Cantors of any level and experience are welcome to this workshop. Tailoring the workshop to those in attendance, Dr. Leyden will help us hone our prayerful skill in leading the sung worship of a congregation.
Wednesday, September 20, 7-9 p.m.
Registration opens at 6:30 p.m. so we can start promptly at 7 p.m.
St. Richard’s Catholic Church
7540 Penn Avenue S
Richfield, MN 55423
Enter by the main doors under the portico, door 3.
This entrance and the church are entirely accessible.
Registration is $20/cantor.
Bring four cantors from the same parish and get your fifth cantor in for FREE. (Pay $80, $20 discount)
Best Deal:
ALM & NPM members get 50% off! (Pay $40 for 5 cantors)
Biography of Dr. Leyden
Dr. Barbara Stahl Leyden recently retired as Director of Music Ministry for St. Joseph Catholic Church, a large parish in the Kansas City metropolitan area. She began playing the organ every Sunday at her small rural North Dakota church as a teen, and has since played keyboards, sung, or directed liturgical music in nearly every conceivable setting. In addition to her broad experience in Catholic and other Christian music, Dr. Leyden lived and taught music from ages preschool through college in places as varied as Holy Trinity Catholic School in Lenexa (10 years), an inner-city school outside Washington, DC; Arizona, Kansas, Hawaii, Korea and Germany. She taught in public and private schools, colleges, universities, community education programs, workshops, state music conventions and in her own private studio. While working, she also sang in community amateur and semi-professional groups of varied sizes, musical styles and location, including the William Baker Festival Singers, Songflower and Nightshade. She has written several articles for National Association of Pastoral Musicians/NPM publications, serves on the Musical Skills and Communications Forums for NPM national and adjudicates for those members earning one of the three levels of Cantor Certificate. She continues to lead song prayer at the keyboard and teach workshops on vocal technique, the cantor ministry and other liturgical music topics.
Dr. Leyden earned a Doctor of Musical Arts in Sacred Music Conducting from the American Conservatory, a Master of Music degree from the University of Arizona and a BS in Music Education degree from North Dakota State University. Her doctoral conducting included a well-received series of five concerts featuring classical choral works sung in a liturgical setting using singers recruited from the entire Kansas City metro area. Her doctoral paper is a complete reference guide to music in Catholic liturgy, including hymn and choral suggestions for the entire 3-year scriptural cycle. Her master’s paper on the child voice is one of the most complete references to be found on that topic.
Her husband is COL Richard Leyden, U.S. Army (Retired) and Dr Leyden is retired as a LTC in the U. S. Army Reserve. She served as a military intelligence analyst, author, and French translator. They have three adult children, Cassandra, Brianna and Nicholas.