The Basilica of St. Mary of the Angels in Olean.

OLEAN — From a bustling downstate metropolis to a peaceful valley in the Southern Tier, Alex Violette finds himself sitting at the bench of a pipe organ, providing music for all those gathered to worship.

A New York City resident for most of his life, Violette is the new Director of Music for the Enchanted Mountains Catholic Community, encompassing the Basilica of St. Mary of the Angels and St. John the Evangelist Church in Olean and St. Bonaventure Church in Allegany.

Alex Violette

“I think our attraction to music helps us look toward something higher in ourselves and in the universe than the present mortal toil,” he told the Times Herald in a recent interview. “Even in music that is ostensibly indifferent or hostile to God, there is some intangible electric quality to the material that has ‘soul.’”

Violette’s first day in his new role was May 8 — his 40th birthday — even though he was initially meant to start on May 1.

“The poetic thing wound up happening when my former parish in Brooklyn asked me to cover two more masses after my April 30 departure,” he said. “At the last minute, the 8th was when I officially requested to start. … It was wild because this isn’t just a new Directorship ministry — it represented the completion of a radical life change.”

This is Violette’s first venture living and working outside of New York City full-time, and he is looking forward to getting to know our Greater Olean area community. He had visited over the past few years after buying a house in north central Pennsylvania in 2021, he said, when the time came to hedge against the instability of big city living with three young children and a fourth on the way at the time.

“I had a friend who was from the area who lived in New York City for a few years and had returned many years before my relocation, who I would visit every few years,” he said. “That’s how I became familiar with the region, but it wasn’t until a month ago that I was actually living here full time.”

AN ORGANIST, pianist and bassist from the Staten Island and Brooklyn boroughs, Violette is a proud graduate of LaGuardia High School of Music and Art, around the corner from the Metropolitan Opera, and the City College of New York in Harlem.

Violette’s musical background is unique since he majored in jazz studies at both institutions, commencing as organist at age 28. His classical tutelage began with a formal apprenticeship as cantor under his uncle, the late composer and Director of Music, Andrew Violette, also a former Benedictine monk.

“For the four years before that and the year after until his passing in 2021, I was essentially his apprentice, first as cantor and substitute organist directly under his direction, and later as protegee after I won my first permanent directorship in 2018,” he said.

Violette said this was also a fascinating development in hindsight because he didn’t reconnect with his uncle until 2006, but he had always wanted to be a church organist. He said he remembers thinking in junior high school that it would be a dream job.

“I come from a secular jazz and R&B background, which is what my high school and college degrees are in, but it wasn’t until I was exposed to church music — first through my mother-in-law in her Episcopal church, and then through my uncle — that I felt like I had discovered what the concentrated essence of music was,” Violette said. “Among colleagues we would discuss certain music and musicians having ‘soul,’ but somehow I didn’t fit the religious piece into this puzzle until I was 30.”

Violette later served as Director of Music, organist, cantor and guitarist at St. Finbar RC and the Shrine Church of St. Bernadette, all in Brooklyn, for seven years. For the final three years of this ministry, Violette was an associate cantor, organist and Schola Director at St. Michael’s Church in Staten Island, where he chanted the parish’s Mass in the Extraordinary Form on Sundays monthly, and on other feasts and solemnities.

Western music theory comes from the Catholic Church because the organized 12 tones were first developed in monastic plainchant, Violette explained. Musical polyphony, the pipe organ and its literature were extensively imbued by later Protestant denominations in Europe and throughout America centuries later.

“The ‘king of instruments’ offered a full-spectrum harmonic palette under my fingers — and feet — that became irresistible,” he said. “Playing at church also meant sidestepping the night club culture, which I was losing interest in.”

SINCE HE IS coming in around the same time as the family of parishes merger and recent installation of Rev. Chris Emminger, Violette said his first goal is to allow feedback to come his way based on what he will present and readjusting his programming over time.

“The opportunity to play, and steward, a large organ in a large church in addition to two smaller but equally beautiful ones is something I know I’ll continue to be amazed by, because of the infinity that can be produced from such variation,” he said.

On his own, Violette said he hopes to build an organist’s repertoire suited to each organ in each church building, but ultimately he’s hoping for engagement to reemerge organically as he becomes better known, as parishioners are inspired by what they hear from him to lend their talents to choir, or even as cantors.

“I’m also excited to see what the local offerings might be as far as musical partnerships with other instrumentalists for high holidays, especially Christmas,” he added. “My job is to harvest any of God’s musical bounty that might be buried in the souls of this congregation and see to it that it’s reordered toward Him, for His glorification and our own sanctification.”

Like the rest of the spiritual goods, music can be corrupted, Violette said, but humanity needs music because it needs God. He said God gave music to humanity to know Him and to love Him, and it’s up to the individual to use the musical art for that objective.

“As an edifying hobby, a musical pursuit often becomes an important keystone of character and identity for the practitioner. On the other hand, there are financially successful secular musicians who either self-destruct early on, or might pursue a stagnant enterprise into a spiritual dead end that leaves them feeling misguided by career’s end,” he explained. “All exemplify the case for music as a tenet of God.”

Moving to the Olean area was a slow transition because Violette had spent the previous two years commuting to Brooklyn while living in northern Pennsylvania. Because he had already had one foot in that town for almost four years, the most jarring thing this past month has been missing his favorite foods from the city.

“So far I’m filling the gap comfortably in some ways — Renna’s Pizza reminds me of home,” he said.

Violette said he’s also getting the hang of the stricter adherence to speed limits with only one lane and the luxuriant abundance of parking. There was also a bear on his porch and a snake in my attic this past month — both invigorating experiences, he joked.

“The views are spectacular in every season and the weather in Olean is always gorgeous, even when it rains,” he added. “I love the cooler weather.”