David Haas

David Haas resides in Eagan, Minnesota, where he is director of The Emmaus Center for Music, Prayer and Ministry and serves as campus minister at Cretin-Derham Hall in St. Paul, Minnesota where he directs the CDH Liturgical Choir and serves as the animator for the Cretin-Derham Hall Taize’ Prayer Community.

He was born on March 11, 1957 in Bridgeport, Michigan, USA.

Highly regarded as one of the preeminent liturgical music composers in the English-speaking world, he has produced more than 45 collections of original music. His liturgical works are sung and prayed throughout the world and appear in hymnals of many Christian denominations and in many languages.

David’s newest projects with GIA include God Is Everywhere!; I Will Live On, The Rosary With St. James, and Mass of Christ Our Hope. In addition to his work and ministry at Cretin-Derham Hall, David has been an international advocate for the role of young people in the life of the church. He is the founder and executive director of Music Ministry Alive!, a national liturgical music formation program for high school and college-aged youth, which has “graduated” more than 2000 students during the past 17 years, many of whom now are serving as pastoral musicians and in other areas of ministry. (www.musicminsitryalive.com)

From 1985-1988 he was an adjunct instructor and composer-in-residence at the St. Paul Seminary School of Divinity in St. Paul, during which time he was very active internationally in writing, composing, and presenting workshops and seminars on the implementation of the Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults. During these years, David was part of what is commonly referred to as the “Minnesota School” in collaboration with two of his colleagues, Michael Joncas and Marty Haugen, in producing some of the most popular and effective music for the Church’s worship that has appeared in the days following the Second Vatican Council.

For more than 35 years, David has been active as a workshop and keynote speaker, author, retreat leader, liturgical musician, concert performer, songwriter, and recording artist and has performed and presented at various conventions, workshops and conferences throughout the United States, Canada, Europe, the British Isles, Ireland, Australia, the Bahamas, Israel, Greece, and Turkey.

In 1991 he was nominated for a Grammy Award for the recording of I Shall See God, and his book The Ministry and Mission of Sung Prayer (St. Anthony Messenger Press) received the Outstanding Professional Book Award from the Catholic Press Association in 2003. Along with Michael Joncas and Marty Haugen, he was the recipient of the Distinguished Alumni Award in 1995 from the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul. In 2004 David was named Pastoral Musician of the Year by the National Association of Pastoral Musicians, and that same year he received the Crosier Award for Outstanding Service in Ministry. He was the 2014 recipient of the Emmaus Award for Excellence in Catechesis from the National Catholic Education Association.