Matthaeus Ruber – singer and composer, author of the Sung Rosary
Who is Matthaeus Ruber?
Matthaeus Ruber is a singer and composer of sacred music, author of the Oratorio on the Rosary, a musical and meditative work created to accompany the prayer of the Holy Rosary through singing, music, and images.
His artistic activity does not arise from a career plan, but from a personal journey of conversion to the Catholic faith, matured after years of searching, spiritual crisis, and deep study of Christian sources.
The heart of his work is one alone: to bring people back to prayer, especially to the prayer of the Rosary, lived not as a simple recitation, but as a meditation on the Gospel with Mary.
From humanistic formation to music
Matthaeus Ruber has a humanistic education. He holds a degree in Cultural Heritage Conservation, with studies mainly focused on history, literature, and ancient languages.
From a young age he cultivated a strong passion for music, studying classical singing and music theory, particularly fascinated by nineteenth-century melodrama and the great European musical tradition.
For many years musical composition remained an unfulfilled desire. Only after 2018, also thanks to meeting a singing teacher and to a more systematic study, did he seriously resume his musical path.
The crisis and the conversion
The life of Matthaeus Ruber was marked by a long spiritual and moral crisis, lived for years also within non-Catholic Christian environments.
After a twenty-year period away from the Church, he undertook a direct study of the Fathers of the Church and of the Christian texts of the first centuries, gradually coming to recognize the historical and doctrinal continuity of the Catholic Church.
From 2023 onward he fully returned to the Catholic faith. In 2025, together with his wife, he made a radical life choice, leaving behind every ambiguity and returning to Italy, accepting a condition of greater material precariousness, but of renewed spiritual and family unity.
The birth of the Oratorio on the Rosary
The Oratorio on the Rosary is born in the first months of 2025, in a time of silence, prayer, and hidden life.
In just a few months Matthaeus Ruber composes a large-scale work, structured around the Joyful, Sorrowful, and Glorious Mysteries, with over four hours of music, dozens of different musical themes, and a full orchestration. To which the section of the Luminous Mysteries has recently been added.
The work is entirely sung, with melodies designed to sustain meditation and accompany the recitation of prayers.
Accompanying the music is a meditative film that recounts the life of Jesus and Mary, conceived not as a spectacle, but as a support for prayer.
The author himself has repeatedly stated that he considers the birth and completion of the oratorio as a gift received, rather than as the result of his own abilities.
A musical vision at the service of faith
The music of Matthaeus Ruber is based on what he calls natural heptatonic music. The use of the seven modal scales is combined with a rigorous harmony of classical character.
The orchestra is structured in an eighteenth-century style, while the musical language seeks to unite rational order and expressiveness, in a synthesis that the author links to Christian thought and, in particular, to the Thomistic tradition.
The singing is not intended for performance, but for prayer.
The goal is not to move emotionally for its own sake, but to help the listener recollect himself, meditate, and pray.
A missionary project
Matthaeus Ruber does not pursue a traditional concert career.
His desire is to bring the sung Rosary to parishes, communities, and places of prayer, without requesting compensation, relying on Providence and the hospitality of those who invite him.
Together with his wife and children, he is developing a project of itinerant life, simple and poor, inspired by the Gospel, in order to serve the Church wherever he is called.
All the contents of the Oratorio on the Rosary are also published online, translated into 43 languages, to make prayer accessible to people of every nation.
A service, not a career
Matthaeus Ruber does not desire fame, media visibility, or artistic success.
He considers music a service and his own voice a received instrument, to be given back.
The ultimate meaning of his work is expressed in a simple conviction:
If even just one person, through this Rosary, returns to prayer and begins to take the Gospel seriously, then everything will have had meaning.
Who is Matthaeus Ruber?
Matthaeus Ruber is a Catholic singer and composer, author of the Sung Rosary and the Oratorio on the Rosary.
What is the main project of Matthaeus Ruber?
The main project is the Sung Rosary, a musical oratorio designed to accompany the prayer of the Holy Rosary.
What kind of music does he compose?
He composes sacred music based on natural heptatonic music, with classical harmony and modal structure.