Jazz, hymns and two Christian traditions converged at a Catholic parish in Coquitlam, British Columbia, to reveal a truth Pope Leo XIV named after a concert in the gardens of his Castel Gandolfo summer residence: Beauty draws us toward God.
“The music drew all of us into an experience of something new, something that was greater than any one of us alone could create,” the pope said.
Beautiful music “opens before us a new horizon, and it awakens within us the desire to go out to meet that horizon,” he said. “When we set out toward it, we discover not simply something, but Someone. We encounter God our Creator. Just as we can follow a stream back to its source, the beauty of music invites us to encounter the one who is beauty itself.”
Concertgoers at a unique performance at Our Lady of Lourdes Parish in Coquitlam Sept. 26 might have reached a similar conclusion.
Billed as “Hymn Swing,” the event featured a Presbyterian church’s jazz quartet performing a dozen “jazzified” Catholic hymns in an upbeat singalong concert.
The pastor, Father Larry Lynn, said the concert was not only a successful exercise in ecumenism but also an uplifting lesson on how jazz can open new doors to appreciating God’s creation.
“And, for me, the concert was fun,” Lynn said in an interview. “It was fun to have the hymns done that way, with different beats, tempos and all that. Everyone had a great time, even some of our parishioners who told me they didn’t really like jazz.”
The Catholic-Presbyterian collaboration began three years ago when, at the urging of a friend, Father Lynn, a jazz aficionado, attended a weekly Jazz Evensong event at Brentwood Presbyterian Church in Burnaby, British Columbia.
Lynn said at the time that he was impressed by how the church’s pastor, Rev. Brian Fraser, had integrated jazz music into the life of his church.
After the renovated basement at Our Lady of Lourdes Parish, newly named St. Bernadette Hall, reopened in May, Lynn collaborated with Fraser to arrange the concert.
Fraser said he had obtained a grant to support the musicians’ jazz concerts throughout the Metro Vancouver area. The gig at Our Lady of Lourdes was the first in a Catholic parish.
Lynn asked his parishioners what hymns they would like to see “jazzified,” and they produced a list that included “How Great Thou Art,” “Lift High the Cross,” and “Holy God We Praise Thy Name.”
Brentwood’s “director of musicking,” pianist Noah Franche-Nolan, wrote the jazz arrangements for vocalist Teresa Marie, bassist Julia Farry, and drummer Arvind Ramdas.
“They didn’t want to do any hymns in Latin,” Lynn said with a chuckle. “I gave them ‘Salve Regina’ because I wanted to put a Marian hymn in there, and they were like, ‘Teresa can’t sing in Latin!’”
The new arrangements gave the hymns a lively and upbeat vibe, said Lynn. “It’s kind of cool.”
Speaking during the show’s intermission, Fraser said transforming traditional melodies into jazz “makes the familiar unfamiliar.”
“You often hear new things in them, get a new feel for them,” he said. “Or catch a phrase that you didn’t hear in them before. So, it’s that continuity between tradition and innovation, tradition and creativity, that I think is so powerful in jazz.”
Fraser also said the lessons learned in jazz, about the importance of collaboration between the musicians, is one that everyone is able to use in their daily lives.
“The most common form of jazz in human experience is ordinary conversation,” he said. “So what would happen if you managed the conversations you have, in co-creating Our Lady of Lourdes and its future, with the same kind of attention and intention that jazz musicians use when they are playing together? You co-create the community one conversation after another.”
Lynn said his partnering with Fraser was an unlikely success. “Me, I’m a very staunch Catholic, a very orthodox Catholic, and Pastor Brian is a rather progressive person,” he said. “We’re two different people, two different streams of Christianity, and yet we’ve come together.”
He said he found Fraser’s ideas to be insightful, and that the collaboration inspired him to ponder why he himself loved jazz so much.
“So, I picked up my pencil and started writing,” Lynn said. “And I wrote this: ‘Jazz, a movement in the soul that renounces sentimentality. Rather, it engages us in the struggle that is life. And draws us into a deeper, more meaningful place where we may soar into the mystery.’”
For the 50 concertgoers, the performance was more fun than philosophy, as they followed Teresa Marie’s lead and sang along to the new versions of the hymns.
“I found it uplifting and joyous,” said Mary McKinnon of St. Joseph Parish in Port Moody, British Columbia. “The music really spoke to me.”
