Converting Beauty into Prayer

A few weeks ago, I went to an Easter concert put on by a new nonprofit called Higher Word at St. Patrick’s Old Cathedral in Little Italy. There had been advertisements everywhere: group chats, conversations, office emails. Catholic New York was simply buzzing with anticipation. 

My friend and I showed up a bit early and sat near the front. The nave was packed and humming with people. The crowd was very young, chiefly those in their twenties and thirties. I recognized faces everywhere. The atmosphere was that of a large, intimate, joyful family reunion. 

Eventually, the fifty-person orchestra took up that fateful final tuning, the choir members filed out, holding candles and solemnly intoning the Exsultet, and the program began. The music featured a broad range of famous composers from various centuries: There was the ancient Exsultet, Palestrina, Beethoven, Liszt. Higher Word’s chief conductor, Juilliard doctoral student Jacob Beranek, introduced each piece with illuminating, engaging vignettes about its composer’s relationship to Catholicism. 

Not every piece was explicitly related to Easter or Catholicism. Among those performed were Mozart’s Overture to The Marriage of Figaro and the Largo of Dvořák’s “From the New World,” which was dedicated to the recently deceased Holy Father. 

It was evident that a lot of preparation and thought had gone into the evening. The church interior had been set up with stage lights that dimmed, brightened, and changed colors. There was a streaming partnership with EWTN and a sponsorship by the Michelin-star restaurant Torrisi, as well as a prominent Italian bakery, Ferrara, which gifted little, neatly-packaged tricolor cookies to the upward of five hundred attendees at the close of the event. For those who had paid for the deluxe ticket, there were receptions before and after.

Curiously, Higher Word was not founded to be a musical organization. A couple of years ago, a group of friends got together with their parish priest, Fr. Brian Graebe, for a theological rooftop discussion. They were all moved by the discussion, and they decided to do it again, this time in a larger apartment and with more friends. As the discussions and venues continued to expand, the main organizer and eventual director, Spencer McIntosh, thought they should add a bit of music. 

First, a cellist and violinist played a waltz. Then at another gathering, there was a quintet. Then, a chamber orchestra. McIntosh began to be introduced to various Catholic musicians in the city, including Christa Dalmazio, who now serves as Higher Word’s music director. All this led McIntosh to form the idea of having a Catholic orchestra. Shortly after, he met Beranek, who enthusiastically agreed to be the conductor of whatever orchestra McIntosh could put together. 

They managed to compile an orchestra of Christian musicians and planned a grand debut at St. Anthony of Padua in SoHo last October. McIntosh told me that two weeks before the concert, there were only about ninety tickets sold, though the church could hold over four hundred people. It still would have been worth it, he said, but they’d been hoping more people would come. Sitting in St. Anthony’s during that anticipatory fortnight, he prayed, “Lord, fill this church.” He sure did, and he did it again for the Advent concert at St. Agnes in midtown, and again at the Easter concert at Old St. Pat’s. 

Higher Word’s success is not orchestrated by any deep pockets in the shadows. For the last few concerts, the organizers risked spending more than they gained, but they didn’t care. It wasn’t about making money; it was about providing something for which there seems to be a cavernous appetite. 

New York City does not lack for musical entertainment. We have Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center, the Met Opera and Broadway. We have free, outdoor concerts in various parks. But there’s something special about Higher Word, something it offers that the rest of the plethora do not. What is it that inspires people to fly home early from work trips in order to attend, to ask for dates in advance so they can make sure they aren’t on call the day of the concert?

Higher Word is oriented around the sacred. Advertisements for its concerts feature touching reflections on beauty, worship, and the role of music in both. “Have you ever wondered where beauty comes from?” asks Jacob Beranek in a video trailer for the St. Anthony’s event. “All the bliss we experience that draws us out of ourselves and that draws us higher? They all point to the same source. What is that source? God,” he answers bluntly. “Our Lord Jesus Christ.” 

Higher Word does not exist to provide lessons in classical music, though its events do simultaneously educate on that front. Their website states: “Have you ever felt the bliss of encountering true beauty through music? Whether that music was secular or sacred, the Higher Word Orchestra’s mission is to recreate those moments.” Higher Word is not about the idea of music, but the experience of it. It’s about the conversion of experiences of beauty into prayer. 

Higher Word’s attention to detail, from their elaborate events to their carefully produced videos (with an original score composed from scratch for each), illustrates that they care about transcendence. They want the people who come to their events to be drawn to beauty and ultimately God as entire persons, emotions and all. Their events are meant to complement other aspects of Catholic life, such as going to church and participating in other faith-related groups. 

In a city obsessed with art in all its forms, the location of Higher Word couldn’t be better. McIntosh told me that they try to select locations that are very New York, have a character of their own, and are places people want to be. 

There’s much more that can be done. If it’s supposed to happen, it will. Higher Word has no agenda. It wasn’t founded to solve any particular problem or address a particular grievance in the culture wars. It continues to grow because people continue to express a hunger for the nourishment it provides. So long as that hunger remains, Higher Word will as well, joyfully rising to the occasion. But if they keep up their current attendance rates, I’m not sure there’ll be a New York venue large enough to accommodate them.