Renowned Lutheran Composer Delivers Address on Campus
Dr. Carl Schalk, noted Lutheran composer, author, and lecturer, gave a lecture in the Wittenberg Auditorium before the MLC Christmas concert December 3. In honor of the Reformation anniversary, Schalk presented “Luther on Music After 500 Years: Paradigms of Praise Revisited.”
Dr. Schalk taught church music at Concordia-River Forest (now Concordia University Chicago, or CUC) from 1965 to 2004, guiding the development of the university’s Master of Church Music degree program and helping establish the Center for Church Music, which holds many manuscripts of 20th-century composers of Lutheran church music.
He is well known for his own numerous choral compositions, several books, and more than 100 hymn tunes and carols published in Christian hymnals. The MLC choirs sang three Schalk compositions as part of their Christmas concert program that weekend.
- “Where Shepherds Lately Knelt” (text: Jaroslav Vajda)
- “There Is No Rose of Such Virtue” (text: anonymous)
- “Before the Marvel of This Night” (text: Jaroslav Vajda)
Dr. Schalk has had a major influence on WELS worship in many ways. The director of the WELS Commission on Worship, Bryan Gerlach WLS ’83, studied with him while earning his master’s degree in church music at Concordia, and seven MLC music professors can claim the same honor: Professors David Bauer DMLC ’78, Grace Hennig DMLC ’88, Edward Meyer (emeritus) DMLC ’58, Kermit Moldenhauer DMLC ’71, John Nolte (emeritus) DMLC ’68, Joyce Schubkegel (emeritus), and Ronald Shilling (emeritus) DMLC ’64.
Professor Joyce Schubkegel taught with Schalk at Concordia, and Professors Hennig and Moldenhauer were Dr. Schalk’s advisees.
Professor Hennig, who arranged the talk, spoke about the centrality of Christ in Schalk’s music and ministry: “At the heart of everything Dr. Schalk teaches about Lutheran worship is the phrase Viva vox evangelii—the living voice of the gospel. For Luther, this is the message that must be beautifully proclaimed and beautifully received.”
Hennig mused that perhaps a young MLC student in the audience would have heard Dr. Schalk for the first time that day and then been motivated “to take up the torch, and do the digging and thinking and asking about Martin Luther and music.”
MLC music professors were proud to host the renowned Dr. Carl Schalk for a lecture before their Christmas concert December 3. From left: Professor Craig Hirschmann DMLC ’84, Professor Adrian Smith ’03, Dr. Schalk, Instructor Erin Meissner, Professor Grace Hennig DMLC ’88, Dr. Wayne Wagner DMLC ’72, and Dr. Kermit Moldenhauer DMLC ’71.
