"You Sing With Your Ears"

Susan Hallauer, of Anonymous 4 conducts chant workshops:

The music [the young women of "Angelus," a five-voice student ensemble at Mount Vernon High School,] sing is ancient, largely evolved from oral traditions, "And all of it is sacred," said Dana Taylor, their music director.

Known generically as "plainsong," the music is sung a cappella and in unison (no harmony).

People raised in the Roman Catholic tradition know the music well. [If only!] Plainsong or "Gregorian chant" is sung during the celebration of Mass; it is a ritual part of worship throughout the day in monastery life.

But the ethereal beauty of the highly formulaic sound taps into a "universal emotion" that has the capacity to lift up the spirits of all who listen, be it in a Cathedral setting or a concert hall, said Susan Hallauer, who, as a founding member of the internationally renowned vocal ensemble, Anonymous 4, has performed the Chant repertoire in both types of venues since 1986.

She also teaches others how to sing it.

And so it was, in a cathedrallike setting last Saturday, when Hallauer met with 14 Mount Vernon High School students, including members of Angelus, for a daylong Chant Camp at the Monastery of the Immaculate Conception in Ferdinand, Ind.

The event was sponsored by Mount Vernon High's music department, Taylor said, but participants included representatives from the Monastery at Ferdinand, the Arch Abbey at St. Meinrad and faculty from Indiana University's Ancient Music and Medieval Studies departments.