Associations and Styles of Music

[johnquinn39]

Stop Press: Imagine the struggle you have in a parish which is dictated to by a few people who want to sing "Colours of day" to get agreement to sing the propers.[/quote]

I do not think this need be such a struggle. There are some appealing propers in Psallite and in the Kevin Mayhew book for example. Also, as I have mentioned in a thread before, near equivalents such as 'Abba Father, send your Spirit' and 'Safe in the shadow of the Lord' can prove very popular.

I would not altogether discount 'Colours of day' if only for the line 'The light of the world is risen again', although (and please, I am not being ageist) I would imagine this would be of more appeal to the elderly than to the young.

[johnquinn39]

I suppose it's mainly a problem for matches and dispatches, at which pastoral considerations may require us to grin 'n' bear it. At other masses, good or bad hymns needn't be an issue, because as liturgically informed Catholics we know we have the Propers and Marian hymns to sing instead.

Could you clarify this Mr Tenor? - Why not sing good hymns as well as the Propers - surely the superb (scriptural and liturgical) texts of Bernadette Farrell, Marty Haugen et al have their place in the Mass.

I am less sure about Marian hymns (I am not referring to the ones in the Graduals - which of course should be sung), but the devotional ones.

Am I recalling the CSL accurately - does it not say that devotions cannot be admitted to the liturgy?

Are these better sung outside of Mass? - I am thinking of 'Hail Queen of Heaven' and the 'Salve Regina' etc. At my parish, we sing these after Sunday evening prayer.

[alan29]

Don't knock "Colours of Day."
I have it on the list for when I am cremated. The chorus is particularly apt (even proper.)
Alan

[NorthernTenor]

Stop Press: Imagine the struggle you have in a parish which is dictated to by a few people who want to sing "Colours of day" to get agreement to sing the propers,

I couldn't work out which emoticon to use when I suggested it, so thought I'd let people go figure . I recognise the problem, but I believe it's surmountable with good will, catachesis and sensitivity.

I do not think this need be such a struggle. There are some appealing propers in Psallite and in the Kevin Mayhew book for example. Also, as I have mentioned in a thread before, near equivalents such as 'Abba Father, send your Spirit' and 'Safe in the shadow of the Lord' can prove very popular.

Even better, we could sing the proper propers from the Graduale, or vernacular versions of them, or sung them to psalm tones, or responsorial versions.

[NorthernTenor]

Nick,

To be strictly accurate, I should have said after Mass.

[NorthernTenor]

Nick wrote:

Given that most of the propers are not proper to the liturgy

That's funny - I could have sworn there was a 1974 Graduale Romanum for the Ordinary Form ...

[NorthernTenor]

** Sigh **

I remember when 'Colours of Day' was new and exciting. I even bought the 45.

[NorthernTenor]

Nick,

My abject confession related to the recorded version (which kind of brings us back to Pius X). I have never been enthused by a live rendering - though, to be fair, I've gone out of my way to avoid it and its kind for many years.

[NorthernTenor]

Of the Graduale Romanun, Nick wrote:

But isn't it only faithful to Year A?

That's to assume that the Misal propers take precedence over the Graduale. They do when the propers are spoken, but when sung it's the other way round. An unfortunate confusion, I know, but I guess it's the kind of ragged edge inevitable given the speed and extent of reform.

[johnquinn39]

Liturgical music in Britain is in a state of abject poverty.

What can we do about it? Probably *beep* all.

The last person I know who tried was Bill Tamblyn with his BA in liturgical music at Colchester. Forget three years – three months with Bill and you'd had enough theory and repertoire knocked into you to last a lifetime.

- Perhaps not quite. If you are prepared to do your homework, and plough through the various publications (public and private) available (admittedly the large publishing houses are US based) and maybe look outside the RC Church for some items, then there is more good music than you might think, although it is very thin on the ground.

The last person I know who tried to do something about this was Fr Peter Jones, with his excellent liturgy course. Unfortunately, this was discontinued many years ago.

Let's also not forget that 'Laudate' is nearly all quality stuff - perhaps much of this has never really been tried.

Again, I think education is the key.

[NorthernTenor]

Nick,

You don't have to sit corrected - we were both right. I was pointing out an apparent inconsistency in the the New Rite, that is, the Missal and the Graduale don't tie up. The 1974 Graduale is supposed to be the point of first resort for sung propers (this was reafirmed in the 2000 GIRM), but it differs from the Missal. I guess the point is that the Church's time-scales for change mean that, 40 years on, we're still working out post-conciliar reform (which arguably began well before the Council, anyway, with Pius X).

There's an interesting discussion of the issue in the 2006 Winter edition of the CMAA's journal:

[http://www.musicasacra.com/publications/sacredmusic/pdf/sm133-4.pdf/url].

You're right about the practicalities of the Graduale, but where they're still an aspiration the texts can be sung to psalm-tones, and there are english-language adaptations of the chants and settings to other music out there.

As to your observation that "Liturgical music in Britain is in a state of abject poverty" - I can only agree with you, to the point that I sometimes fear the sin of despair. Still, there are bright spots.

[NorthernTenor]

Nick,

No, the Graduale doesn't follow the three-year cycle. Yes, according to the GIRM it takes precedence when the Mass is sung, not said. Yes, this is confusing, and the Church is still working out liturgical reform.

As for despairing of the younger generation - looking back, I suspect we and our elders have rather landed them in it.

[wanders off for a pint of mild, muttering 'we are all guilty' ...]

[NorthernTenor]

Nick wrote:

So it's not really much use.

Not if you want to sing responsorial psalms. Personally, I find them a cumbersome and often embarrasing nuisance whether I'm in a choir or the congregation, but if it's your thing, there's no harm in mixing and matching, e.g. introit, offertory and communion from the Graduale and psalm from the Missal / Lectionary. The Graduale is, after all, the official book for the singers ...

[ back to the mild ... ]

[docmattc]

I think what Northerntenor is suggesting is that whatever the texts are in the graudale, over whatever cycle, they override any texts in the missal/lectionary if singing is taking place.

Surely singing a responsorial psalm is proper to the rite, whether we find them cumbersome and an embarrassing nuisance is irrelevant.

[contrabordun]

if singing is taking place

Raises the interesting question of when-does-a-mass-with-singing-become-a-sung-mass?
If Nick(?) was right in saying that you can mix and match between the Missal and the Graduale during the course of a Mass and NorthernTenor is right in saying that G overrides M in a sung Mass and vice versa in a said one, does this mean that a given mass can jump between being sung and not sung?
This sounds as though I'm being tongue in cheek, but actually, I'm just confused