Easter Alleluia

[quaeritor]

The new Missal (altar version) is now very clear about the form of the great Easter Alleluia. (Maybe it's predecessor was to, and I just missed it.) We have always used the simple plainsong Alleluia, best represented in text as follows:

G A B G___ ; A B A G E___ D___; G A B A-G G___ (I'm sure you'll know the one I mean.)

So now it's back to the ancient one I remember from days long past. The threefold repetition in rising keys by priest or psalmist is easy to understand (if not to execute!) but:

!: can it be the Deacon who does this?

2: My shiny new Missal (layman's edition) along with the new Misalettes for the Triduum, shows the Lectionary texts as well, of course, and describing the verses that follow the Alleluia as a Responsorial psalm shows as the response to be repeated after each verse "Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia!" Is this intended to be the elaborate plainsong one just proclaimed three times? - and if so is it meant to be repeated three times after each verse? - or is it the simple plainsong in which the word is repeated three times for each iteration of the melody?

Q

[VML]

Maybe it's nostalgia that takes me back to the first few years I heard that great long Alleluia. More recently, our best cantor sang it each year, once, and followed by the Alleluia psalm with the plainsong Alleluia response, sung by the choir and assembly. Our PP decided to sing A. last year, but only the one you have written.
I hope we will revert to the long one, and do it properly, x3 and rising.

[John Ainslie]

1: can it be the Deacon who does this?

Yes, or a cantor (the rubric says so). Traditionally and IMHO preferably the priest as presiding over this special occasion.

2: My shiny new Missal (layman's edition) along with the new Misalettes for the Triduum, shows the Lectionary texts as well, of course, and describing the verses that follow the Alleluia as a Responsorial psalm shows as the response to be repeated after each verse "Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia!" Is this intended to be the elaborate plainsong one just proclaimed three times? - and if so is it meant to be repeated three times after each verse? - or is it the simple plainsong in which the word is repeated three times for each iteration of the melody?

This is a bit of a Roman case of right-hand not knowing what left-hand is doing.

1) The original Alleluia was a prelude to the first verse of Psalm 117 set to an Alleluia-verse-type Gregorian chant - and indeed one could argue that the musical climax of the piece was not in the Alleluia at all, but in the first word of the response, 'Confitemini'. In the pre-Vatican Graduale the verse was not followed by a repeat of the Alleluia ('Hic non repetitur Alleluia'), but by a Tract-type verse. In the updated Graduale the Alleluia is to be repeated after the verse - presumably only once.

2) In the Lectionary, I would assume that the simple threefold Alleluia you sketch was in the mind of the Lectionary compilers, and that this is repeated after each of the three four-line verses found there.

3) In the new Missal, it gives the old tone in ICEL blobby orthography, then says rather vaguely that the Alleluia is followed by 'Psalm 117' with the 'Alleluia' repeated. Clearly it is not intended that all the verses of this rather long psalm should be sung. I would suggest that the Alleluia is repeated only once after each verse or group of verses, using the Lectionary for guidance.

Note that, whereas the words and rubrics of the Missal are de rigueur, the music is not. Whereas there is much to be said for using the older traditional tone, it needs a suitable psalm setting to go with it, if not the traditional plainsong verse noted in 1) above. However, if it cannot be sung with adequate mastery (and it is tricky to get it right - the ICEL blobs iron out the important rhythms and nuances), then better to sing the simpler version properly and confidently. There is no reason why this simpler version could not be sung by the priest/deacon/cantor three times, each time in a higher key, which would mean a three-time threefold Alleluia. Just the threefold Alleluia would then be sung as a response, as in the Lectionary.

[FrGareth]

You can listen to the great threefold Alleluia here: http://www.portsmouthdiocese.org.uk/userfiles/Easter%20Vigil%20Triple%20Alleluia.mp3

[Peter Jones]

I sing it more dramatically than that.

[NorthernTenor]

I sing it more dramatically than that.

I was just looking for the "Like" button and realised where I was(n't)!

[JW]

I sing it more dramatically than that.

Not a la Shirley Bassey, I hope!

[johnquinn39]

We tried this setting over a few years at the parish I serve in, but it had the effect of reducing the congregational voice to silence.

[festivaltrumpet]

In exploring the texts and chants for the Easter Dismissal with its alleluia this evening, eyebrows were raised at the chant given by the Commission for the first option, "Go forth, the Mass is ended, alleluia, alleluia." There is no quarrel to be had with the text, but the tone moves from G to A on the second syllable of ended, thereby stressing this latter syllable.

In which of the ICEL member nations is English spoken in such an affected manner that endED is the correct pronunciation of this world? Simply putting all of the word 'ended' on the A would seem to be the more elegant solution.

[Southern Comfort]

In exploring the texts and chants for the Easter Dismissal with its alleluia this evening, eyebrows were raised at the chant given by the Commission for the first option, "Go forth, the Mass is ended, alleluia, alleluia." There is no quarrel to be had with the text, but the tone moves from G to A on the second syllable of ended, thereby stressing this latter syllable.

In which of the ICEL member nations is English spoken in such an affected manner that endED is the correct pronunciation of this world? Simply putting all of the word 'ended' on the A would seem to be the more elegant solution.

Yes, it's one of a multitude of infelicities brought about by a desire to stick, Liturgiam Authenticam-like, to the Latin plainchant neumes as far as possible, instead of following their contour. See the minor anomalies thread for other examples.

It is a tragedy that our bishops decided to allow this stuff to appear in our Missal, when it was known a long time in advance that it was inadequate. They had the choice not to include it. Such is the stuff of church politics, alas.

[Peter Jones]

One of the chant compilers resigned over such inelegant musicianship, didn't he? (I noticed this dismissal yesterday and was horrified. I questioned in my mind as to whether or not those compilers who remained numbered any singers at all among them.I also wondered why they didn't all resign...and if they had done, what would have happened.)

[Southern Comfort]

One of the chant compilers resigned over such inelegant musicianship, didn't he? (I noticed this dismissal yesterday and was horrified. I questioned in my mind as to whether or not those compilers who remained numbered any singers at all among them.I also wondered why they didn't all resign...and if they had done, what would have happened.)

No, that wasn't why he resigned. But I think in the wake of the reactions that have been forthcoming, he is trying to disown his own part in the process (and what we have now is mostly his fault).

His resignation was over the texts of the Missal and the way they were butchered in Rome between 2008 and 2010.

[NorthernTenor]

In exploring the texts and chants for the Easter Dismissal with its alleluia this evening, eyebrows were raised at the chant given by the Commission for the first option, "Go forth, the Mass is ended, alleluia, alleluia." There is no quarrel to be had with the text, but the tone moves from G to A on the second syllable of ended, thereby stressing this latter syllable.

In which of the ICEL member nations is English spoken in such an affected manner that endED is the correct pronunciation of this world? Simply putting all of the word 'ended' on the A would seem to be the more elegant solution.

Yes, it's one of a multitude of infelicities brought about by a desire to stick, Liturgiam Authenticam-like, to the Latin plainchant neumes as far as possible, instead of following their contour. See the minor anomalies thread for other examples.

It is a tragedy that our bishops decided to allow this stuff to appear in our Missal, when it was known a long time in advance that it was inadequate. They had the choice not to include it. Such is the stuff of church politics, alas.

It is a tragedy that those who ought to know better continue to clutch at anything with which to beat those who have failed to heed their lost cause, even straw. The move from G to A at that point no more militates against a feminine ending than the opening of the ICEL Sanctus requires us to place a stress on the 2nd note - no-one with an ounce of musicianship or experience of chant would do either.

[nazard]

...
It is a tragedy that those who ought to know better continue to clutch at anything with which to beat those who have failed to heed their lost cause, even straw. The move from G to A at that point no more militates against a feminine ending than the opening of the ICEL Sanctus requires us to place a stress on the 2nd note - no-one with an ounce of musicianship or experience of chant would do either.

Whatever do you mean - who is beating whom?

I second your implied suggestion that there has been some lousy musicianship around.

[alan29]

In exploring the texts and chants for the Easter Dismissal with its alleluia this evening, eyebrows were raised at the chant given by the Commission for the first option, "Go forth, the Mass is ended, alleluia, alleluia." There is no quarrel to be had with the text, but the tone moves from G to A on the second syllable of ended, thereby stressing this latter syllable.

In which of the ICEL member nations is English spoken in such an affected manner that endED is the correct pronunciation of this world? Simply putting all of the word 'ended' on the A would seem to be the more elegant solution.

Yes, it's one of a multitude of infelicities brought about by a desire to stick, Liturgiam Authenticam-like, to the Latin plainchant neumes as far as possible, instead of following their contour. See the minor anomalies thread for other examples.

It is a tragedy that our bishops decided to allow this stuff to appear in our Missal, when it was known a long time in advance that it was inadequate. They had the choice not to include it. Such is the stuff of church politics, alas.

It is a tragedy that those who ought to know better continue to clutch at anything with which to beat those who have failed to heed their lost cause, even straw. The move from G to A at that point no more militates against a feminine ending than the opening of the ICEL Sanctus requires us to place a stress on the 2nd note - no-one with an ounce of musicianship or experience of chant would do either.

Setting aside the rudeness, I am wondering how much musicianship should be required from a worshipping community in something that is expressly meant to be sung by all.