Canto app is a liturgical music application developed in Cuba thanks to the initiative of a French priest, encouraged by the demand that recordings have on and outside the island.
This is Fr. Albán María Du Cosquer of the Fraternity of the Verb de Esperanza, who has been missionary in the Diocese of Santa Clara.
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In conversation with Ewtn News, the priest recalled that everything was born at his first Mass, when he realized “that there was a lot of talent, many talented young, musicians, who wanted to do something with music.”
Then, they started with some evangelization concerts and the group was called the acrisolada “because I liked the idea of purification.” “To be able to sing to Jesus, you have to be purified, you have to live from Jesus, you have to accept a path of conversion,” he explained.
“Then we started thinking about liturgical music, because we needed this in the field,” he added.
The priest said that the first purpose was to help the mission, however, then he began receiving orders from priests who wanted to have the recordings. “Very quickly I talked to my bishop, which encouraged me to do it,” he said.
The recordings, texts and scores were delivered free of charge to all Cuban dioceses through the National Liturgy Commission. However, requests from abroad also arrived. So it was that the idea of Canto app was born.
Fr. Albán María Du Cosquer indicates that they currently have more than 800 recordings that cover all liturgical time and specific songs for “the great solemnities, which come, we will say in the first place in Cuba, but from the Hispanic and Latin American world too” .
In addition, the application not only has popular religious music in format, but also “with more than 250 songs in organ format, and there is also a start of Gregorian and polyphonic music.”
“It is an application that wants to be dynamic,” he explains, not only with songs sung by acrisolate, but also other groups that have been added. Even the idea is to “propose to Hispanic composers to present their music, and a careful selection will be made” to see what can be included in Hispanic liturgical music.
Song app It is available in Apple and Android, and the annual subscription will cost $ 30.
“The idea is to self -finance the liturgical music project and also, if it generates something else, it will help to help the church here in Cuba. Especially the priests who need it so much,” said Fr. Albán María Du Cosquer.
More information about Canto app, on your website.
Eduardo Berdejo
Professional in Social Communication of the National University of San Marcos in Peru, I have more than 20 years of experience in Catholic digital journalism. As part of ACI Press, I have been sent to cover the trips of Pope Francis to Cuba, Mexico, Colombia and Peru, in addition to the Synod of Sinodality in the Vatican in 2023.