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A forgotten story: Jazz finds religion in Pittsburgh
Renowned pianist Mary Lou Williams and her ties to Bishop John Wright
By Mark Sullivan
(Page 2 of 2)
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Concert or Mass?

Was this too bold of a request? Cardinal Wright didn't think so. “I frequently remember the concert we had in the Civic Arena in Pittsburgh, and no one would be more pleased than I to see you present a liturgical concert or even a Mass here in Rome,” Cardinal Wright responded via a letter dated April 26, 1978.

The cardinal couldn't guarantee the personal presence of the Holy Father at such an event, so he tried to set up a sacred concert at St. Susanna's Church, the American parish in Rome. Williams knew the difference between a liturgical concert and a Mass and fired back.

“Certainly would be nice to celebrate the Mass in St. Peter's where the pope is. Dearest cardinal, they have done Masses of African chants ... but never any American artistic music (jazz),” Williams said in a letter dated May 18, 1978.

Unfortunately, Williams never got to perform for the pope. She did have an audience with Pope Paul VI in 1969, however. And “Mary Lou's Mass” was used during a Mass celebrated at St. Paul Cathedral in Pittsburgh as well as at St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York. Even though her liturgical music isn't used very often in parishes, it has been the subject of three musicology doctoral theses in the last 10 years.

Sullivan is a member of St. Paul Cathedral Parish.

The Mary Lou Williams Collection, which arrived beginning shortly after her death in 1981, is the largest and most widely referenced collection of personal papers at the Institute of Jazz Studies at Rutgers University in Newark. The collection contains every material imaginable for a musician of her stature and career spanning six decades, including original music manuscripts, rare unreleased tapes, photographs and scrapbooks, correspondence and autobiographical writings, and business and performance records, to name a few.

Use of the collection has substantially revived the memory of her illustrious career through books and scholarly articles, documentary films, as well as new recordings of her music and concerts celebrating her work, such as one at Jazz at Lincoln Center a few seasons back. Williams last manager, Fr. Peter F. O'Brien, S.J. of Jersey City, continues to lend his expertise to aid researchers and musicians looking to learn more about the pianist, composer and arranger or perform her music.

For further information about the Mary Lou Williams Collection or to make arrangements to use it, please call Annie Kuebler at the Institute of Jazz Studies at 973/353-5595.

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