By Rita McInerney

Alphonso Nuckles has two congregations, St. Paul of the Cross in northwest Atlanta where he’s been choir director since November, 1985, and Zion Baptist in Roswell, his home church.

Within the past year, he’s participated in two archdiocesan celebrations, as one of the special directors for the installation Mass of Archbishop Eugene A. Marino, S.S.J., last May 5 at the Civic Center, and as music coordinator for the sixth annual Mass Jan. 15 honoring Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., at the Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in downtown Atlanta.

Both were liturgies in which traditional church music and African American hymns were combined to provide a rich and proper background for the mystery unfolding at the altar.

At the installation Mass, the unity of celebrant, singers and congregation of 4,600 was visible at Communion as Nuckles, 28, led the 120-voice choir and soprano soloist Jeanne Brown, his own voice teacher, in an enduring Baptist hymn, “Blessed Assurance.” Response, from the on-stage altar to the outreaches of the large auditorium, indicated heartfelt recognition of soul-stirred music in its strongest spiritual interpretation.

In helping plan the installation music, Rhonwyn Rogers, director of the Office of Black Catholics, issued a call to choir directors from member parishes of the Commission for Black Catholic Concerns. On the night of the meeting, Nuckles was the only director to show up.

Mrs. Rogers saw his presence as an answer to her prayer. “I was going to ask them to select (a director) from among themselves.” When the others couldn’t be present because of meeting conflicts, Alphonso Nuckles had the job.

“He proved to be someone who could work with all the directors,” Mrs. Rogers recalled. “What I liked was that other choir directors joined the chorus.”

“I don’t know if people realized what a challenge it was. That was another thing I prayed on. Whoever took on the task would have to pull together not just voices but had to teach a way of singing that some of our people had never been exposed to,” she explained. “But the choir was receptive and accepted the challenge. I was proud of them.”

Nuckles also felt challenged. “I knew Ham (Hamilton) Smith’s reputation and felt a little insecure at first.” But working with Smith, music director of the Cathedral of Christ the King, proved enjoyable. “I directed the black idiom while he did the traditional music, along with Kevin Culver, choirmaster at the cathedral.”

Nuckles knew he had to get white members of the multi-ethnic choir thinking about what the music they would be singing meant in the life of black people. All the selections he led were from Lead Me, Guide Me, The African American Catholic hymnal.

“I passed out music. I knew that was a mistake. Black churches did not have music taught by rote. And singing in black churches in southern Georgia is different than singing in black churches in north Georgia. Singing is different in black parishes here in the city. A lot has to do with the people, where they come from, their experiences.”

“They sang what was written on the page,” he went on to say of the raw choir. “People from the black parishes just looked at me. I sang them through the tone and asked them to put the music down. I would sing it as I wanted them to sing. I loosened them up. I’m not Mr. Strict.” So well did he loosen them up that one woman made him a white Michael Jackson glove, sequins and all, to wear while directing.

Directors involved in the installation talked hopefully of more combined appearances for this new archdiocesan choir, Nuckles hasn’t given up that hope although he was disappointed when, in preparing for the King Mass, the commission sent letters to all pastors asking for choir participation. “We didn’t get the response I wanted,” Nuckles conceded.

He still wants to see an archdiocesan choir singing together regularly. From such a large group he envisions a small group that would sing Gospel music.

He was music coordinator for the King Mass, sharing direction of the large combined choir from commission parishes with three other choir directors. The energetic response which unites Catholics from around the archdiocese at this annual liturgy.

After several years he is comfortable with the performance of the choir at St. Paul of the Cross. Singing under his direction, when the group is at full strength, are 23 women and seven men, a ration, he said, that is “bad but not unusual.”

“I’m blessed. My women have good voices. I wouldn’t mind hearing them sing solos.” He admits he pushes the choir. “God deserves our best because He gives us His best,” he reminds them often.

Last Sunday, Feb. 12, there was a good turnout in the choir loft. The choir observed Black History Month by singing Let My People Go and Swing Low Sweet Chariot. Nuckles, with his classical training “has problems with the Mass being all gospel (music).” On Feb. 12, most selections were traditional, All Hail the Power of Jesus’ Name, Give Thanks And Remember, Taste and See the Goodness of the Lord, and the recessional, Lord Throughout These Forty Days. The strong voices of the men compensated for their fewer numbers while the congregation contributed to the full sound of worship filling the church.

“A director should know and combine voices to achieve a pleasant sound,” Nuckles explains. “He should know where to seat each singer. Weak voices need to be in the center, stronger voices on the outside.” Seated in the back pew of the choir loft are children, some active, others sleeping, of the women singers.

Like congregations, choir members can be of two models; the every Sunday faithful and those attending Christmas and Easter. St. Paul of the Cross is no exception. One problem, Nuckles said, is that many of his singers are professional people whose work demands keep them from weekly rehearsals and Sunday choir presence.

“I can understand that,” he says, but often reminds them to “remember that God doesn’t hand out His blessings only at Christmas and Easter. Where’s your commitment?”

He found a commitment to hospitality by the entire parish when his professor of music at Shorter College contacted him just after Christmas. Dr. John Jennings, who also directs the chorale at the Baptist college in Rome, Ga., offered to bring the 44-member chorale to the church for a concert Jan. 11. Father Tom Brislin, C.P., the pastor, was enthusiastic. So were the parishioners. The concert was combined with a prayer service honoring Dr. King.

After a reception, 42 white and two black student singers went home with their hosts to spend the night. Both guests and hosts hoped they could return.

The visit by the Shorter chorale gave Nuckles a change to tell Dr. Jennings “all the things I appreciated” from those 55-minute classes in which Dr. Jenning so often would devote 45 minutes to “one little phrase.” Nuckles looks back now and realizes the significance of this method. “you need to know what you’re singing about.”

During the four years Nuckles, a tenor, was studying for his bachelor’s degree in music and theater, he traveled to Salzburg twice with the Shorter chorale. There the Georgians performed at the Helbraune Festival, the “commoner” part of the renowned Salzburg Festival, according to Nuckles. During his student years he sang at St. Mary’s Church in Rome and then would attend Sunday service at the Baptist church down the street.

There was nothing foreign in being choir director at a Catholic church for Nuckles. Music courses at Shorter included the Roman liturgy; one test required the students to write out the order of the Mass. While growing up in Roswell, he was fascinated with Catholic churches and visited as many as he could. His parents, Carrie and Henry Nuckles, while “strict Baptists were not close-minded,” he said.

He enjoys building a choir as he has done at St. Paul of the Cross. He believes “the Lord has something for me to do. I think He wants me to do it within the Catholic Church.”