200+ Years of ‘Beautiful Music’

The Chapel Singers, Trinity’s oldest student group, still making music and memories

By Andrew J. Concatelli

While many factors might explain the extraordinary endurance of The Chapel Singers—the choral group recognized as the College’s oldest continuously active student organization—one in particular stands out to its director.

“We always need beautiful music,” says Christopher Houlihan ’09, John Rose Distinguished College Organist, director of Chapel music, and artist-in-residence, who has led the group since 2017. “The music that The Chapel Singers study and perform is timeless and adds tremendous beauty to our world, which is absolutely necessary in any era.”

The group originated as the Chapel Choir in 1825, just two years after Trinity was founded. To celebrate the 200th anniversaries of both the College and the choir, The Chapel Singers recorded The Bicentennial Album in 2024 and released it in 2025. The music is entirely by composers with connections to Trinity, including Robert Edward Smith, the Chapel composer-in-residence since 1979. The album also features music by alumni and faculty members.

“The particulars of the group have changed over time, but the constant that endures is the importance of offering music that really transcends the difficulties of the world,” says Houlihan, who was a member of The Chapel Singers and also occasionally accompanied the group on the organ when he was a student at Trinity.

The choir was all male before Trinity became coeducational in 1969 and had once shrunk to a quartet, but today it comprises about two dozen undergraduates of all genders. The members are from diverse backgrounds and academic disciplines, and no religious affiliation is required.

The Chapel Singers perform at special Chapel services, including Choral Evensong and the annual Christmas Festival of Lessons and Carols, and at major College events, including Convocation and Baccalaureate. The group also sings at regular Sunday services at the Trinity College Chapel and performs other concerts on campus and on tour throughout the year.

The group’s repertoire spans eras from Gregorian chants to choral music from the 16th and 17th centuries to contemporary music. “The applied musicianship students learn is important,” Houlihan says. “For some Chapel Singers who are music majors and minors or taking other music courses, it connects to their music studies and is an important part of their education.”

John Rose, College Organist-and-Directorship Distinguished Chair of Chapel Music, Emeritus, and director of The Chapel Singers for four decades (1977–2017), says that the music created by the group honors the beauty and inspiration of the Chapel building, which has been treasured by the College since it opened in 1932. “Much of the history of the College is memorialized in the Chapel, by the wood carvings of the pew ends, among other things,” Rose says. “When you are singing there, you are part of the history of the College.”

Shayla L. Titley ’02 remembers processing into her first Lessons and Carols service singing Christmas hymns. “The Chapel was packed!” she says. “It was a beautiful and sacred moment, and I felt so connected to the importance of The Chapel Singers to the College and this Hartford community tradition.”

Houlihan points to the connections formed among students as another important aspect of the group. “While undertaking this focused musical study together, they build a close-knit community of Trinity friends,” he says. “They also get to share this very powerful, beautiful music with the campus community and the broader Hartford community. All of those things make it a unique and rewarding Trinity experience.”

Mark “Scotland” Davis ’88 notes, “The Chapel Singers is that thread that will always connect me to that place in time when beauty, music, truth, and sincere effort were the mark of youth. The group has endured for more than two centuries because each new generation finds those same values waiting there.”

Will Bannon ’28, a current member, says that the group exists alongside coursework and research rather than in competition with it. “It offers a peaceful counterbalance to academic life while also contributing meaningfully to the broader Trinity community,” he says. “Weekly rehearsals, shared repertoire, and the rhythm of services create continuity over time, and being part of that collective sound fosters connection across class years, majors, and backgrounds.”

Rose points out that students form lifelong friendships through the group. “A number of alumni met their future spouses in The Chapel Singers,” he says.

Among those future spouses were Jamie Tracey Szal ’06 and Timothy Szal ’06. Jamie says, “I think students who sing in The Chapel Singers not only benefit from improving their musicianship but also really enjoy spending time in the company with other musicians who enjoy singing beautiful music.” She says that a favorite memory is touring Argentina with the group in 2005. “We sang in some really incredible spaces, and we enjoyed a lot of seriously good food. . . . That was a trip of a lifetime.”

Rose also took the group to perform in Venice, London, and San Francisco, among other cities around the world. Under Houlihan’s direction, The Chapel Singers have performed in New York City several times in the last decade.

Houlihan says he hopes the group will continue to find ways to create music that inspires the Trinity community in the broadest sense possible. “Directing The Chapel Singers is a privilege and very important part of my work here at Trinity,” he says. “I try to program music that inspires people of all backgrounds. It has been rewarding to offer concerts that speak to our shared experience; I hope that will continue to grow.”

Bannon says he believes that The Chapel Singers have endured for more than 200 years because the group has always been rooted in the practice of showing up regularly, listening closely, and making music together in a shared space. “That kind of commitment does not age out. While styles, students, and even the campus itself change, the core experience remains the same,” he says.

“What sustains the group is that each generation steps into something already in motion,” Bannon adds. “You are aware that the sound you are helping to create has been shaped by countless voices before you, even though every rehearsal and service exists only in the present moment. The tradition lasts because students are trusted to take part in something that matters and to carry it forward in their own time.”

 

Header image by Nick Caito, 2024