Gregorian Chant

Gregorian Chant: Back to Your Actual House is a documentary/performance film which interweaves a visual reflection on the text of Genesis with chants performed by the Schola Cantorum of the Benedictine monks of that convent and interviews with the monks themselves on the reasons and the beauty of their lifestyle choice. One of the monks expressly says that Gregorian chant represents for them a sort of moment of return to their true home, to the somewhat spiritual home to which we all belong, and inspired the film's title. The parallel juxtaposition of the chants and the words of the monks to Genesis, a text which more than any other speaks of our earthly home and its beauty, acts as a contrast on the one hand and on the other it supports the spirituality and happiness of these monks. Photographed in the convent of Heiligenkreuz, writer/director Roberto Quagliano (Pericles by Shakespeare on the Road) also interviews historians and experts on Gregorian chant to reconstruct how these chants were born and how they developed historically starting from the seventh century.