepare the world for rediscovery of the beauties of plainsong. It may require a great deal of time and effort, but you must accomplish this before you die of joy on a basketball court thirty years after the millennium."
So was born the Saint Cecilia Society for the Preservation and Restoration of Gregorian Chant and Peking Opera. A few years ago our founder unilaterally added the following to our name: "and Other Endangered Arts."
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Saint Cecilia is the patroness of musicians and, some say, pigs. Our beginnings at singing Gregorian chant were rather shaky and we needed the intervention of a saint, or at the very least a beginning voice teacher. Someone at the Caffe Pergolesi in Santa Cruz suggested we sing chant live instead of just playing recordings. We began singing chant, inflicting our awkward efforts on unsuspecting customers at the Caffe on Sunday mornings. Herb Schmidt, some kind of chaplain at UCSC, encouraged us and helped find "Jubilate Deo" a very basic chant book. This was a small pamphlet with common chants in modern notation. Later we acquired the book "Chants of the Church," which used traditional notation, from the Gregorian Society of America. Still later, after scouring bookstores, we found 2 or 3 copies of the standard chant book "Liber Usualis" for from $10 to $25 each. We Xeroxed passages and learned some basic chants by listening to recordings and practiced lots. Meanwhile, our founder haunted the St. Vincent DePaul thrift store in San Francisco twice a week on his lunch hour for 2 or 3 years. His diligence was rewarded by finding 10 copies of the Liber Usualis priced at 2 for 35 cents. He was charged 35 cents each, but did not complain. We still have 9 copies, all of which have been rebound inexpensively by some good Franciscans in Oregon. We have a good idea who walked off with one of the books, and hope that his guilt will prompt return of our valued book. We are always in need of chant books, especially the Liber Usualis, but we can't afford the going price of around $100. We accept donations of Libers, gladly. They will be used with care and love. Where have all the Libers gone?
The group's salvation was Dan Landry, who became our music director and cantor. Dan had spent much of his youth singing chant with the Franciscans. He had a good voice and his family had selected him as the designated sacrifice to the holy mother church. Vatican II and the discovery of women precluded his joining the priesthood. The crimes against humanity and the planet perpetrated by the Holy Mother Church, as well as a totally ridiculous theology, also led Dan to forego the mindless comforts of the church of his youth. The Vietnam War got in the way as well. Dan's patient instruction in the nuances necessary for chant to sound right and his well developed sense of humor helped us move along the torturous path of learning chant.
While we have no clerical pretensions, we offer Dan back to the Church as the St. Cecilia Society's way of thanks, but only as Pope. We know that change is necessary if the Church is to survive, its quick death would be best for all concerned. Frankly, we think the world would be in better shape without its meddling, but change is slow. There was a time when the Pope was elected by popular acclimation and, with this precedent in mind, we think the time for a democratically elected Pope is now. Face it, the College of Cardinals is more likely to move the Church into the Tenth Century rather than exert the necessary vigor for social and cultural change. So, let all baptized Catholics, practicing or not, popularly elect the next Pope. We humbly submit that chanting ability be a prerequisite, and that women, wonderful creatures that they are, be eligible also. Let us not forget Pope Joan. Visualize the competing adds: Vote Landry-Balls. Vote Sister Monica-compassion. Vote Cardinal Sin-experience. The mind, she reels. Think on it. Catholics of the world unite and act upon it. You have nothing to lose but your dependence and the guilt of over-populating the earth while destroying it.
The Society rehearsals: In The San Francisco Bay Area on a random weekday evening and the Santa Cruz group meets on Sunday morning. Five of the current group have been chanting with the Society for 26 years
Dan Landry ---- Cantor & Music Director
Don Cochrane ---- Iconographer
Craig Johnson ---- Translator
Frank Foreman ---- Sec.
Don Day ---- Scribe
Other active members are:
Waldemar Huala ---- Fishmonger & Innkeeper
Takashi Yogi ---- Quantum Mechanic
Steve Dye ---- Projectionist
Kirke Sonnichsen---Ear of God
Andy Bouchard---Foreign Minister
Brian Tailleur---Recording Engineer
Jed Handler---Ethicist
Inactive members:
David Evans ---- Minister of Defense
David Lewis ---- Staff Photographer
Phil Pinto ---- Astrologer
Norman Packard---Keeper of the Flame
Christopher Meyers---Clown
Craig Andrews---Seer
These and other absent members join us when they return to Santa Cruz for visits.
We also import unpaid hired guns to beef up the group when we have important performances-- Sasha Bogandovitch and the late Gene Lewis were valuable additions. Membership requires one or two chanting sessions each week, a perverse sense of humor, publication in Scientific America (Lou can now join us since his letter was recently published), a love of plainsong, a fair ear, balls, a passable voice, cappuccismo (our eucharist is cappuccino because of our caffeine addiction, a result of the many years of singing in the Caffe Pergolesi) and a willingness to submit to the autocratic dictates of our capricious cantor.
WOMEN---When Man Ray was in his eighties he was asked what had been most satisfying in his life. He responded: "I should say women." Theodora sang with us in our first months, but alas it did not work. She had a fine voice, certainly better than most of us, but in order to sound like one voice we just don't have women in the group. She left the group of her own accord. We offer willing assistance to women eager to perpetuate plainchant.
We have sung in cafes, churches of various persuasions, schools, music festivals, cathedrals, universities, living rooms, stairwells, parking garages (we call them carthedrals), and even on the streets of San Francisco's financial district on Good Friday. (We were asked to leave the foyer of the Bank of Guam.) Our plan was to earn enough money to go out for a nice lunch. The take was about $7, so we had coffee at the Caffe Trieste and sang there, a lifelong dream of the Sec. We sing on our one day of holy obligation--St. Stupid's Day, while parading through downtown San Francisco. While we are not joiners, we do participate in the First Church of the Last Laugh parade on April First every year, chanting fools that we are.
Our weekly Santa Cruz practice sessions are held in our clubhouse, a converted shed. We have all the necessary amenities---a fireplace, good light, quiet surroundings and a good espresso machine.
Our Bay Area sessions are at the homes of various members and occur on random weeknights, after work, food and drink.
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Over the years, we have sung the Requiem for various friends and relatives who have died. We have even done one for a friend's cat. We have chanted the Requiem for Nino Rota, Carl Orff, Abbie Hoffman, Ed Abbey, Page and Eloise Smith, Frank Zappa and even Frank Sinatra ... just about anyone who strikes our fancy will get a Requiem. We learned the Missa in Doctoribus for a member of the group who was awarded his Ph.D. in astrophysics. Naturally, the ordinary we selected to accompany it was Mass XIII---Stelliferi Conditor Orbis (roughly translated by a non-Latin scholar as: he who conducts the orbits of the stars). Missa in Albis is the most recent mass in the St. Cecilia Society repertoire. This is no longer true, since most of this was written several years ago. We know the masses for most of the major feast days and some of the hours of the office. We are learning the Santa Cruz mass---mass for WHATEVER is necessary. We do a damn good Requeim since we get all too much practice. People just don't stop dying on us. We have yet to sing one for a member of the Society, but we are aging. We are available, at an immodest fee, for funerals, weddings, house dedications, exorcisms and bat/bar mitzvahs.
A tape of the chant by the St. Cecilia Society is available. It includes:
Requiem & Doctoribus recorded 2/l8/89 at Bear Creek Studios Santa Cruz
Missa in Albis recorded live at Mission Santa Cruz on St. Cecilia's Day l989
Tapes can be ordered for $10 plus $1 postage from St. Cecilia Society, P.O. Box 454, Santa Cruz, Calif. 95061-0454 Make checks payable to Frank Foreman.
There may be a CD in the offing.
We have no clerical pretensions, other than those aforementioned. (Yet another aside---When Dan becomes the first popularly elected American Pope his first act will be to appoint the Sec. Cardinal of the Seven Seas.) We merely lay claim to an abandoned music that was formerly the province of emasculated clerics and college glee clubs. The Church has all but forsaken plainchant, in fact some charge it has killed this high music (arsicide?). The St. Cecilia Society treats the music with love, respect and not a little humor, especially in some of the texts (i.e.. ..."angelicos testes..." ((ignorance of Latin sometimes helps)). A little bit of knowledge has convinced us never to sing the Credo, at least in its present form. We are, however, in the process, a rather protracted one at that, of writing our own. It will begin, if we can ever agree, "I believe in no god..." or "I believe in all gods..." " I do not believe..." or "I believe in nothing..." After deciding upon a beginning it will be easy to transform the schmaltzy prayer into poetic planetary wisdom.
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The Origin of the Saint Cecilia Society for the Preservation of Gregorian Chant and Peking Opera
Recently, someone asked me how the St. Cecilia Society got its name, and what did it mean anyway. Let me say that when the composer Lou Harrison heard the name of our group, he immediately understood. We are not all Lou Harrisons, so here is a brief explanation. I will begin at the beginning with St. Cecilia and ramble on.
Our friend Karen liberated a rather stern, very Protestant looking four-foot tall plaster statue of St. Cecilia which had languished her high school basement for many years and seemed destined for the flea market. The statue naturally became a prop for many photo opportunities at Reed College in the sixties where Karen was studying. Check out the Reed yearbooks of the time. Karen, it should be noted, entered our lives as a girlfriend of Don Day (a long standing member of the society), who was also sometimes a Reed student, but mostly he lived with us in our North Beach apartment. Karen visited our place on acid and KNEW we were to become the caretakers of St. Cecilia while she ran off to Europe to join the circus. Sometime thereafter, Karen offered the saint to us. We transported her across state lines in the back seat of our VW bug, along with some Tillamook cheese.
St. Cecilia resided as the main attraction in our living room in North Beach for many years. We uprooted her to Santa Cruz in 1972, where she suffered the indignities of being adorned in various costumes our children devised; we, of course, could not keep out of the fun. She wore sun glasses, bonnets, Mexican wrestling masks, Batman garb, feather boas, a glow in the dark squid, cowboy hats, W.W.I aviator goggles, berets, assorted costume jewelry and all kinds of sequined accessories, Groucho nose & glasses, wreaths of flowers or garlic, which transformed her into a middle-European folk dancer, or the martyred saint she is. Now she sports a classic Borsolino, a priest's crucifix (with bones of several saints, which the Church considers relics, hidden inside) on a chain with a pair of dice and she has painted roofing nails at her feet along with various other offerings, such as dried flowers. We all considered her our Barbie doll for dress up. She has tolerated our loving wardrobes with aplomb. On trips to Europe we found that Virgins, usually black, were ritually dressed in different robes daily. We began seeking them out. Then there is the Infant of Prague, reputed to be the best dressed statue in the world. He has well over 50 different costumes (we have the post cards to prove it), including a silk dragon robe from China. The Virgin statue at Maria Einsiedln in Switzerland is but one of the many competitors in the undeclared contest for the Best Dressed Saint in the Universal Church. Where do you think Mrs. Handler got the idea for Barbie's many costumes? Is there a Barbie nun yet? How about historical Barbies---Joan of Arc or St. Lucy?
In short, St. Cecilia is the one family member who is always at home, providing us with burglar protection as a scaresaint and constant reassurance with her expression of mild disapproval. She spent a few years in the early 90's residing with Karen in Berkeley. The change was good for her. Julian, Karen and Wale's son, had a chance to dress her with a Swiss hip-hop flair. She now proudly graces the main room of the Hermitage of St. Cecilia in Santa Cruz. Lou Harrison deplores her tattered state and has wanted for years to repaint her. We, on the other hand, embrace the wabi-sabi aesthetic of distressed saints, besides we can always put new costumes on her. We are, at the behest of our 8 year old granddaughter, considering painting her toe nails, but the polish must be subdued, says Briana. It would not become a saint to sport a color called Vixen.
There are touching legends surrounding our patroness and her life stands as an example to all virgins. Her death in her bath, not unlike Marat, seems an ideal way to leave this world. She heard the angels singing in her death throes, so it is written. Bathing in the Japanese style and at hot springs is an important sacrament for the fratres here at the Hermitage of St. Cecilia. We honor her memory while indulging in bodily pleasures. Her story is recounted in Butler's Lives of the Saints, (and in other Lives as well), but is a bit too saccharine for our wanton pagan tastes. We are writing our own life of Saint Cecilia, spicing it up a bit with more emphasis on lust and less on blood lust. Perhaps it will be a film.
So now we have the St. Cecilia part of our name. We are aware of the St. Cecilia Societies that flourished in Europe over the past few centuries and the role these amateur musicians played in promoting music, and especially Gregorian Chant. They, in fact, played a role in determining what we know of as chant now sounds like. There was much controversy and it seems the Romantics won out. But why Preservation and Restoration? In 1974 the edicts of Vatican II were taken seriously, so much so that Latin masses all but disappeared, save in the People's Republic of China. The celebration of the mystery of the mass was relegated to wishy- washy Protestantish folk songs accompanied by guitar. A few Benedictine monasteries in Europe continued the tradition of Gregorian Chant, but only old men were keeping the tradition, as Dan and I found on our 1977 search for chant. We feared it would die out. So our layman's group of irreligious, non-singers dedicated our free time to preserving plainsong, plain chant, or Gregorian Chant, the more common term, and we included it as part of our group's name.
We know with certainty that chant is one of the universal beauties created by so-called civilized man. We certainly claim that the resurgence of chant is partly due to our efforts and are amused to find it adopted as the darling of New Age music. Utter amazement and rowdy laughter was our response few years ago when Gregorian Chant topped the pop charts in America and Europe. This is more than we bargained for, and we now fear that it will become music's smily face. A direct benefit is that the monasteries of Europe are once again filling up with young men who seem bent on preserving the tradition, or something. Also, old recordings have been remastered and new ones are recorded, it seems, daily. The Church, however, still wallows in wasteland music, but it has finally become clear that Gregorian Chant may be sung and is not forbidden. Delightfully, there has been a movement in the conservative tentacle of the church to utilize Latin and the great music of the past. There are even schismatic groups. Ironic it is that the generation of Roman Catholics who grew up without chant discovered it on pop radio stations, at raves and on MTV. On a trip to New Zealand our Sec. found Gregorian Chant CD's catagorized under Easy Listening.
Now it appears that Gregorian chant is being preserved (it is being digitally archived at the Benedictine monastery of Solesmes, the officially designated curators of the music) and restoration can not be too many centuries off. (The Church, she moves glacially.) Is there any reason to continue our quest? We think so. We gain great satisfaction from singing the music, and outside of monasteries it is not sung well very often. It is, after all, prayer. Don't forget that a prayer sung is twice said, so said St. Ambrose or some other saint. Furthermore, it is really not performance music, and to hear it live, one must get to a monastery, or be fortunate enough to chance upon us singing in one of our rare public performances. We plan to chant for several feast days in 1999 at one of the Carthedrals in Santa Cruz. Find us if you can. We try to find a spot removed from the street noises, usually on the 2d level of the parking garage and near a parked truck for good acoustics.
There is some good news about performance. Chanticleer, a professional a cappella group from San Francisco does perform chant around the country. They are very good. Would that our Society had their discipline and talent. Chant has also returned to the repertoire of many good early music groups. Just pay attention.
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The Peking Opera part of our name causes embarrassment in some and consternation in many. They just don't get it, the ever elusive it. In 1971 my wife, Judy, and I joined Don Day and Karen and Don's mother Ros for an evening of Peking Opera at the Great Star theater in San Francisco's Chinatown. We returned for the three remaining performances, so hooked and amazed were we. We were entranced by a universal complete theater, not unlike the description Harry Partch relates about Greek theater. Dance, music, circus, vaudeville, mime, acrobatics, battles, martial arts, singing, poetry, costumes, makeup, minimal sets were not to be believed, and the invisible man in gray who moves among the players to change furniture provided a mysterious touch of reality. All of this formed a cohesive whole. A universal, not unlike the universality of the Latin mass. Mandarin, like Latin to most Catholics, was not accessible to the average person in Chinatown. The text was projected on a screen at the side of the stage. We understood much of what was going on stage and later found English translations of the stories. The humor was broad and easily understood, but the subtleties passed us by. Ah, the spectacle.
Peking Opera is the opera of the capital. It is a highly developed art form that evolved from the best of provincial opera. It is stylized, (26 kinds of prescribed laughs signify subtle coloration), sometimes arcane and always satisfying. It is well worth investigation. We spent some time in Taipei and Singapore finding out about Chinese Opera in its various guises. The sec. shot baskets with the Monkey King at a Peking Opera school in Taipei. Later, a tour of the school and attendance at a student production informed our developing understanding.
Check it out. Several recent films have featured Peking Opera---Peking Opera Blues, and My Favorite Concubine are but two. Mei Lan Fang was the major performer of the 20th Century and some day films of his performances will be available on video in America. A. C. Scott has written about Mei Lan Fang and Peking Opera, as have many others.
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Although cappuccino is important to our ritual, it is not an article of faith, and we accept members who choose not to participate. As evidence of this enlightened toleration, in marked contradistinction to the inquisitorial and dogmatic attitudes of the historical church, a member is allowed to get hot water from the espresso machine to brew a cup of tea, in accordance with his diverse but equally fervent belief. In return, the same tea- drinking heretic has engineered a digital electronic proportional temperature controller to keep the water at the precise canonical temperature of 197 degrees Fahrenheit. ----- -T. Y.
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