My strength lies solely in my tenacity.
―Louis Pasteur

    Kathleen Hart Brumm holds a Bachelor of Music degree in Church Music from Westminster Choir College in Princeton, New Jersey where she was a William and Mary Renneckar scholar.  Following an internship in Naples, Florida, she served a number of churches in New Jersey as vocalist and choir director.  She received her Master of Divinity from New Brunswick Theological Seminary cum laude in 1992, and was ordained by the Classis of New Brunswick the same year.  Since then she has concentrated on pastoral work in parishes of the Reformed Church in America with an emphasis on worship leadership, liturgical music, and preaching.

    Along with pastoral duties, she is busy with writing: hymns, hymn tunes, musicals for children, and choral arrangements for small choirs. Her articles on music and worship have appeared in The Chorister, The Hymn, Reformed Worship, and The Church Herald. She was part of the committee that prepared the children's hymnal Sing With Me (Faith Alive Resources, 2005).  She also leads choir retreats for adult and children's choirs, along with teaching classes and workshops on liturgy and music. 

When I get a little money, I buy books.  If I have any left over, I buy food and clothing.
— Erasmus 

          James Hart Brumm is a Minister of the Word and Sacrament in the Reformed Church in America (RCA), serving as Pastor and Teacher of the Blooming Grove Reformed Church in DeFreestville, New York. He has served as an adjunct professor of RCA history and worship at New Brunswick Theological Seminary, at St. Bernard’s Institute, and the Capital Region Theological Center in Albany, New York, and as Book Review Editor for The Hymn, journal of the Hymn Society in the United States & Canada, and as moderator of the RCA Commission on History.  James holds degrees from Westminster Choir College, New Brunswick Seminary, and Drew University. He has written articles for The Hymn, Reformed Worship, the Bulletin of the Hymn Society of Great Britain and Ireland, and The Church Herald (the RCA denominational magazine).  He is also the author of Singing the Lord’s Song: A History of English-Language Hymnals of the Reformed Church in America (RCA Historical Society, 1990) and editor of both Equipping the Saints: the Synod of New York, 1800-2000 (William B. Eerdman’s Publishing Company, 2000) and Liturgy Among the Thorns: Essays on Worship in the Reformed Church in America (Eerdman’s, 2007).  He was part of the committee that prepared the hymnal supplement Sing! A New Creation (CRC Publications, 2001). 

James is married to Kathleen Hart Brumm, a pastor, children’s choir clinician, author, composer, and educator.  They live in DeFreestville, New York, across the Hudson River from Albany, with their son, Christopher, and their dogs, Jessie and Pumpkin.