Easter Alleluia

Well it does to the people who post here... dispassionate and reasoned debate, with a good deal of humour thrown in for good measure.

Moderators: Dom Perignon, Casimir

quaeritor
Posts: 350
Joined: Sun Jan 29, 2006 11:33 pm
Location: oxfordshire

Easter Alleluia

Post by 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
User avatar
VML
Posts: 727
Joined: Thu Feb 12, 2004 12:57 am
Parish / Diocese: Clifton Diocese
Location: Glos

Re: Easter Alleluia

Post by 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
Posts: 395
Joined: Mon Oct 03, 2005 10:23 am

Re: Easter Alleluia

Post by John Ainslie »

quaeritor wrote: 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.

quaeritor wrote: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.
User avatar
FrGareth
Posts: 217
Joined: Wed Jun 03, 2009 1:01 am
Parish / Diocese: Sion Community for Evangelism (Brentwood)
Contact:

Re: Easter Alleluia

Post by FrGareth »

><>
Revd Gareth Leyshon - Priest of the Archdiocese of Cardiff (views are my own)
Personal website: http://www.garethleyshon.info
Blog: http://catholicpreacher.wordpress.com/
Peter Jones
Posts: 604
Joined: Thu Sep 01, 2011 8:46 am
Parish / Diocese: Birmingham

Re: Easter Alleluia

Post by Peter Jones »

I sing it more dramatically than that. :!:
Any opinions expressed are my own, not those of the Archdiocese of Birmingham Liturgy Commission, Church Music Committee.
Website
NorthernTenor
Posts: 794
Joined: Sat Sep 13, 2008 7:26 pm
Parish / Diocese: Southwark

Re: Easter Alleluia

Post by NorthernTenor »

Peter Jones wrote:I sing it more dramatically than that. :!:


I was just looking for the "Like" button and realised where I was(n't)!
Ian Williams
Alium Music
JW
Posts: 852
Joined: Sat Mar 03, 2007 8:46 am
Location: Kent

Re: Easter Alleluia

Post by JW »

Peter Jones wrote:I sing it more dramatically than that. :!:


Not a la Shirley Bassey, I hope!
JW
johnquinn39
Posts: 450
Joined: Sat Mar 13, 2004 4:44 pm
Parish / Diocese: Birmingham

Re: Easter Alleluia

Post by 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
Posts: 105
Joined: Mon Sep 29, 2008 6:47 pm

Re: Easter Alleluia

Post by 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
Posts: 2024
Joined: Sat Feb 23, 2008 12:31 pm

Re: Easter Alleluia

Post by Southern Comfort »

festivaltrumpet wrote: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
Posts: 604
Joined: Thu Sep 01, 2011 8:46 am
Parish / Diocese: Birmingham

Re: Easter Alleluia

Post by 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.)
Any opinions expressed are my own, not those of the Archdiocese of Birmingham Liturgy Commission, Church Music Committee.
Website
Southern Comfort
Posts: 2024
Joined: Sat Feb 23, 2008 12:31 pm

Re: Easter Alleluia

Post by Southern Comfort »

Peter Jones wrote: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
Posts: 794
Joined: Sat Sep 13, 2008 7:26 pm
Parish / Diocese: Southwark

Re: Easter Alleluia

Post by NorthernTenor »

Southern Comfort wrote:
festivaltrumpet wrote: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.
Ian Williams
Alium Music
nazard
Posts: 555
Joined: Tue Sep 05, 2006 7:08 am
Parish / Diocese: Clifton
Location: Muddiest Somerset

Re: Easter Alleluia

Post by nazard »

NorthernTenor wrote:...
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
Posts: 1240
Joined: Fri May 27, 2005 8:04 pm
Location: Wirral

Re: Easter Alleluia

Post by alan29 »

NorthernTenor wrote:
Southern Comfort wrote:
festivaltrumpet wrote: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.
Post Reply