Arts News

NEW YORK - Can it be? Has Broadway found religion?

According to one recent article, a bumper crop of faith-themed shows, like "Jesus Christ Superstar," "Godspell," "Book of Mormon" and "Sister Act," has transformed Broadway into a "highway to heaven."

So why the great awakening on the Great White Way?

TORONTO - There’s no time like the present, except of course the past. Dominican art historian Fr. Marius Zerafa knows the past and refuses to romanticize it.

“Human nature has remained very much as it was in the Old Testament,” he told The Catholic Register in an interview. The golden age of sacred art was never quite so golden as it’s generally portrayed. Even 450 years ago, cardinals and bishops at the Council of Trent worried over the degeneration, immorality and self-indulgence of contemporary art.

Fr. Michael Prieur has lived at St. Peter’s Seminary in London, Ont., for more than 50 years. For 40 of those years, he never paid attention to the stained glass windows in the chapel.

“And then one day I wondered why St. Jerome was dressed up like a cardinal when there was no such outfit in the days that he lived,” Prieur told The Catholic Register.

Organix festival co-founder Gordon Mansell talks with The WholeNote's David Perlman May 8 2012, one week into the 7th annual month long Toronto Organix Festival. 

See http://www.organixconcerts.ca for more information.

Related Story

- Musical journey brings acclaimed organist Massimo Nosetti to Toronto [w/ audio]

TORONTO - At first glance, Patrick Murray is pretty much the antithesis of a choral music composer. The lanky, plaid-wearing fellow with a quick laugh and easy smile has been making a name for himself with his impressive compositions, most recently for his work “Book of Lamentations,” a choral composition based on a 10th-century Christian text that will be premiered by the prestigious Canadian Men’s Chorus. And he’s just 22 years old.

“It is extremely structured, extremely singable and the structural complexity of it is extremely interesting and very advanced, I think, for someone who is 22 years old,” said Greg Rainville, founder and artistic director of the Canadian Men’s Chorus.

TORONTO - The funky former professional jazz musician Fr. Stan Fortuna from New York’s Community of Franciscan Friars of the Renewal will perform two shows in Toronto this month.

Fortuna and his Fodera five-string bass will first appear on May 18 at the Poetry Jazz Cafe in Kensington Market. 

“I’m going to be playing with a young Catholic-Italian pianist, Carmen Spada, and a drummer,” said Fortuna, ordained in 1990. “It’s going to be great, we’re just going to improvise and play some jazz standards and I’ll do some of my stuff too.”

TORONTO - There’s a lot to sing about in the revised Roman Missal, and hundreds of Catholic musicians plan to do just that at Toronto’s Annuciation of the Blessed Virgin Mary parish on Pentecost Sunday.

By late April, the Office of Lay Formation had already signed up more than 200 musicians for a May 27 Mass with Cardinal Thomas Collins. The Mass will celebrate the last year spent preparing for and then implementing new Mass texts musically. Registration for the event will be open right up until the baton drops for the entrance hymn, said Lay Formation executive director Bill Target.

TORONTO - Massimo Nosetti has just flown from Italy to Nashville (a.k.a. Music City, U.S.A.), but not to visit the Grand Ole Opry or to practice his country twang to the whine of a slide guitar. Rather, Nosetti’s allegiance lies with “The King of Instruments,” the organ, and he is one of its undisputed champions.

Nosetti is a hard man to get a hold of. Because he’s on the first leg of a tour that will take him through the United States and to Toronto for the opening gala of the 2012 Organix music festival, we exchange a number of e-mails, a dozen missed phone calls, and finally, through a rather exasperated Nashville hotel employee, we connect. Most people would be somewhat wearied by both the travel and the exertions of performing, but Nosetti is charming, engaging and excited by his upcoming appearances.

WASHINGTON - In the upcoming movie "For Greater Glory," Catholic actor Andy Garcia plays a Mexican Revolution-era general lured out of retirement a decade later to head the insurgent "Cristero" forces doing battle against their own government's severe curbing of religious freedoms, which included the murder of priests, the desecration of churches, and laws designed to reduce the visibility of the Catholic Church in the overwhelmingly Catholic country.

It is a battle that the Cuban-born Garcia feels strongly about.

TORONTO - If you were to ask someone to name a popular vocal group comprised of three male voices, it’s arguable that the answer wouldn’t be The Three Tenors, but rather The Priests. The group comprised of three Irish Catholic priests is currently on tour with a new album in hand, and looking forward to their May 4 concert in Toronto.

"We are looking forward to bringing the music to as many people as possible, and of course there's a big Irish connection in Toronto as well. So we really are looking forward to it. Again, it's a place that has featured highly in our beginnings in this particular journey as The Priests. Toronto has featured highly and given us great support as well," Fr. Martin O’Hagan told The Catholic Register during a phone call from his Rhode Island hotel.