Events
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Ongoing Activities
Scala Foundation organises conferences and other large-scale public events such as concerts and liturgical services on an annual or biannual basis. Margarita and David are sought-after speakers who regular lecture in the US and abroad to academic audiences, artists, churches, teachers, students and parents.
We are regularly engaged in deep work in our local community. This work occurs at a personal level through intensive person-to-person mentoring of student leaders and cultural entrepreneurs, who themselves spread our approach and vision by through organizations in other parts of the US and internationally. This is how Scala Foundation transforms culture organically, one personal relationship at a time.
In Princeton, New Jersey, we run a weekly Way of Beauty Fellowship Meeting and organize chant and art workshops for local families. This is how we connect the great traditions of the liberal arts and sacred arts to grassroots educational movements and small-group faith fellowships.
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Event Information & Signup
June 2026, Princeton, NJ: Sacred Music Symposium, featuring Sir James MacMillan
Working in partnership with The Catholic Sacred Music Project under the directorship of Peter Carter and Tim McDonnell, this is a two-week event on the campus of Princeton Theological Seminary and Princeton University. Attendees will take master classes in composition, choral directing, and choral singing. Margarita and David will address the attendees and the public, discussing how sacred music impacts the wider culture, and how visual art can work with sacred music to transform us in prayer.
FOLLOW LINK HERE FOR MORE INFORMATION AND TO APPLYRecent Conferences
Conference 2025: Thomism, Creativity and the Arts, Blackfriars College, Oxford
Jacques Maritain, the great French Thomist of the 20th century, held a belief in the artist’s mission to ‘shelter the prayer, instruct the intelligence, and rejoice the eyes and the soul.’ This provides an inspiring mandate to investigate art-making in the present age, in all its depth and variety. The conference included plenary talks, panel discussions, poetry readings, music and film, and brought together a rich and diverse range of presenters from across the UK and USA, with the final keynote talk delivered by Sir James MacMillan, a renowned Scottish composer and conductor. Margarita and David to the opportunity to interview Sir James about creativity and the arts, and this was published as a series of videos (see the interviews here). Margarita was subsequently invited by Sir James to serve as a commentator on his BBC Radio 3 series Genesis and the Creation Story in Music, which was broadcast in six episodes in December 2025 and January 2026.
SPEAKER VIDEOS
Conference June 2024: Workshops for Composers, Choristers and Choir Directors, with Sir James MacMillan: Princeton, New Jersey
Scala Foundation co-sponsored and participated in a two-week event with three separate residential workshops on the beautiful campus of Princeton University and the Princeton Theological Seminary. It was organised and run in partnership with Peter Carter of The Catholic Sacred Music Project, who led the program and whose vision this was. The Catholic Sacred Music Project is a regular partner of the Scala Foundation. The workshops were led by a stellar team of composers, conductors, and composers: Sir James MacMillan, Gabriel Crouch (pictured above leading the chorister workshop), Paul Jernberg, Dr James Jordan, and Dr Timothy McDonnell. It featured performances of participants’ original compositions. The opportunity for conductors. Choristers and composers to learn from internationally known masters drew participants from across the US and abroad.
SPEAKER VIDEOS
Conference 2023: Art and the Common Good
Scala Foundation’s April 2023 conference on Art, the Sacred, and the Common Good was held at the Princeton Theological Seminary in Princeton, New Jersey. Featuring in-depth discussions with artists Jonathan Pageau, Aidan Hart (above in British red pants), and Rifle Paper Company Co-Founder and Scala Board Trustee, Anna Bond.
SPEAKER VIDEOS
Conference 2022: Art and the Common Good
Featuring poet James Matthew Wilson, composer Paul Jernberg, and many other speakers. An important part of the conference was the inclusion of Morning Prayer under the direction of Paul Jernberg and featuring his compositions. In the front row, one attendee is artist Robert Puschautz (in striped shirt and cardigan), who was inspired to found the now-thriving art school, the Stabat Mater Atelier, for which David serves as an advisor. As well as being invited to lecture the students on Christian art and the role of the Christian artist in the modern world, Robert asked David to help him incorporate regular psalm chanting into the formation of his art students.
SPEAKER VIDEOSTestimonials
“I have soaked a lot in since meeting you and attending the conference at Scala in 2023 – podcasts, interviews, books, and conversations have all been confirming my intuitions, further informing me, growing my knowledge, giving me room to pause, and energizing me to share the knowledge. I’m working with the philosophy department at my high school to introduce art as important to philosophy. It is so important for the good of humanity!” Art teacher, Boston area
“The value of what Scala provides is in the stratosphere. I was on the call with Aidan Hart and I was so impressed with his thought and the conversation that I subsequently purchased his book of essays. And Margarita Mooney Clayton is always incredibly prepared for these public events. Her mastery of the material and thought-provoking observations and questions take the conversation to levels we would never reach if we were in less capable hands.” Michael M., a professional in NJ, aspiring teacher, attended Aidan Hart event and 2022 Scala conference
“No hyperbole here, what Margarita discussed with Jonathan Pageau is the key to the reconstruction of the world after the metaphysical disaster of “naturalism” — the purely immanent frame, as Charles Taylor diagnosed it. It’s the Christian analogical sense of God and reality that is almost nowhere to be found these days. The question about how to judge when symbolism is “real” was spot on. Margarita’s line of questioning at the conference was perfect to make Jonathan’s big ideas about symbols concrete.” Angelo M., media professional, New York, attendee at the 2023 Scala conference.
“As an atheist, I had given up on art and beauty—because I got to the point of thinking what’s the point? After I became a Catholic, I searched for anything online about beauty and liturgy and found Scala’s events. Now I am seeing the point of art afresh. It’s like everything went from black and white to full color.” Charles, graduate of MIT and Cambridge University (UK). Digital media professional, New York City.
