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Liturgical Composers Forum Competition seeks entries
By John Gleason
Composers of Church music are being given the opportunity to display their work with the announcement of the 2011 Composers Forum Competition sponsored by the Archdiocesan Music Committee. The competition is looking for unpublished works from local composers that could be used in the Communion Rite of the Mass or for adoration or other eucharistic liturgies.
Bob Klimek is director of music at Light of the World Parish in Littleton and a member of the Archdiocesan Music Committee. The purpose of the contest, Klimek said, is to exhibit the talent of pastoral composers whose work might otherwise never be heard outside their own parish.
“There’s a lot of talented people writing music in the diocese,” he said, “and the forum will allow more folks access to that music.”
The forum is open to anyone who is an active musician and/or composer in the Archdiocese of Denver. Composers will have their work professionally critiqued by members of a screening committee. Submissions can be related to any of three areas of Catholic liturgical music: praise and worship, traditional chorale or representative of an ethnic tradition.
The roots of this forum can be traced back to the early 1970s when parishes in Missouri wanted to broaden the selection of music they heard on Sunday beyond what was being offered by music publishers, according to Klimek.
“There were composers in every diocese that never had an audience bigger than their own parish because the music was never published,” Klimek said.
The forum, Klimek said, helps change that.
“On the one hand you have the music … put out by the music publishers—that is the way it’s been done for years,” he said. “And on the other hand you have parishes using music at Mass that is composed by their own parishioners. I think this (forum) takes us from being a corporate Church to a personal one.”
Guidelines for the 2011 Composers Forum can be obtained by calling the Office of Liturgy at 303-715-3221. Questions about the forum can be emailed to lucitatree@aol.com.
Works that are to be considered for the forum must be sent to the Office of Liturgy, 1300 S. Steele St., Denver, CO 80210. Submissions must be postmarked by Sept. 6 for consideration. Winners will be selected by Oct. 24 and acknowledged at the St. Cecilia Mass Nov. 19 at Immaculate Conception Church in Lafayette.
“We have the talent right here,” Klimek said, “and we want to hear from them.”
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