Southern Comfort wrote:(b) whether they are within the priest's competence to sing, and (c) whether it would be better, on the grounds of the musical unity that the Guide for Composers is promoting, not to use the Missal tones at all!
Alongside the other settings you mention, one can usually rely on the clergy to sing the existing Missal tones. Presumably, the intention is simply to continue this. Although why the present one has to end on a different note to the present one is beyond me.
Southern Comfort wrote:I would like to see a setting submitted which includes the rubric "The Missal tone cannot easily be used with this setting"
With you there.
Southern Comfort wrote:But none of them sing the current Missal tone for "Let us proclaim the mystery of faith", and I doubt whether many of them will be able to manage the new "The mystery of faith" or the new doxology.
Most of the clergy I've worked with can manage both.
Southern Comfort wrote:Nick, very few of the conposers we are talking about even read the SSG forum, let alone post on it, hence the second-hand reporting.
Fair point. So is it simply coincidental that the people reporting on here from their own experience mention only textual problems?
Nick Baty wrote: ... in the light that so many on here are claiming the right to musical integrity.
It is a pity that some feel that such a claim has to be voiced on here. I wonder if those who have been pulled up on musical grounds would agree with the voicing of such a claim. I dare say that most composers would.
Nick Baty wrote:
Southern Comfort wrote:Nick, very few of the conposers we are talking about even read the SSG forum, let alone post on it, hence the second-hand reporting.
Fair point. So is it simply coincidental that the people reporting on here from their own experience mention only textual problems?
Well, unless the people reporting on here are hiding having been pulled up on musical grounds, that would seem a sensible conclusion to draw.
Nick Baty wrote:But it's still a tad odd that the only people reporting on here from their own experience report only textual problems.
Once again, Nick blithely ignores counter examples. I don't expect him to have read the original (he filters out the posts of those who persist in disagreeing with him), but my evidence to the contrary has been referred to in others' comments addressed directly to him. WIth this wilfull disregard for evidence, how can anyone take his arguments seriously?
Southern Comfort wrote:I think the point about all this is that the best congregational composers use repetition and sequence as a good way of providing "hooks" to facilitate memorability for congregations. (Indeed you do it yourself.)
Would that we could all compose tunes of the stature of Parry's Repton ............... mind you, Alan Smith's Pershore Mass Glory to God contains some masterful examples of how to generate hooks, together with both rising and falling sequences. No wonder it's now published in the new Decani collection and, I hear tell, will soon be published in hymnal supplements too.
I'm not sure which settings SC makes reference to but if a new setting might have been rejected on the grounds of too many "Blessed" and a re-written setting, with a similar number of "Blessed", accepted, the composer deserves more than a peremptory jotting on the "withheld" notice. A fuller explanation would not only be more just but also, plain and simple good manners. Otherwise, how are we (in general) to know how the 'case law' is taking shape?
Calum Cille wrote:Well, unless the people reporting on here are hiding having been pulled up on musical grounds, that would seem a sensible conclusion to draw.
That is possible, CC. Although I haven't heard of anyone being pulled up for consecutive fifths, false relations etc.
But I really am living proof that the panel is not, as far as we know, making musical judgements. I’ve written some seriously *beep* stuff – stuff that wouldn’t have been accepted in the first year of my first degree, but it’s been passed by the panel because it obeyed the rules – putting aside to what extent we do and don't except those rules.
Now, what if someone wrote a Sanctus that was almost impossible for the assembly to sing? Perhaps it had chromatically impossible intervals, top Gs, ridiculous leaps etc etc. Presumable that would be rejected – and, if so, it would be rejected on musical grounds. But would anyone seriously submit such a work? Perhaps we should try it and see!
I've just had an unpleasant dream. Four bulldogs, all wearing dog collars, were sitting behind office desks and eating up red, white and green butterflies (which were actually musical notes) but without ever getting any fatter. Three of the dogs were on the phone. One was yelping down it, "withheld, withheld," another was barking, "resubmit, resubmit!" and another was reciting, "big mistakes, no problem - tiny mistakes, disaster!" Then this dragon walks in, roaring, "undod cerddorol, undod cerddorol," and using tongues of flame to burn some pages with the legend 'S. Northern Tenor' on them. Another of the dogs was drinking mulled wine and typing on an old-fashioned typewriter, whining, "two holies for him, three holies for me, two hosannas for him, three hosannas for me ..." All through this, an ox was coming in and out bellowing wisdom at the bulldogs, "it's no yoke, it's no yoke".
Then the bulldogs and dragon were all crushed into a black mini driving over the border into Scotland, singing, "uuuuuuunity, uuuuuuuuunity, muuuuuuuuuusical uuuuuuuuunity". Then I was transported to mass somewhere and the music was just the same sickly tune, over and over and over again; but the dream was one. The congregation's foreheads were all sealed with the ICEL copyright blurb. Somehow I knew they had all once been composers but were now brainwashed and mindless. The chapel was tilting at crazy angles as I went around asking them if they'd seen the dogs and where the dogs were from. The people were all replying, "I don't know who they are," with this mad grin on their faces. Then a rather vicious looking westie with dead and dying blue and white butterflies dripping out of its mouth appeared from the sacristy followed by the bulldogs and dragon. The westie saw me straight away and they started in my direction. I tried to run away as all the people grabbed at me, repeating, "obey the punctuator, obey the punctuator ..." Then I heard a deacon chanting loudly, "Look towards the east." Everyone turned and suddenly the dogs and dragon were all instantly burned to ashes by rays of sunshine from the east window and the butterflies all came alive and escaped into the air as beautiful music and the ICEL copyright blurb faded from the congregation's foreheads. But then someone turned to me and said, grabbing my arm, with a mad look, "they made my music redundant! they made my music redundant!" Then I woke up.
Very interesting dream. It diverges from reality only in that there are five bulldogs rather than four, and they may not all wear dog collars. Or perhaps the westie is the other dog.
For those who cannot be bothered to look it up, the Welsh phrase means "musical unity".
I dunno - I blink for five minutes and I'm four pages behind!
Rather disappointed that no-one chose to address my post on page 31 quoting the GIRM. Within my longer extract,
GIRM wrote:The Conference is likewise to judge which musical forms, melodies and musical instruments may be admitted in divine worship, provided that these are truly suitable, or can be made suitable, for sacred use.
. . except CC with whose opening para I agree:
Calum Cille wrote:
quaeritor wrote:It doesn't leave much room for "how dare these unqualified dabblers tell me that my stuff isn't fit for purpose?"
Well, if you put in those terms, no, it doesn't, but we could paraphrase: "on what grounds do the Bishops, or those they have delegated judgement to, invalidate the appropriateness of my composition for liturgical use?" Having the right to judge is not necessarily the same as producing right judgement or reasonable grounds for judgement, or even a fixed, immutable judgement. Bishops, as priests, are well-versed in making accommodations. A 'dabbling' bishop may be less willing to pronounce musical judgement; hence, he may delegate responsibility to people with more narrow and rigid musical opinions. It is quite appropriate for composers to speak up for their own sensibilities on how musical forms relate to tradition, theology, pastoral concerns and so on, as a bishop may appreciate this kind of information in order to form his own opinions.
. if you disagree with their judgement discuss it with them - it's still their judgement that counts in the end, though.
(The rest of CC's post passed me by - I'm not easily disposed to take seriously an argument prefaced with "Get this" - I don't think I've engaged in that level of debate since my days in the school playground. (See you, Jimmy . . . ))
quaeritor wrote:I dunno - I blink for five minutes and I'm four pages behind!
Rather disappointed that no-one chose to address my post on page 31 quoting the GIRM. Within my longer extract,
GIRM wrote:The Conference is likewise to judge which musical forms, melodies and musical instruments may be admitted in divine worship, provided that these are truly suitable, or can be made suitable, for sacred use.
. . except CC with whose opening para I agree:
Calum Cille wrote:
quaeritor wrote:It doesn't leave much room for "how dare these unqualified dabblers tell me that my stuff isn't fit for purpose?"
Well, if you put in those terms, no, it doesn't, but we could paraphrase: "on what grounds do the Bishops, or those they have delegated judgement to, invalidate the appropriateness of my composition for liturgical use?" Having the right to judge is not necessarily the same as producing right judgement or reasonable grounds for judgement, or even a fixed, immutable judgement. Bishops, as priests, are well-versed in making accommodations. A 'dabbling' bishop may be less willing to pronounce musical judgement; hence, he may delegate responsibility to people with more narrow and rigid musical opinions. It is quite appropriate for composers to speak up for their own sensibilities on how musical forms relate to tradition, theology, pastoral concerns and so on, as a bishop may appreciate this kind of information in order to form his own opinions.
. if you disagree with their judgement discuss it with them - it's still their judgement that counts in the end, though.
(The rest of CC's post passed me by - I'm not easily disposed to take seriously an argument prefaced with "Get this" - I don't think I've engaged in that level of debate since my days in the school playground. (See you, Jimmy . . . ))
.. then consider: might not the principal of subsidiarity and the interests of organic development be better served by less detailed prescription in arguable matters?
393. Attento loco eminenti, quem in celebratione cantus obtinet, utpote liturgiæ pars necessaria vel integralis, Conferentiarum Episcoporum est melodias aptas approbare, præsertim pro textibus Ordinarii Missæ, pro populi responsionibus et acclamationibus, et pro peculiaribus ritibus per annum liturgicum occurrentibus. Item iudicare quasnam formas musicales, melodias, instrumenta musica in cultum divinum admittere liceat, quatenus usui sacro vere apta sint vel aptari possint.
Thanks, Presbyter; but a parallel English translation might be welcomed by those among us whose Latin is not up to translating this.
While I am posting, could I issue a general appeal to ease off on the personal stuff? There is a fine line between debate and demolition, especially when we are repeatedly retreading the same old ground. (This retreading cuts both ways, of course: a point which failed to convince the first time around is unlikely to do so next time on the strength of mere repetition.)
Perhaps the most useful corrective would be to hear detailed first-hand reports of successful and unsuccessful submissions from the composers themselves - at least until the Panel's terms of reference have been revised and clarified (after which we must hope that a 'case law' approach will no longer be necessary).
This is the CBCEW official version of the relevant paragraph of GIRM for England and Wales, as published by the CTS in 2005:
393. Bearing in mind the important place that singing has in a celebration as a necessary or integral part of the Liturgy, all musical settings of the texts for the people’s responses and acclamations in the Order of Mass and for special rites that occur in the course of the liturgical year must be submitted to the appropriate office of the Conference of Bishops of England and Wales for review and approval prior to publication.
The Conference is likewise to judge which musical forms, melodies, and musical instruments may be admitted in divine worship, provided that these are truly suitable, or can be made suitable, for sacred use.
A translation of the universal GIRM is more generalised but states the same principle: "...it is for Episcopal Conferences to approve suitable melodies, especially for the texts of the Ordinary of the Mass, for the people's responses and acclamations, and for special rites occurring during the liturgical year". The second paragraph is identical in both versions.
One might observe that the CBCEW version is slightly more relaxed than the universal GIRM inasmuch as the latter includes all texts of the Ordinary of the Mass whereas the CBCEW version limits itself to "the people's responses and acclamations".
