Pasadena World Premiere: 2 new Guadalupe Carols in Marian concert!
About this Event
Friday, November 20, 2026 - 7:30 PM
Very Marian Advent Carols with the Benedict XVI Institute and Saint Andrew Catholic Church in Pasadena!
The Very Marian Advent Prayer Service is the Catholic version of "Lessons and Carols" in which we wait with Mary during the last difficult month of pregnancy for the coming of Baby Jesus.
This year's concert will include world premieres of two new hymns to Our Lady of Guadalupe:
The first “A Guadalupe Carol” is by Benedict XVI's great artists-in-residence: composer Frank La Rocca and poet James Matthew Wilson.
The second “Luminous Lady, Radiant Woman” comes from the husband and wife team of Joseph and Monique Gonzalez, best known as the authors of the Guadalupe and the Flower World Prophecy: How God Prepared the Americas for Conversion Before the Lady Appeared.
Since Our Lady appeared during Advent, and adorned with the Aztec symbols expectant mothers used, it seems particularly fitting to begin to add carols for Our Lady of Guadalupe into the Church's Advent carols..
A dessert reception will follow, by registering you help us know how many cookies to bake and make sure we let you know the next time we are bringing sacred music to Pasadena.
The holy music will lift your soul, with the choir led by maestro Steven Ottományi, a conductor, composer, organist and tenor.
About Steven Ottományi
Steven Ottományi is a conductor, musicologist, composer, organist, and tenor with a rich background in pastoral music making since 1981. He earned a Bachelor of Arts in Music History and Theory from California State University, Fullerton, and a Master of Music in Choral Conducting from California State University, Los Angeles. He is currently a Ph.D. candidate in musicology, with a dissertation focused on the performance practice of the earliest layer of Gregorian chant. Ottományi’s sacred choral and liturgical music is published by major ecumenical and Catholic publishers, and his compositions have been commissioned by parishes and cathedrals nationwide. In 2012, he founded the California Mission Schola and Sinfonia to revive the music of the California Missions. Since 2020, he has served as director of music at Saint Andrew Catholic Church in Old Pasadena, where he established a large music department, a children’s choir school, and the Music at Saint Andrew concert series. He is an active researcher, presenting on topics from California Mission music to Gregorian Chant to the intersection of music and language, and is the son of Indigenous American and Hungarian immigrant parents.
To learn more and listen visit: https://benedictinstitute.org/very-marian-advent-and-christmas-carols/
"While all the Earth in Darkness Sleeps," Frank La Rocca composer, lyrics by James Matthew Wilson, premiered at St. Andrew Catholic Church, Pasadena 2025.
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