Which is the British Processional ?

[AntoineDaniel]

This website:

http://www.ssg.org.uk/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=82&Itemid=60

says the Processional can only be obtained by E-mail.

But is the Processional not also available here?

http://www.liturgyoffice.org.uk/Missal/Music/index.shtml

At the bottom of the page?

http://www.liturgyoffice.org.uk/Missal/Music/ProcessionalBook.pdf

[musicus]

Jeff, that last link of yours is the correct one. The SSG link points to a page that is, I suspect, now out of date: it correctly states that the Processional is only available as a PDF, but the e-mail address link, which originally redirected to John Ainslie, the compiler of the Processional and then Chair of the SSG, is probably now redirecting to the current SSG Chair, Caroline Dollard. People should use the Liturgy Office link.

No doubt John Ainslie will correct me if I am in error.

(Apologies for that over-complex second sentence. I can't imagine where I picked up such poor style.)

[AntoineDaniel]

Would John Ainslie be willing to post a few samples of his English adaptations of the chants?

[John Ainslie]

I have no 'English adaptations of the chants' to offer. In any case, I don't believe in adapting existing Latin melodic chant pieces for use with English texts. Fresh wine, new wineskins!

[NorthernTenor]

I have no 'English adaptations of the chants' to offer. In any case, I don't believe in adapting existing Latin melodic chant pieces for use with English texts. Fresh wine, new wineskins!

What a pity, John, that an aversion to continuity has led so many to "either/or" in place of "and". There's no sarcasm or lack of respect in that observation - I really do think such narrow-mindedness (surely the product of its passing age) the shame of the world. I speak as a practising liturgical musician, who is happy to work and produce the new and the old and and explore the boundaries between the two.

[NorthernTenor]

... work with ...

[John Ainslie]

You misunderstand me, NT. I carefully said that "I did not believe in adapting existing Latin melodic chant pieces for use with English texts". By melodic I mean the antiphons, Graduals, etc of the Gregorian chant repertoire which were skilfully written specifically to adorn and express the Latin text. Attempting to render these in English does violence to the chant, or to the text, or to both. I have seen recent attempts to do so from the other side of the Atlantic and am not impressed.

I do not include in my "leave alone" category formulaic chants (psalm tones, tones for Prefaces, orations, etc) or simply syllabic hymn tunes. These are quite usable in English, provided that care is taken to respect the differences of accentuation, at word and syntax level, between Latin and English.

Nor do I exclude new chant-type settings, of which I have written quite a number for use in my own parish. Some of them certainly enjoy the status of new wine in fresh wine-skins.

I do not think that such care over the use of the existing Gregorian chant repertoire as well as selective development for the future merits your charge of 'narrow-mindedness'.

[NorthernTenor]

John, It is quite possible to adapt a traditional melodic chant to the vernacular, so long as the adaptation does not attempt to follow the original slavishly, as if it were holy writ, but instead develops it so that it works with the translation, while retaining the marks of its particular origin. To suggest this is not possible because word-setting is all in such chants is to base your position on an over-simplification: they are a balance of words, pitch, rhythm, stress and phrase that goes beyond simple word-setting; one such as yourself who is alive to the beauty and structure of the originals should be able to adapt them, more or less freely as the translation requires. I believe you are well placed to do this, and urge you not to let your evident respect for the original get in the way of a worthwhile development that can but strengthen the reform-in-continuity to which we are called.

More broadly, I suspect the wider failure to attempt or achieve such development reflects an underlying cultural problem in post-Conciliar Catholicism, in which time has been frittered away in dispute between those who would make all things new (and too often ugly) and those who demand stasis. We have seen this recently in the differences between those who would have happily kept the old, banal, often inaccurate and incomplete translation of the Mass, and the late, awkward changes to the new translation by those whose concern for the literal got in the way of their ear for good, liturgical English. The time has come to move on from this simplistic opposition, be it theological, liturgical or artistic.

[Nick Baty]

John, I remember reading somewhere that you hoped composers would be inspired by The Processional. I know of one or two people who've set one or two items. Have you had any feedback?

[John Ainslie]

John, I remember reading somewhere that you hoped composers would be inspired by The Processional. I know of one or two people who've set one or two items. Have you had any feedback?

In a word, no. But I'd be very happy to act as a general information point on what has been set, and to direct enquirers accordingly.