On June 11, 2019, the American Guild of Organists, by action of the AGO National Council, entered into a partnership with the Church Music Institute to provide discounted CMI membership rates for AGO members. AGO members will have the ability to enjoy CMI member benefits at a discounted rate which include access to its fully searchable online Sacred Music Library of nearly 19,000 curated choral selections and 14,000 organ composition titles. Members of the AGO may join CMI through the AGO website using their AGO membership login credentials. (After logging in on the AGO website, go to "Update Personal Information" for code.) CMI Executive Director Charlotte Kroeker, Ph.D., reflected on this new relationship commenting that "The Church Music Institute is pleased to partner with the American Guild of Organists in our mutual commitment to excellence in church music."
About the Church Music Institute Sacred Music Library
The Church Music Institute contains an extensive Library of sacred choral and organ music for evaluation and study to support the educational purposes of the Institute. The Library is unique in collecting and preserving music for worship and study. Through electronic resources, members find appropriate anthems or organ music to use in worship from the convenience of their home or office.
The choral collection includes an archive of thousands of catalogued sacred octavo anthems for adults and children with additional compositions added daily. Each anthem has been chosen for quality of text, music, and function in worship by the professional staff of CMI. Anthems from every stylistic period from the Renaissance through those most recently published are placed in permanent, acid-free folders for preservation, so that present and future generations may identify, study, and utilize them in worship. Additional choral music contained in the collection includes cantatas and oratorios, service and liturgical music. The library’s holdings have been donated to CMI by universities, seminaries, and church music scholars.
The organ collection includes music based on previously existing tunes, including hymn tunes and Gregorian chants. Many works are chorale preludes, while others are re-harmonizations, interludes, and arrangements with other instruments. Sample pages are continuously being added. The collection is being built from libraries that scholarly church organists donated to CMI, online collections in the public domain, and newly published music provided by publishers.
About the Church Music Institute
The Church Music Institute is dedicated to the advancement and stewardship of the best liturgical and sacred music for worship, serving clergy, musicians and congregants. Offerings include educational workshops and courses, inspirational festivals of church music, newsletters addressing current issues in church music, and online and print resources including the largest curated library of sacred choral anthems and organ compositions in the world. CMI also sponsors research in the field of church music.
Creating a home for the best music of the church, CMI provides a place in which proven practices that govern good music-making can operate. This work proceeds in a theological context where music serves the liturgy and is a vehicle for congregational worship. At CMI, the goal is to equip clergy, musicians and congregants for the glory of transcendent and transformational worship.
CMI is supported primarily by donors who understand the importance of music to religious faith and who want to invest in CMI’s future to maintain modest fees for its events and easy access to its libraries. With generous donations from supporters, CMI is able to equip clergy, musicians and congregants for meaningful worship. CMI is incorporated in the State of Texas and has IRS 501(c)(3) non-profit status.