I just thought I'd like to share today's liturgy. We sang 'My soul in stillness waits' (yes, I know, a but early, but we won't have an organist for the rest of Advent) as a Communion song (choir verses, everyone refrain), and for once our PP was so stunned we had a bit of silence after Communion, and even the fractious children caught a bit of the mood.
Then this evening we had an Advent liturgy, mostly Taizé, but including some other stuff, and we sang the 'When two or three are gathered together in my name' from Cantate (the one found by Martin Foster, not Chris Walker's), which the tiny choir had learned more or less by heart. When it was going well, I began the canon, someone else took it up, and we sang it through several times: a really uplifting moment for a group of singers who haven't yet had the confidence to put an alto line into a Taizé chant. One of the gals even started a bit of, what is it, syncopation? 'When two' (when two) 'or three' (or three) 'are gathered together in your name... It sounded really good and was such fun to sing! So it's been a good day; which is nice, because last Sunday was a stinker!
Some days are diamonds
Moderators: Dom Perignon, Casimir
-
nazard
- Posts: 555
- Joined: Tue Sep 05, 2006 7:08 am
- Parish / Diocese: Clifton
- Location: Muddiest Somerset
Re: Some days are diamonds
Today was a diamond to remember: celebrating the Immaculate Conception with Tridentine Mass just after dawn in a tiny cotswold stone chapel on a frosty Gloucestershire hillside as the sun rose.
May you all have such diamonds to enrich you.
May you all have such diamonds to enrich you.
Re: Some days are diamonds
For reasons that are too tedious to go into our, voluntary, Mass at school for the Immaculate Conception was intended to show our continuity with the sisters who celebrated the closing of the Holy Year for the 100th anniversary of St Bernadette's visions of Our Lady.
Usually school Mass requires weeks of preparation, choosing music, writing out of parts, rehearsals, piano practice for me etc. On this occasion I sang the parts to myself for a week beforehand and had a 15 minute sing through after school on Friday with 5 of what would turn out to be a congregation of 40. It was far and away the most stress-free Mass at which I've led the singing/played and at the end of it I felt like I'd actually been to Mass (I'm sure we all know the feeling of concentrating so much on having the next piece of music ready or registration prepared that Mass seems to have happened around you, or near you, but not quite where you are!).
The children already knew the Sanctus and Agnus from Mass XVIII, we sang the Gloria from Mass XV which was new to them but uses only 5 notes - and we sang the Propers from the Anglican Use Gradual which uses simple but effective Psalm tones. In an ideal world I'd have used a more modern English translation but even with the 'hath's they still joined in brilliantly with music they were singing for the first time.
Bearing in mind that my organ skills are such that I need an hour's practice to do justice to the 4 hymns at Mass, I'd gladly repeat the experience in the parish given half the chance...not least because the extent of my 'choosing' was making the decision Latin or English, complex melodies or simple melodies - and not an hour long committee meeting in sight!
I was looking at the chants for Advent 3 and 4 earlier and, with the Advent prose I sang at evensong last week and the Psalm tones I used on the 8th I could comfortably sight sing my way through it. It's worth a thought.
Usually school Mass requires weeks of preparation, choosing music, writing out of parts, rehearsals, piano practice for me etc. On this occasion I sang the parts to myself for a week beforehand and had a 15 minute sing through after school on Friday with 5 of what would turn out to be a congregation of 40. It was far and away the most stress-free Mass at which I've led the singing/played and at the end of it I felt like I'd actually been to Mass (I'm sure we all know the feeling of concentrating so much on having the next piece of music ready or registration prepared that Mass seems to have happened around you, or near you, but not quite where you are!).
The children already knew the Sanctus and Agnus from Mass XVIII, we sang the Gloria from Mass XV which was new to them but uses only 5 notes - and we sang the Propers from the Anglican Use Gradual which uses simple but effective Psalm tones. In an ideal world I'd have used a more modern English translation but even with the 'hath's they still joined in brilliantly with music they were singing for the first time.
Bearing in mind that my organ skills are such that I need an hour's practice to do justice to the 4 hymns at Mass, I'd gladly repeat the experience in the parish given half the chance...not least because the extent of my 'choosing' was making the decision Latin or English, complex melodies or simple melodies - and not an hour long committee meeting in sight!
I was looking at the chants for Advent 3 and 4 earlier and, with the Advent prose I sang at evensong last week and the Psalm tones I used on the 8th I could comfortably sight sing my way through it. It's worth a thought.