The Recovering Choir Director

Cdl. Ratzinger, like you, hammers on this alleged ‘dichotomy’–which is promoted only by those who have a malevolent agenda–

And, of course, he also makes it clear that there are some “styles” which simply are NOT to be used, including either ’soft’ or ‘hard’ rock, and I would add “jazz.”

“lyrics of unsound theology”

sort of like “rodents of unusual size”…they don’t exist

maybe i should have enclosed the quip in [joke][/[joke] tags….

‘princess bride’ fans would understand the connection of the r.o.u.s. to the l.o.u.t.

Dang, do _I_ feel dumb — I did recognize the Princess Bride reference, but forgot the context :

Right after Wesley lies (to reassure Buttercup) that he doesn’t think they exist, a ROUS latches on to his throat, right?

Duh….. so when I said surely you jest — you jested.

I’m starting to lose my sense of humor. I hate that. I hope my Bishop at least READS the Instrumentum laboris, even if he then disregards it the way he did Redemptionis Sacramentum .

Sorry, Anon.

Are Traditionalists capable of understanding ‘Unity in Diversity’ ?

Dateline: this coming Saturday - July 16 2005

Venue: Melbourne, Australia. St Patrick’s Cathedral. (A gothic masterpiece downunder)

Solemn Pontifical Mass with Confirmation.

Celebrant: His Grace Archbishop Denis Hart, Archbishop of Melbourne. (A truly orthodox Catholic, blessed with a beautiful singing voice and master of liturgical action.)

Choir: a blend of Traditional Mass choirs (men and women) from across Australia

Pre-Mass: “Lauda Jerusalem Dominum” (19th Century, Harmony by the Abbe Darros - French)
Choir, with organ, trumpet and timpani.

Introit ‘Spiritus Domini’, Gradual ‘Beata Gens’, Alleluia ‘Veni Sancte Spiritus’, Offertory ‘Confirma Hoc’ (With verse from ‘Offertoriale Triplex’) , Communion ‘Factus Est Repente’ from Votive Mass of the Holy Ghost – Unacccompanied, chant incorporating the semiology of Dom Cardine OSB.(‘Graduale Triplex’)

Kyrie, Gloria, Agnus Dei from Mass ‘Cum Jubilo’ Unaccompanied, chant

Sanctus – Orbis Factor/14 th century Czech canon. Uncaccompanied chant/polyphony

Credo III – chant, with organ accompaniment.

Confirmation: ‘Veni Creator Spiritus’ : chant & Anton Bruckner (German, 19th Century) alternating. A cappella. Antiphon: Confirma Hoc Deus – Chant.

Motets: Offertory: ‘Confirma Hoc’: SATB William Byrd (English, 16th Century) A cappella

Communion: ‘O Sacrum Convivium’ SSATB Thomas Tallis (English, 16th Century) A cappella.

‘Lauda Jerusalem Dominum’ (As above – congregation joins in the antiphon) Organ, trumpet and timpani.

Recessional Hymn: ‘Help Of Christians’. Late 20th Century Australian (lyrics: James McAuley – one of Australia’s greatest poets and a convert to Catholicism. Music: Richard Connolly)

Postlude: M.A. Charpentier: Prelude to ‘Te Deum’: Organ, Trumpet and Timpani. (French, early 18th Century)

…. Needless to say, a range of stunningly beautiful music from across the centuries and from all parts of the Western Church.

We are so fortunate!

What Scott Hahn once said of the Catholic Faith can be applied with equal force to the Cathholic Liturgy:

“It is a like a lion … let it out the cage, and it can look after itself”.

Anyone interested in the full choral score (pdf) of this event, please email me & I’ll refer them to a (temporarily available) link.

Hugh Henry
hugh AT webone DOT com DOT au

Never mind, Hugh, I just googled and found it.
Thanks very much.

Oh, come on, Todd, all the guy had to do was dot the first note, ” You —- who dwell,” not to have it sound like “yoo-hoo.”

The prosody (is that the word?) stinks.

The melody isn’t great, starting the verse where it does, but since he didn’t intend it as a group sing thing, I think we can pass over that.

I do think he has, from the evidence of his more recent compositions become a decent musician (big talk from me, basically a NON-musician, self-taught,) but I question his whole, pritty-ditty approach to liturgical music.

Everything, even Mass settings, sounds like rejected Air Supply ballads. (Showing my age, huh?) There is no timelessness, no taking you into another place, putting you into another frame of mind from the everyday. It would not seem odd to hear them in elevators or at K-mart.

I would say JMO, but I’ve heard the same opinion from too many people whose opinions I respiect.

Marge, your take is the right one. The stuff falls under Ratzinger’s category of “manufactured [pop] music,” and is the grandchild of the “manufactured” [pop] hymns such as On This Day O Beautiful Mother–which were Tin Pan Alley-inspired.

The fact that my dear mom liked “On This Day” doesn’t make it any better…

OK. Correction: a PRECURSOR of Tin Pan Alley

Marge, I’m not really convinced. Any cantor can dot the note; you don’t need “permission” to interpret. I think “lyrics” are a better term than “prosody,” and if you can’t dig Psalm 91, I’m not sure what will satisfy; the lyrics are a very close match to the old NAB text.

I think he was a decent musician in the early 70’s. Liam tells me he won some young classical composer thing in Minnesota before his liturgical music was published. I see less influence from Australian pop music than American musicals in Joncas’ music.

Timelessness won’t be determined by eith er personal taste or publisher promotion. I think enough people have made enough of a connection with Joncas’ music that some of it will indeed be around in a few centuries. I suspect the widening of sacred styles will have also taken effect by 2300 or so. I also suspect that people will have forgotten the acquisition of pop, rock, and jazz by then, too, just as we have rejected the most vehement complaints about polyphony and organum today.

Last note on this: the parish musicians are the ones who make or break music. I don’t need to resort to Down Under pop stylings when I play “On Eagles Wings.” In fact, I hardly ever use the written accompaniment as published on most any contemporary thing. If I’m feeling inspired, I often rewrite the vocal parts, too to suit the liturgy better.

Hi Dad29…

Not that I’m an ardent fan of “On This Day…”, I simply don’t agree with you that “drippy” is a musical term that is defined by a melody. “Drippy”, in my mind, is more a manner of the performance of the melody, and not the melody itself. Certainly “On this Day…” can sound drippy, but it can also sound tender, which is befitting the matronly lyrics.

Gregorian Chant is the father of melody, and in particular, of scales. The melody of “On this day…” is very scale-based. The melody of most of these lyrics go up and down one pitch at a time, which is similar to how Gregorian chant’s melody moves.

And even though “Dixie Melody” borrows from “on this day,” it doesn’t nullify the original melody or intent. Do you nullify “Adagio for Strings” by Barber because of its use in Oliver Stone’s “Platoon”? Do you nullify “Hail Holy Queen” because of its use in “Sister Act”? Do you ignore all uses of rainbows, because homosexuals have adopted that symbol as their own? I can go on…

The bottom line is: does the melody bring the lyrics to life? In the case of “On this day…” it does. It most ardently does. I certainly wouldn’t want the lyrics of “On this day…” sung with the same grandeur of “Jesus Christ is Ris’n Today” or “For All the Saints”–to do so would be a clash of intentions with the lyrics.

Thank heavens there’s room for all different expressions of devotions in the Body or Christ!

Dad29, I think you need a deeper grasp of what actually happened in liturgical music after 1963. The “reformers” had very little to do with what was sung. Vernacular liturgy seemed to step easily into vernacular music. Catechetical songs were first (At That First Eucharist, Songs of God) because many people interpreted the Liturgical Movement as being about understanding the Mass. Social justice themes were picked up early on (They’ll Know We Are Christians (partly because of the Catholic sensibility for it, and partly because of the tenor of the times.

Very early we also see songs based on the texts of Scripture and the liturgical texts. The common thread for the past forty years has been greater faithfulness to the liturgy, using any appropriate style that works (or at worst, that will sell).

The original Worship and Hymnals for Young Christians didn’t organize their content liturgically, but alphabetically and thematically. But no serious Catholic hymnal of any style doesn’t align itself along liturgical lines.

Nick is right. Performance is key to the presentation of music. Inexperienced and untutored musicians have a narrow range of style, by definition. Skilled church musicians should be able to play and lead in most any style. And they do. The debate over style misses the point. Better to focus on the quality of directors and music makers than get sidetracked in the arguments over style which cannot and will not be won.

Todd, after you’ve paid for Marge’s drycleaning, send another $20. out here–same problem, same reason.

Your claim that ‘a good musician can [make a silk purse of a sow's ear]‘ is absolutely nuts.

First off, the MUSIC has a style. One does not sing the Ave Verum of Mozart at 160, nor Gregorian Chant at, say, 40 to the punctum.

“Good musicians” know this–I would hope.

Secondly, for you to state that “any style” is fine is not only patently silly, it directly contradicts EVERY Pope who has ever written on the topic, including B-16.

Rock, R&B, and Rap come to mind as “styles” not exactly fitting for the House of God.

Finally, I was active as a Church musician beginning around 1962–but before then, from about 1956, was a VERY active listener for familial reasons.

Your take on Music History in the church following VatII is partly true–about 10%.

There were excellent hymnals with LOTS of English texts extant long before VatII, including “Our Parish Prays and Sings,” which was re-formulated slightly a few times…and then, because of the quality of the music, was out of print by 1975 (or earlier.)

That is to say–the quality of the hymns was far too good.

The Money Music was written by the Jebbies and other musical misfits, and was successful for a couple of reasons: 1) it was “new,” and (as Cdl. Ratzinger observed, it was also “pop”–but ‘manufactured pop,’ not genuinely popular. Since the times were anti-nomian (you DO recall the sex-drugs-rock’n'roll ’60’s, no?) it was just fine and dandy for those with an agenda. 2) The music was heavily pushed by a certain group of people within the US Church Music “establishment,” which at that time was headed by Rembert Weakland of Milwaukee; he saw to it that like-minded people were staffing BCL and other ‘centers of influence,’ and Rembert was backed by none other than Joey Bernardin. 3) ICEL texts were required, and ICEL got royalties for its texts. This invalidated a big chunk of “older” hymn texts, leaving only a few publishers able to put out the “new/hot” stuff–they did not have to re-invest bucks in ICEL taxes.

PS: The Psalms were sung at the Introit, Gradual, Offertory, and Communion EVERY SUNDAY in the Old Rite, and Psalms were also the foundation-text for many of the “old hymns.”

Perhaps you could study history before you pontificate on it.

“I see that both Marge and Dad29 are very content with taking Todd’s comment out of context. Note the phrase: Any _appropriate style that works_.”

Huh?
I didn’t comment on that, much less take it out of context.

“And Marge, I must adamantly state that just because a lot of fringe groups take advantage of a misinterpretation of Vatican II does not mean that Vatican II is faulty.”

And double “huh?”
I expressed no opinion whatever on VCII. So state what you want, adamantly or half-heartedly, it makes me no nevermind.

I questioned — okay, not “questioned,” MOCKED the notion that greater fidelity to the liturgy is a hallmark of the last 40 years of liturgical praxis.
This is a comment on the liturgy of the last 40 years, not the Council, not the liturgy the Council asked for — not the ideal but the reality.

(And in the interest of full disclosure, I have no experience of the entire 40 years.)

“I’m all for liturgical renewal, but part of this renewal means that we take Vatican II at face value, and live it, not live a faulty misinterpretation of it.”

Couldn’t agree more.
SC VI 116, right? Fave value, pride of place, etc, etc, right?

“I must confess to have never heard “To Jesus Heart All Burning.” However, since you declare it “drippy,” and devotional, I suppose you can answer for me why then, was it included in the Westminster Hymnal (Impimaturred by E. Morrogh Bernard, in November 1939). Perhaps you can also explain why your sudden disdain for Bach’s harmonization of the piece.”

Okay, and another dog metaphor — I don’t have a dog in this fight, I don’t know To Jesus, Heart All Burning (or didn’t until a moment ago, looked it up in an old hymnal,) but are you saying there is a harmonization of the tune by JS Bach? I have trouble following your syntax sometimes, Nick.

“if Bach is “drippy” then there goes “O Sacred Head Once Wounded” (or perhaps you meant an alternate melody).”
This is an illogical conclusion.
To call one work by an artist by some pejorative is not to condemn all his work.
And if, as you say, Bach “harmonized” it, and someone criticized the “melody” whether an alternative melody exists or not is really not germane.

Dad29,

I sincerely hope that your last statement about the Holy Spirit was tongue-in-cheek. Otherwise, despite your store of knowledge and your command of the english language, you have lost all credibility.

Dad29…

If we so agree about the council, then why the snarky Pollyanna retort? What gives?

Dad29…

Nobody here said “any style would work.” Please, show me where anybody here said that.

The term, “any appropriate style that works” implies that there are styles that do not work. Maybe you don’t catch that, but that is certainly what is meant.

Further, my point on the “To Jesus Heart All Burning” is that, here was an example of a hymn being used and approved in hymnals, before the time of the “liturgical reformation.” You may disapprove of the hymn, but it goes to show that you cannot create a simple test as to what melody is proved appropriate or not based on your own personal whims. What you consider to be “drippy”, others (notably the editor and Imprimaturer of the pre-VII Westminster Hymnal) do not. If only it were that easy!