St. Paul, MN Church peforms orchestral masses

Tonight at St. Agnes Catholic Church in St. Paul, 60 singers
will assemble in the choir loft for midnight mass. Violinists,
oboists and trumpeters — many from the Minnesota Orchestra — will
tune their instruments.

Then, as Christmas arrives at the stroke of midnight, the
glorious strains of Mozart’s monumental Coronation Mass will rise
in the baroque splendor of this onion-domed, gilt-and-marble church
in Frogtown, as bells peal in the frosty air.

Worshipers and visitors will have to pinch themselves to
remember they’re in Minnesota, and not in a cathedral in Vienna or
Munich.

A chance to hear the Coronation Mass — among the grandest music
ever written — would seem a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to many
Minnesotans.

In fact, the Twin Cities Catholic Chorale performs classical-era
masses of Mozart, Haydn, Beethoven and others at St. Agnes at 10
a.m. almost every Sunday from October until June.

Though the music is magnificent in the concert hall, says
director Robert Peterson, it’s different and more meaningful in the
context of the Latin mass. There, it’s performed to give glory to
God — just as its composers intended it to be.