Exultet

[gascoynep]

We used the Martin Foster Exsultet setting from the Resurrexit supplement on Saturday as suggested earlier on this thread (thanks Kerrezza ).
It went most satisfactorily - we omitted the refrains as they did not make it to the order of service(!) and used guitar, piano and mandolin accompaniment.
The parish priest worked hard on the singing and the result was a more tuneful and joyful exsultet than any I can remember from the past 20 years! Hopefully we will use it again next year with the refrains.

[Southern Comfort]

There's a simpler setting . . on this web page . . but not for much longer, I suspect.....

It would be a shame to loose such a useful resource. Were there to be by chance anyone connected with that department reading this, might it be possible to rescue the material, and might the Society website be able to find it a home?

Q

I am sure it will be possible to arrange for this setting to be available after April 6, which is the cut-off date for the Department for Pastoral Formation of Portsmouth diocese.

[quaeritor]

Thanks SC - but I was thinking of the whole collection of examples towards which I have been directing "my" pp and deacon. not just this specific one.

Q

[promusica]

Here's one that has been used a lot in our own diocese:
http://cherrybrookmusic.weebly.com/uplo ... mation.pdf

[Southern Comfort]

Here's one that has been used a lot in our own diocese:
http://cherrybrookmusic.weebly.com/uplo ... mation.pdf

Interesting. There are only 3 pages on the PDF — the rest is missing. On page 1, should the B flat on [Mother] Church be an A? Seems likely. And is Ephrem Feeley a pseudonym or a real person?

[promusica]

On page 1, should the B flat on [Mother] Church be an A? Seems likely.

Well spotted. For consistency, an A is probably better here, although the B flat works ok too, as there is a tonic-dominant fall which should be fine for the singer.

[VML]

Are there many parishes where a woman is singing the Exsultet?

[Ros Wood]

Mine - in fact we've had women singing it for over 25 years (except for the one year that we had a deacon).

[Southern Comfort]

The cause of women singing the Exsultet was advanced a number of years ago by OCP's recording of Christopher Willcock's setting, where the cantor is a woman. A significant number of churches heard this setting and went and did likewise. The setting is of course a casualty of the recent change of text....

[VML]

Yes, but the recent change of text is far closer to the Latin than the earlier one.
When in 1987 I asked our Dean, who was more musical than our then PP, if it was in order for a woman to sing it, he gave me a chant copy, and also Fr Gregory's (AGM) setting, which I sang that first year for simplicity. We have over the years had three different women and three different men singing the chant, but over the last twelve years, two of us take turns.
I love the new one. It will be, as ever, a privilege to sing it.

[Nick Baty]

And is Ephrem Feeley a pseudonym or a real person?

A real person: http://www.cherrybrookmusic.com/
and published by GIA: http://www.giamusic.com/shop/artist/ephrem-feeley

[Southern Comfort]

Thanks, Nick!

[FrGareth]

There's a simpler setting of the Exsultet (PDF and sound file, using a Gregory Murray psalm tone, with assembly refrains) on this web page:

http://www.portsmouthdiocese.org.uk/pastoralformation/liturgy/presiders.php

but not for much longer, I suspect..... This setting has worked well for the past four years in both former and new translations (the latter with revised refrains that tie in with the new text) — just the thing for deacons who want to sing but can't manage the Missal tone.

Fortunately, most good things from yesterday's internet have been saved by the Wayback Machine: https://web.archive.org/web/20130325024751/http://www.portsmouthdiocese.org.uk/pastoralformation/liturgy/presiders.php

[Southern Comfort]

There's a simpler setting of the Exsultet (PDF and sound file, using a Gregory Murray psalm tone, with assembly refrains) on this web page:

http://www.portsmouthdiocese.org.uk/pastoralformation/liturgy/presiders.php

but not for much longer, I suspect..... This setting has worked well for the past four years in both former and new translations (the latter with revised refrains that tie in with the new text) — just the thing for deacons who want to sing but can't manage the Missal tone.

Fortunately, most good things from yesterday's internet have been saved by the Wayback Machine: https://web.archive.org/web/20130325024751/http://www.portsmouthdiocese.org.uk/pastoralformation/liturgy/presiders.php

Gareth, that is brilliant! One or two of the files have also turned up here http://www.magnificatmusic.com/pubs_3.htm including the simplified Exsultet.

[VML]

Wow! I had only seen Dom Gregory Murray's simplified Exsultet in full. This makes it so easy for any regular cantor to cope.