"It's mainly due to the growing realization that the chant is not just another style of music at the Mass, it's the music of the Mass itself," Tucker said.

Signs of the revival are everywhere, he said.

The Church Music Association of America has a national registry of scholas, or choirs, that sing Gregorian chant. In the past five years, that registry has grown to 150 scholas from a dozen.

The association puts on a Gregorian chant teaching conference every year. Five years ago, 28 people attended. Last year, registration was closed two months early when the maximum of 140 had registered. This year, 400 will attend.

Gregorian chant is influencing a whole generation of young people, he said.

"The chant is for the young generation what groovy guitar music was in the 1970s. It's the music of rebellion against bad music in churches," he said.

Tucker sees several reasons for the explosion of interest in the chant.

"Chant has universal properties," he said. "If you listen to chant, it causes your mind and heart to extend upward. It always rises up, like incense. It's heaven-bound music.

"It also goes along with a new desire for solemnity. People are beginning to realize that church should be different from the rest of life. It's all designed to serve a need, the longing for salvation. It calls forth eternal reflection."

It was the music heard by saints and martyrs of all times, he said.

"It connects us with our deepest roots in music."

He also said that Gregorian chant, normally sung in Latin, appeals to all languages and ages. In an era in which the Catholic Church is becoming ever more multicultural, it is a music that unites people.

It sounds ironic, he said, but this most ancient of musical forms has always been boosted by technology.

When the written musical staff was invented about 1000 A.D., the music could be passed to others without face-to-face teaching.

The invention of the printing press further expanded use of the chant.

Today, the Internet is a source of learning and networking among those interested in the chant, and thousands of pieces of music are available at the push of a button.

Bill Sherman 581-8398
bill.sherman@tulsaworld.com