The Making of The Passion
Led by Grammy® Award winner and Director of the Notre Dame Folk Choir Dr. J.J. Wright, this series will introduce The Passion, a new artistic production combining Scripture with original poetry and set to original music. Through Christ’s Passion, we learn to encounter suffering and incarnate love, to behold one another in our “not-enoughness.” As we enter the upcoming Lenten and Easter seasons, we invite you to journey with the Folk Choir and some of our closest collaborators through the development, rehearsal, and performance process of The Passion. Along the way, we will explore the Passion and Resurrection in light of the most pressing issues on the minds of our students, including the clergy sexual abuse crisis, the role of women in the Church, and climate change. In May, the choir will make a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, where they’ll walk in Jesus’s steps through the Passion and record this new work at the Jerusalem Music Center.
Meet the Faculty: J.J. Wright
J.J. Wright’s style cannot be easily categorized. Trained as a jazz improviser at the New School for Jazz in NYC, he’s also passionate about sacred music. Palestrina and Bach vie with Monk and Cannonball Adderley as just a few of his harmonic and melodic inspirations. While with the U.S. Naval Academy Band, Wright performed for the President—as well as several other high-profile diplomatic gigs—and with the Caribbean Jazz Project: Afro Bop Alliance, recording and performing with vibraphonist Dave Samuels. The album was nominated for a GRAMMY for ‘Best Latin Jazz Album’ and won the Latin GRAMMY in the same category. In addition to Mr. Samuels, J.J. has had the privilege of performing with Billy Hart, Ike Sturm, Nate Wood, Chris Cheek, Zach Harmon, Mark Ferber, Matt Ulery, and Delfeayo Marsalis.
In November 2016, Wright’s Advent cantata with the Notre Dame Children’s Choir, O Emmanuel, debuted at the top of the Billboard Classical Charts where it remained for eight weeks. He did his graduate studies in choral conducting at the University of Notre Dame and had a fellowship in Rome, where he researched and wrote his dissertation on the early Baroque oratorio while studying at the Pontifical Institute of Sacred Music and interning with the Sistine Chapel Choir.
Wright became the Director of the Notre Dame Folk Choir in 2017, and has released two albums with the choir: Catch the Spirit, which celebrates African and African American sacred music and They Tell Me of a Home: Celebrating 40 Years of the Folk Choir. When he’s not conducting, composing, or recording, he’s a husband and father to three beautiful children.
Meet the Faculty: Kimberly Belcher
Professor Kimberly Belcher, Associate Professor of Theology at the University of Notre Dame, grew up in Sarasota, Florida, and attended the University of Florida, where she earned a B.S. in Mathematics and Chemistry. It was at the university parish of St .Augustine’s that she became interested in liturgy and theology. Coming to Notre Dame for graduate work, she eventually received an M.T.S. and Ph.D. in liturgical studies. She taught at the College of St. Benedict and St. John’s University in Collegeville, Minnesota, before returning to Notre Dame on the faculty in 2013. Professor Belcher has three children.
Meet the Student Speaker: Anna Staud
Anna Staud is a senior at Notre Dame studying Economics and English with an Honors Concentration in Creative Writing and minors in Theology and Latino Studies. She serves as Co-President of the Folk Choir and Assistant Stage Director of The Passion, and has been honored to be part of the writing and composition of this project. She is originally from South Bend and will be teaching for the Alliance for Catholic Education (ACE) next year.
Meet the Student Speaker: Noelle Dorvault
Soprano Noelle Dorvault is a first-year at Notre Dame pursuing a major in biology and a minor in science and patient advocacy. She is originally from Pensacola, FL, and is very grateful to have been welcomed into this project through the ND Folk Choir this year.
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Featured Speakers:
- J.J. Wright, Director, Notre Dame Folk Choir
- Kim Belcher, Professor in the Department of Theology, University of Notre Dame
- Anna Staud, Senior, Co-President of the Notre Dame Folk Choir, and Assistant Stage Director of The Passion
- Noelle Dorvault, First-year member of the Notre Dame Folk Choir