Amazing Grace

[Sarabande]

I remember levitating off the sidewalk in Sankt Gilgen on the Mondsee in Austria one Thursday evening. Passing the parish church of St. Gilgen, we heard Mozart floating out of the choir loft windows . . . It was choir practice. Ordinary Austrians. Ordinary parish church (OK – it WAS *Sound of Music-*ville). Ordinary Sunday Mass. This stuff is NOT exclusively for an elite corps of privileged people. All it takes is someone who can help train people and a culture that values music, that teaches kids to sing in parts from the time they can open their mouths.

But I guess that pretty much describes the German-speaking world.

Yes… I think that is basically it. I studied at the Mozarteum music conservatory in Salzburg and experienced the same as you did while in Austria. (I also made a stop in St. Gilgen on one the two days I had off during my time of study there - It’s such a beautiful town!) Every high mass at the Cathedral was a Mozart mass and I believe the low masses had either a mass by Josef Haydn or his brother Michael. Then, you’d walk down the street and hear these little children with their mother or grandmother singing some Kyrie or other piece of music in harmonies. You’d hear music in the breeze and in the trees, down the Salz River. It was an incredible experience for me.

Almost every single church I entered had the same kind of music except for one. I can’t remember the name, but upstairs in the main church they had your “typical” mass with choir, motets, organ, etc. Then downstairs in the basement there was a guitar mass!!! Ugh… it spread all the way over there, but the other masses were always so packed so I’m not worried about it. Also, I never saw so many young religious - priests and friars especially all over the place. I felt like I was in Catholic heaven.

 

[mercygate]

Yes… I think that is basically it. I studied at the Mozarteum music conservatory in Salzburg and experienced the same as you did while in Austria. (I also made a stop in St. Gilgen on one the two days I had off during my time of study there - It’s such a beautiful town!) Every high mass at the Cathedral was a Mozart mass and I believe the low masses had either a mass by Josef Haydn or his brother Michael. Then, you’d walk down the street and hear these little children with their mother or grandmother singing some Kyrie or other piece of music in harmonies. You’d hear music in the breeze and in the trees, down the Salz River. It was an incredible experience for me.

Almost every single church I entered had the same kind of music except for one. I can’t remember the name, but upstairs in the main church they had your “typical” mass with choir, motets, organ, etc. Then downstairs in the basement there was a guitar mass!!! Ugh… it spread all the way over there, but the other masses were always so packed so I’m not worried about it. Also, I never saw so many young religious - priests and friars especially all over the place. I felt like I was in Catholic heaven.

Amen to everything (except the guitar Mass). DH studied his German at Salzburg. Is that place Heaven, or what?