The Glory Days

[NorthernTenor]

This is nothing less than patronising, in my view. You have tried to derail the principle topic of this thread

I'm sorry that you've descended to peronal abuse again, SC. It wasn't helpful previously, and it doesn't add anything to this thread.

[NorthernTenor]

There is nothing in the text that precludes the choir proclaiming the Sanctus in a representative role

In which case, the Church does not need liturgical musicians.

I guess that begs a definition of liturgical musician, Nick. I must read your dissertation!

[mcb]

Many of my generation had the principles drummed into us.

Despite being born in the same year, you and I had very different musical upbringings, Nick - my formation in liturgical music was pretty anarchic, and I came to my grasp of the principles (such as it is) after I'd been a practitioner for many years. In my teens I sang in (what was then called) the parish 'folk group', and at university, while you were imbibing the principles from Bill, although I sang evensong in the college chapel choir, for Sunday Mass I took part in (what was still then called) the chaplaincy 'folk choir'. I think the driving instinct, then and now, is the feeling of having glimpsed authentic collective prayer in the singing of the gathered assembly.

The rules came later, and to my mind come second. (I told you my basic training was as an anarchist.) So it seems to me no problem at all if some choirs in some places set aside the strictures of GIRM on singing the Sanctus, as long as they do so for the best of reasons. The best of reasons is beauty. It can't have been the Council's intention that we should never again hear the Sanctus from the Missa Papae Marcelli, or the like. So even if GIRM is normative, I wouldn't like to see it as inviolable, and I don't think the rules lose their value in being treated that way. I certainly don't see that it follows from this that there's no longer a place for liturgical musicians like you and me.

Theodor Klauser touches on this, sort of, in his A Short History of the Western Liturgy. To paraphrase from memory (because it's in the other room), "the history of the Western liturgy is one of experiment". We try things that are not quite in conformity with the rules, and we retain or discard them according to how much they aid or hinder successful and effective public prayer, rather than how much they conform to the rules. The rules will catch up, if development is authentic.

To my mind diversity per se counts for a lot - the more things we try, the greater the likelihood of those authentic developments coming into being. (Always within the bounds of orthodoxy. But orthodoxy, historically, is permissive.) The poison comes when we take sides, when it's no longer a matter of doing it our way, but also of condemning the way they do it (whoever we and they are). The blogosphere brings out a lot of people who like to think in we and they terms. But I don't thing internet demagogues have much to do with real life, or the way we do things on the ground. All we can do is remain true to the vision that inspires us, which in your case, I think, means fidelity to the true spirit of the liturgical reform and the true letter of the liturgical documents. Keep at it!

[Southern Comfort]

This is nothing less than patronising, in my view. You have tried to derail the principle topic of this thread

I'm sorry that you've descended to peronal abuse again, SC. It wasn't helpful previously, and it doesn't add anything to this thread.

At what point does expressing an opinion become categorised as personal abuse? I was merely expressing an opinion. This thread is about what happened in our major cathedrals in the 1970s and 80s, not about plainchant, which you have interjected. And it's not about belittling Nick Baty, who is a staunch pastoral muscian with a greater sense of perspective than you appear to have yourself.

Let's get back to the topic.

[Southern Comfort]

Many of my generation had the principles drummed into us.

Despite being born in the same year, you and I had very different musical upbringings, Nick - my formation in liturgical music was pretty anarchic, and I came to my grasp of the principles (such as it is) after I'd been a practitioner for many years. In my teens I sang in (what was then called) the parish 'folk group', and at university, while you were imbibing the principles from Bill, although I sang evensong in the college chapel choir, for Sunday Mass I took part in (what was still then called) the chaplaincy 'folk choir'. I think the driving instinct, then and now, is the feeling of having glimpsed authentic collective prayer in the singing of the gathered assembly.

The rules came later, and to my mind come second. (I told you my basic training was as an anarchist.) So it seems to me no problem at all if some choirs in some places set aside the strictures of GIRM on singing the Sanctus, as long as they do so for the best of reasons. The best of reasons is beauty. It can't have been the Council's intention that we should never again hear the Sanctus from the Missa Papae Marcelli, or the like. So even if GIRM is normative, I wouldn't like to see it as inviolable, and I don't think the rules lose their value in being treated that way. I certainly don't see that it follows from this that there's no longer a place for liturgical musicians like you and me.

Theodor Klauser touches on this, sort of, in his A Short History of the Western Liturgy. To paraphrase from memory (because it's in the other room), "the history of the Western liturgy is one of experiment". We try things that are not quite in conformity with the rules, and we retain or discard them according to how much they aid or hinder successful and effective public prayer, rather than how much they conform to the rules. The rules will catch up, if development is authentic.

To my mind diversity per se counts for a lot - the more things we try, the greater the likelihood of those authentic developments coming into being. (Always within the bounds of orthodoxy. But orthodoxy, historically, is permissive.) The poison comes when we take sides, when it's no longer a matter of doing it our way, but also of condemning the way they do it (whoever we and they are). The blogosphere brings out a lot of people who like to think in we and they terms. But I don't thing internet demagogues have much to do with real life, or the way we do things on the ground. All we can do is remain true to the vision that inspires us, which in your case, I think, means fidelity to the true spirit of the liturgical reform and the true letter of the liturgical documents. Keep at it!

Now, here's an example of a good and balanced post in the spirit of the thread. Thank you very much, mcb.

I would disagree with you on the subject of Palestrina settings of the Sanctus. The Council Fathers and their advisors were well aware of the fact that the preconciliar Sanctus/Benedictus effectively masked the most important part of the liturgy ─ the Eucharistic Prayer ─ and they did want to do something about it, in order to eliminate two parallel actions going on simultaneously. Sacrosanctum Concilium certainly had something to say about this, as well as about the people taking a full part in the parts that belong to them (e.g. paras 21, 30, 34, 50).

Thank you, too, for mentioning the blogosphere: I'm sure this is one of the things Archbishop Nichols had in mind in his homily on Thursday when he talked about those "in the media" with different opinions having respect for one another and being able to dialogue rather than shoot each other down in flames.

[NorthernTenor]

At what point does expressing an opinion become categorised as personal abuse? I was merely expressing an opinion. This thread is about what happened in our major cathedrals in the 1970s and 80s, not about plainchant, which you have interjected. And it's not about belittling Nick Baty, who is a staunch pastoral muscian with a greater sense of perspective than you appear to have yourself.

Let's get back to the topic.

SC, the form in which you expressed your opinion included personal abuse. You accused me of being patronising. That's an offensive assertion. Your subsequent post which I quote above continues to play the man rather than the ideas, and accuses me without a shred of evidence of belittling Nick. And your suggestion that plainchant was off-topic is simply not true. More than one commenter had bewailed the musical preferences of younger, more conservative Catholic musicians, in contrast to the ideas of the Glory Days. And you have alluded to the use of chant and polyphony at Westminster as an example of how things shouldn't be done.

Unfortunately, your response to those with whom you disagree has a tendency to break this forum's rules. I don't know why that is, but If you would like to continue this conversation, it may be more appropriate for us to do so on Holy Smoke, where the rules are not nearly so civilised.

[docmattc]

What hits me with parish music is that so many of the youngsters in the 70's who set up bands and groups to provide music for parishes have disappeared off the scene

Its also true that there are a number of these people who are still providing running parish music groups but have fossilised the music at the point 'Hymns Old and New' was published. Thus the parish diet contains much Mayhew, but 'those great composers' that SC refers to are completely unknown.

There may or may not have been 'Glory Days' in big cathedrals, but I doubt there ever was in the average parish church.

[Southern Comfort]

Northern Tenor, I think we must live in different worlds. I live in one where healthy disagreement is encouraged. If every time someone disagrees with you, you condemn it as offensive, then I'm afraid that I don't inhabit such a world.

I thought you were being patronising to Nick, so I said so. If I misinterpreted you, I apologise. I also thought you were trying to tell us that Gregorian chant was what the Holy Father wanted us to use. I thought the thread was about something quite different, so I said so. The fact that you were the messenger was incidental. I am not attacking you ad hominem, merely trying to keep us on track, and saying quite openly when I disagree with opinions expressed.

The previous thread about Westminster seems to be doing quite well, by the way.

[Southern Comfort]

There may or may not have been 'Glory Days' in big cathedrals, but I doubt there ever was in the average parish church.

I think this is precisely what Nick was trying to imply (hope I am right, Nick). When the St Thomas More Centre was flourishing in the 1970s and 80s, what happened in a significant proportion of parish churches was at the very least influenced by what was going on in cathedrals, and vice versa. In those days cathedrals had a sense of mission in leading their parishes, and were connected to them (except for Westminster, which was always out on a limb). Today, they seem to want to be centres of excellence which no lesser mortals can imitate.

At the same time, the Mayhew folk movement was also present. It seems to me that what happened in the 1990s was that the "praise and worship" (Kendrick and friends) music came along and displaced much of the work that had been done by the STM Centre, which had by then dissolved into ineffectiveness due to a change of director.

I think it's important that this thread remind people of some of the things we have left behind, or maybe never even knew existed.

Having said all that, I think that many parishes still know and use the music of Farrell, Walker, Inwood, Walsh, and others. The old red Responsorial Psalm Book is still being used, alongside the Responsorial Psalter and others. What parishes may no longer know is the full extent of what "went before them, marked with the sign of faith", and to that extent doc may be right.

[NorthernTenor]

Northern Tenor, I think we must live in different worlds. I live in one where healthy disagreement is encouraged.

So do I, SC, but I've always been encouraged to address the idea, and attempt to justify the points I make. You don't quite seem to have cottoned onto this necessary qualification.

If every time someone disagrees with you, you condemn it as offensive, then I'm afraid that I don't inhabit such a world.

Others have disagreed with me here, and I haven't condemned their posts as offensive. You may wish to contemplate the significance of that, SC. And it isn't just your comments about me. You seem to inhabit a world in which you feel free to cast aspersions on the morality and integrity of others, without the need to provide evidence or circumstance to justify it. Like the definition or not, that's an ad-hominem approach - that is, you're addressing the man and not the argument.

[musicus]

Enough of this bickering - please take it somewhere else.

I will remove any further posts that are off-topic.

The topic is set out in Nick Baty's original post, and it not about chant.

[Southern Comfort]

Southern Comfort, Northern Tenor and others might be interested in an extract from my last dissertation which I've loaded onto Issuu: http://issuu.com/baty/docs/dissext (If you hover to the right of the pages you should see an arrow which turns them for you.)

I know it's terribly arrogant of me to post it, but I do so in the hope of explaining why those of us above a certain age hold specific beliefs about the form and function of music in the liturgy.

I suspect I'll be held up to ridicule by the youngsters, but I'm getting to that age when I no longer care too much about what people say. (Besides, my students have me down as some sort of gin-soaked eccentric.)

It's not downloadable because you never know where these things end up and I'll take it down again in a week or so. But I hope that those who criticise what some of us do in our parishes – paricularly those who label us "trendies" – might at least come to understand that we believe our decisions to be informed.

I think this is a very good synthesis of where we've come from - thank you, Nick. Obviously there's a lot more detail behind it, not least in the bibliography, but this does give the main lines.

[Nick Baty]

The debate here is between my strongly-held belief in what the assembly must sing and those who believe these parts may be sung by the schola on behalf of the congregation.

Clearly, the Church is directing us to a middle ground, in which the polyphonic repertoire is upheld by choirs capable of it, so long as there are sufficient occasions for the rest of the parish to sing and know the chant.

It is not a case of "sufficient occasions" but "specific occasions". Consider these:

GIRM 1975 [¶55b]: "Joining with the angels, the congregation sings or recites the Sanctus. This acclamation is an intrinsic part of the eucharistic prayer and all the people join with the priest in singing or reciting it."

GIRM 1975 [¶169]: "The preface is said by the principal celebrant alone; the Sanctus is sung or recited by all the concelebrants with the congregation and the choir."

Celebrating the Mass[¶192]: “In this acclamation the assembly joins its voice to that of all creation in giving glory to God, with words inspired by the vision of Isaiah (6:3).

Celebrating the Mass[¶192]: Settings of the Sanctus Acclamation, together with Memorial Acclamations and Amen should form a unity which reflects the unity of the whole Eucharistic Prayer.

Take away this bedrock of practice, and suddenly you don't have to sing Hosanna on Passion Sunday, Venite adoremus at the procession of the Cross on Good Friday or Alleluia at the Easter Vigil. These are cultic items with a specific functionality – give these items to the choir and you change that functionality and, arguably, the whole nature of the rite.

NT suggests that these instructions leave room for manoeuvre. If so, where does that leave us with instructions on maintaining Gregorian Chant?

But it's about more than following rules. A good liturgical musician can feel why certain texts should be sung by the assembly. A poor one will simply hand things over to the choir when the going gets tough.

And, please, note, I am not discussing or favouring specific genres or styles here: I am simply explaining the philosophy with which we old gits grew up.

if the setting goes with other elements of the sung Ordinary, it's a reasonable choice.

No it isn't. The item in question is the Agnus Dei. Its specific function is to accompany the breaking of the bread. This rite has become so short these days that the litany has been reduced to two or three invocations ending have mercy on us and grant us peace. To shift the Agnus Dei to communion because, to quote NT, it "goes with other elements of the sung Ordinary" is an example of rite serving music rather than music serving rite.

One final point before my next coffee – because I am not yet quite awake – given how many thousands of items of polyphony there are available for the choir, and given that there are five or six opportunities to sing from this repertoire in any Mass, why would you want to take from the assembly those three or four items which Sacrosanctum Concilium describes as "rightly theirs".

[Nick Baty]

Despite being born in the same year

Yes, but you were born many, many months before me, MCB!

[NorthernTenor]

Enough of this bickering - please take it somewhere else.

I will remove any further posts that are off-topic.

The topic is set out in Nick Baty's original post, and it not about chant.

This saddens and dissapoints me, musicus. One of the remarkable things about this comment board is its encouragement of reasoned, informed discussion, and discouragement of personal attack. Your occasional interventions have supported that ethos, and my comments on this thread have, I hope, been reasoned and informed (though I am happy for others to disgree with my conclusions). Another contributor, however, has over a period of time made a number of personal attacks against those with whom he disagrees, both on and off the board, without any attempt to justify them with facts or reference to the individuals' arguments. That was happening yet again on this thread, and the extent of my 'bickering' was to point this out, and to give examples when the individual denied it.

As for your threat to remove any further posts on chant (and presumably, by extension, polyphony) - well, Nick has made this difficult for you by continuing the discussion. Nor is that unreasonable of him. The new music of the the 'Glory Days' cannot fruitfuly be discussed in isolation from the traditional music it was designed to replace or supplement, and which was given such prominence by the Council from which it drew its vision. Nick's own criticism of the younger, more traditional Catholic musicians who apparently aren't very interested in that vision illustrates the point nicely.

I will refrain, out of respect for your judgement, from responding to Nick's latest post. I must, however, out of respect for the Comment Board's stated aims and constraints, ask you to consider the reasonableness of that judgement, and the worrying problem that I have alluded to above.