Music selection for Low Mass at St. Matthew’s « The Recovering Choir Director

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Music selection for Low Mass at St. Matthew’s

In response to this comment from Ann:

I just began an organist position at a parish that is very interested in preserving sacred music most notably gregorian chant (not a complete Latin mass, though). The church is still wedded to singing hymns. I immediately replaced all modern non-liturgical hymns with traditional hymns. I would be very interested in an article on the rubrics of how you prepare for each Sunday Mass. It appears that you chose your organ preludes/postludes based on the propers of that particular Sunday. Does the congregation ever sing any traditional hymns?

Any info on background prep would be most appreciated.

Here’s a basic rundown of how music is selected for the 9:00 AM Low Mass. Our resources are the Liber Usualis and the Adoremus Hymnal.

For preludes, I will employ a very simple organ improvisation on the Introit of the day.

For hymns sung at the Entrance and Offertory, we take a look at the Proper of Saints as found in the Liber Usualis and see which feasts fall on or around that particular Sunday. From there, we will select the Vespers hymn for one or two of those feasts. If the Liber lists a Lauds hymn, that will receive priority (as our Mass is a morning Mass).

For hymns sung at Communion, we will usually, but not always, sing a Eucharistic hymn out of the Adoremus Hymnal.

The seasonal Marian antiphon is almost always sung after the Last Gospel or the Leonine prayers, whichever comes later.

Posted 11.19.2007
by Aristotle A. Esguerra
3 comments.
Filed under: 1962 Missal; Liturgical Music in Practice; Low Mass (Missa Privata).

3 Comments

Thanks for the information. It is easy to follow and replicate.

Ann
11.20.2007 @ 8:03 am #

What about hymns that are based on the text of the Introit, Offertorium, or Communio? I would think that would be even more liturgically sound than taking one of the traditional hymns from Vespers or Lauds (although that is a pretty slick idea I hadn’t thought of). I’m thinking of Musicam Sacram #32 (on substituting hymns for propers) and #36 (on singing festal or seasonal texts at Mass, not just ones that are “eucharistic.” Most hymnals these days have a Scripture index… so besides TIME digging things out, wondering what your thought is on that.

Amy L
11.24.2007 @ 11:15 pm #

Amy, thanks for writing.

I doubt that our solution is “slick”, although it is certainly elegant in its time-efficiency! Using this solution minimizes the time spent on selecting hymnody, allowing us in the choir to pay more attention to the execution of the pieces. It has the other effect of helping people immerse themselves in the Latin and the modal melodies so that when we eventually move to the missa cantata, it will not be a tremendous shock to the congregation’s collective ear.

If the people in charge of selecting hymns have access to hymnals with good Scriptural indexes, then basing hymn selection the way you suggest is quite suitable. As time is much more limited in this position, we default to the resources found in the Liber and, to a lesser extent, the thematic and seasonal suggestions given by The Adoremus Hymnal. However, when I had access to multiple hymnals back when I was a full-time music director, the method you described is the method I employed. Of course, not knowing what I knew then, I based hymn selections on the readings for the day.

As far as degrees of liturgical soundness go, though, it has been written that a missa in cantu is the most desirable degree; my strict reading of it means the actual proper texts, and where possible, the actual Gregorian melodies, within the context of a basically through-sung Mass. While we’re aiming for that at St. Matthew’s, not all of us are there yet. Regarding Musicam Sacram ¶36 — we did ask for permission to sing the propers at Low Mass, but we were not given that permission by the competent territorial authority (in this case, the pastor). Which is fine — I believe he would rather have a tangible distinction remain between the Low and High Masses. (He’s also trained in law…)

Your citations of Musicam Sacram deserve further, more longer-lasting discussion than can readily be provided by this format, so I will be thinking of how best to pursue that conversation.

I hope this helps in some small way.

Aristotle A. Esguerra
11.25.2007 @ 5:52 pm #

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