Jazz Mass
Located in 2 routes
A composed liturgical form setting the Catholic Mass ordinary — Kyrie, Gloria, Credo, Sanctus, Agnus Dei — to jazz ensembles, born of the mid-1960s liturgical-reform era when Vatican II opened the door to vernacular and contemporary music in worship. The works range from trio settings played live in cathedral services to orchestral suites with choir, swinging the ancient texts with walking bass, improvised solos, and bossa and waltz meters while preserving the Mass's structure; several were premiered inside actual services rather than concert halls, which is the form's defining gesture. It is a composer's genre — each mass is an authored, through-composed work — distinct from the congregational church-groove wing of gospel jazz.
History
The form arrived almost simultaneously on both coasts: Vince Guaraldi's Grace Cathedral mass (San Francisco, May 1965) was recorded live as the first jazz service in a major US church, Paul Horn's Jazz Suite on the Mass Texts (arranged and conducted by Lalo Schifrin, 1965) won a Grammy, and Eddie Bonnemère's Missa Hodierna (1966) became the first jazz mass used in a US Catholic church at St. Charles Borromeo in Harlem; Joe Masters' The Jazz Mass followed on Columbia (1967), and Mary Lou Williams — the movement's deepest theological voice — premiered what became Mary Lou's Mass at Columbia University in 1970, later reissued by Smithsonian Folkways and danced by Alvin Ailey. The lineage continued through Dave Brubeck's To Hope! A Celebration (recorded 1996), and jazz masses remain in active liturgical and concert use.
Defining artists
Essential listening
- At Grace Cathedral(1965) — Vince GuaraldiSpotifyYouTube
- Jazz Suite on the Mass Texts(1965) — Paul HornSpotifyYouTube
- The Jazz Mass(1967) — Joe MastersSpotifyYouTube
- Missa Hodierna(1966) — Eddie BonnemèreSpotifyYouTube
- Mary Lou's Mass(1970) — Mary Lou WilliamsSpotifyYouTube
- To Hope! A Celebration(1996) — Dave BrubeckSpotifyYouTube
Sources
- "At Grace Cathedral", Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/At_Grace_Cathedral
- "Jazz Suite on the Mass Texts", Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jazz_Suite_on_the_Mass_Texts
- "The history of jazz Mass", Black Catholic Messenger, https://www.blackcatholicmessenger.org/the-history-of-jazz-mass/
- "Mary Lou's Mass", Smithsonian Folkways, https://folkways.si.edu/mary-lou-williams/mass/jazz-ragtime/music/album/smithsonian