A year on, what are we singing?

[JW]

Was chatting to a PP on my travels last week - they haven't done any new music yet. Their bishop has commented. Mass of St Rita is on the way! I suspect there are a lot of similar parishes.

[Southern Comfort]

Was chatting to a PP on my travels last week - they haven't done any new music yet. Their bishop has commented. Mass of St Rita is on the way! I suspect there are a lot of similar parishes.

There are even a couple of parishes in this part of the world that have not changed any spoken texts at all...... Father won't do it, you see.

And more than a few where they have a new Sanctus and memorial acclamation but are still using an old Gloria as part of a phased transition. Additionally, in a handful of parishes they have, sadly, stopped singing altogether, at least for the time being.

[Hare]

Was chatting to a PP on my travels last week - they haven't done any new music yet. Their bishop has commented. Mass of St Rita is on the way! I suspect there are a lot of similar parishes.

There are even a couple of parishes in this part of the world that have not changed any spoken texts at all...... Father won't do it, you see.

And more than a few where they have a new Sanctus and memorial acclamation but are still using an old Gloria as part of a phased transition. Additionally, in a handful of parishes they have, sadly, stopped singing altogether, at least for the time being.

Good grief - and I thought I was copping out / incurring the wrath of the bishop in September last year when we introduced a new Sanctus and Mem Acc but used an old Gloria for the first week, introducing the new one the following week

[promusica]

In Ireland, there are four mass settings being used throughout the country: Mass of Saint Paul by Ephrem Feeley, Glendalough Mass by Liam Lawton, Mass of Saint Columba by Columba McCann and Mass of Renewal by Bernard Sexton. These have been published jointly by the National Centre for Liturgy and the Advisory Committee on Church Music in a collection called Sing the Mass, which I see is now available in the UK from Decani Music. The collection also contains revisions of some mass settings which were extremely popular in Ireland, though how well these revised settings work is still to be seen. The idea is that throughout the country there is be a common repertoire - we're beginning to see the fruits of this at various masses throughout the country, and the forthcoming International Eucharistic Congress which is to be held in Dublin next week uses music from this collection extensively. Of course there are still parishes and music ministers that dug their heels in last November and refused to change from the old to the new, but I would imagine that these are rare. The bigger problem in Ireland is that there are many churches where the parts of the Ordinary (Kyrie, Gloria, Gospel Acclamation, Eucharistic Acclamations, Agnus Dei) are not sung at all (or worse - some vague hymn/acclamation is done in place of a Gloria or Sanctus etc), as there is still a mindset to sing four hymns (Entrance, Offertory, Communion, Recessional) and speak the rest. There is no real tradition of assembly song in this country, as it is usually left to the choir or music group.

[pdsfd]

Has Michael Joncas composed a new translation for his Mass for John Carroll Gloria?

We're still using the non-translated Salazar Gloria, we are however using a new translation Sanctus (Missal Tone I think?) and a slightly altered Memorial Acclamation 'When we eat this bread', still to the same tune 'St Columba'. I'm not the organist and don't really have a say on musical matters at my parish but I'd really like us to start using Peter Jones' new Gloria, the problem is we don't have a choir - we're only a small parish!

Having also been to the Salford Cathedral Sunday mass a few times recently, I've picked up on and really do like the Spring Sanctus and St Agatha Alleluia. Again though they I don't know whether these would work well without a choir? Slightly off topic but I think Michael Joncas' 'Take and Eat' Communion hymn is beautiful - prefer this to quite a few of the 'traditional' Communion hymns!

[promusica]

Michael Joncas has updated the Gloria from the Mass of John Carroll. I don't think there are any plans to update the rest of the Mass, which is one of Joncas's finer mass settings; however, the Penitential Rite, Gospel Acclamation, Amen and Agnus Dei stand fine in the new Roman Missal as they are. The Sanctus should be easily modified. It would be interesting to see what he would do with the Memorial Acclamation - often a very strong existing setting might not bear the strain of being modified with new words.

On the Take and Eat comment, my own sentiments exactly. It works each and every time. Although I always find it a bit disconcerting to sing of eating and drinking from the Lord's table when we in Ireland are rarely (if ever) given the possibility of receiving from the cup. A topic for another post, perhaps.

[Nick Baty]

We've just had the funeral of our Deacon, Gerry.* For the Vigil Mass and the Funeral Mass we sang the acclamations from A New Celtic Liturgy. Congregation sang with gusto. Clergy, also sang loudly – as they do when gathered for such occasions however, despite having the text in front of them, they all sang the old words – suspect that music embeds things in our subconscious.

None of the concelebrants was comfortable with the revised Per Ispum from the above so I opted for the Missal chant, linking back to Walker with added soupy brass. It was a delicious mess. No two guys sang the same "for ever and ever".

But before I sound as though I'm having a go at the priests who attended, on Wednesday I was the only bloke in an SAB** arrangement of Amazing Grace. I dished out music to the clergy and half of them sang the B part. Some of them were sitting behind the choir, some on the opposite side of the sanctuary but it sounded great.

* Full music list here for anyone who's interested.
** B = Blokes (somewhere between tenor and bass!)

[Nick Baty]

We have five sets of acclamations... However, so far we only have one Gloria (through-composed) as we've been concentrating on building up Communion processionals.

Just assessing what we've done while planning for the next few months.

We're now up to six sets of acclamations and two Glorias with a third Gloria (rewrite of an old one) making its first appearance on 23 September.

I think that's our lot for now. We'll rotate the acclamations we have and possibly add a fourth Gloria in January. But, that aside, we need to consolidate what we have before we add any more.

On the other hand, after all my grumbling, Communion processionals have finally taken off and we have quite a few now in the repertoire.

[Southern Comfort]

None of the concelebrants was comfortable with the revised Per Ispum

I should think they found the textual change from Ipsum to Ispum particularly trying....

[quaeritor]

On a recent holiday trip I visited an unfamiliar church and felt the rise of uncharitable thoughts as a mechanical device launched into the Entrance hymn - the start of the classic four hymn sandwich, with absolutely nothing else sung. Later I reminded myself that I was in fact at the nine o'clock Mass; in my own parish where we like to think we "do things right" there would not even have been that at the early Mass (nor yet at the Vigil Mass). How many parishes actually follow the prescription that no Mass on a Sunday should be without music? - How do they resource it?

Interestingly, this summer's experience contrasted markedly with what I observed over a number of years in some small sparsely attended Spanish churches in a number of villages where the Alleluia and Holy holy holy were always sung - unaccompanied and led by the celebrant. On special occasions there might be an Entrance hymn and a recessional, both led by the celebrant who therefore had to process in first to start the "entrance" hymn and linger at the end to lead the recessional thus perhaps defeating the object of both! The "Holy", by the way, was always the same in all the churches in which I heard it - perhaps a "national standard"?

Q

[alan29]

Our mass yesterday had three concelebrants, each of whom sang a slightly different version of the embolism. Liturgical Ligeti, anyone?
Maybe that is the kind of polyphony certain people are advocating.

[musicus]

No, that is heterophony (singing variants of the same thing simultaneously). Britten used it extensively in his later works, notably in the three Church Parables (all of which, coincidentally, derive their basic music material from Gregorian chant melodies).

[alan29]

And very effective it is too - Prodigal son tempters.

[alan29]

I was astonished to find the Peruvian Gloria listed yesterday, but delighted the our congregation could still raise the roof in three parts.

[johnquinn39]

We sing Marty Haugen's 'Creation' Mass (revised) as a default setting.

More recently ,we have been singing Mike Stanley's 'St. Luke's' Mass, and
we are learning Dan Dchutte's 'Christ the Savior' Mass.

During Advent we shall probably sing James MacMillan's 'St. Anne's' setting.