The Chants of Holy Week

Holy Week from Palm Sunday to Easter is a fantastic time for the most extended use of Gregorian chant in Catholic liturgy. Whole books or shelves of books could be written about the chants that pertain to these days, for they are among the most emotionally varied and stylistically impressive melodies ever written. They range of vibrant hymns for the people, to epic narratives, to soaring melodies on single syllables that suggest prayerful improvisations inspired by unforeseen awe and wonder.

Sadly for musicians, these are among the busiest days of the year, and probably the worst time to attempt something new. As choirs and directors approach Holy Week, the musicians dig through their hard drives and their stacks of binders in the choir room and pull out the agenda from last year, which so happens to be the same as the year before and the year before that, going back twenty and thirty years. It’s not great, and they know it, but it gets the job done. They are pleased enough with themselves just for getting through it all. It truly is an overwhelming experience. This is why you will find Catholic musicians all over the world in a full meltdown on the Monday after Easter Sunday, decompressing and sleeping in and otherwise doing as little as possible as a means of much-deserved rest.

The tragedy is that it is almost always the case that the season’s most impressive music is not sung or even attempted. In fact, it is not even known today. This music comes from the Gregorian chant books. We are supposed to give chant first place at Mass every week, but one might say that this principle is all the more important to apply during Holy Week.

Alas, this has not been the case. And yet another factor is part of the calculation here. This is a week that draws people to the parish as never before, with visiting families and a heightened consciousness of the need to draw more closely to the faith. The pews are packed. Musicians might feel an intensified pressure to use music that pleases people (“meets people where they are”) rather than letting the music of the ritual speak for itself and thereby inspire a conversion of heart and an embrace of a new way of thinking, praying, and living.

We should be singing a new song and yet we do not.

It remains true that even for those musicians (and pastors) who feel the need to upgrade their Holy Week music, and see the need to give chant first place in these times above all else, they might not even know where to begin. The Gregorian books provide far more music than appears in the missalletes (which can be oddly sparse, leaving out whole sections of music with text that appears in the Roman Missal, as if they should just be skipped).

What to do? How is one to begin? To answer these questions, we have ever reason to celebrate the appearance of the CD Cantemus Domino, and its masterful production and presentation by the Oregon Catholic Press. The OCP has brought its legendary capacity for teaching and marketing to the cause of Gregorian chant for Holy Week, using the greatest choir that one can imagine for such work: Dean Applegate’s Cantores in Ecclesia of Portland, Oregon.

This CD provides a large sampling of chant for Palm Sunday, Holy Thursday, Good Friday, and Easter Vigil — fully 25 tracks of music, and every one of them expertly sung with just the right combination of voices.

I really can’t imagine a better CD to introduce this great music. It is an excellent tutorial on its own, providing ideas for performance in addition to showing directors and singers how to approach the music. It also makes for great listening, even if you are not in a position to work up this music in your parish just yet. In fact, if you are in a parish without chant, listening to this CD during Holy Week will provide you at least the sound of the faith during these wonderful days.

As just one example of how this CD provides an excellent model for performance, consider the Improperia chant for Good Friday, which is (sadly) hardly ever sung in any parish using the ordinary form of the Roman Rite. The choir chooses to use a single male voice to introduce the chant, singing in the voice of Christ: Popule meus, quid fecit tibi? The single voice turns to an entire group of men for Hagios O Theos. This is answered by an entire group of women singers: Sanctus Deus.

This drama of switching ranges and movement between a single voice and a group of voices makes this wonderful piece of music come alive with high drama. A piece like this underscores the reality that Catholic music is its own unique art form, and capable of transporting our minds and hearts into a realm of spirituality we might not otherwise visit.

We should be grateful even for the presentation of the Litany of Saints for the Easter Vigil, for it demonstrates the inherent dignity of the traditional litany tones. They can be sung by the schola together with the congregation (which is always represented on this CD by the mixture of high and low voices). And hearing them here will show choirs that tradition really does hold up in a way that is far better than any modern alternative I’ve heard.

There are also chants for all the people here, such as the hymn Gloria Laus et honor, for Palm Sunday. This is something that everyone can and should sing, and the presentation here shows how it can be done. Another example of such a hymn is Crux fidelis for Good Friday. Again, the antiphon is sung on this CD with a mixture of high and low voices to represent the people.

The level of sophistication of the choices of settings, where there are choices to be made, is extremely high. For example, the Gloria setting for the Easter Vigil Mass is Gloria I in Mode IV, from the ordinary chants called Lux et origo. It is so beautiful and yet so rarely heard. For a parish that has never used a Latin Gloria, its introduction provides an opportunity to move beyond the ubiquitous (in preconciliar modern times) Gloria VIII. Gloria I here is a delightfully refreshing alternative.

In addition to the sophistication of the choices, and the creativity of the performance models employed, a word should be said about the quality of the singing itself. It is nothing short of perfect to my ear. Applegate’s choir here has a long history of singing this music over generations – something rare in the postconciliar period. The singers have a great confidence about the words, music, and phrasing. The sound is just right for listening by parish choirs seeking a model for their own singing.

As you listen to this CD, consider the pastoral implications from the point of view of the visitors and parishioners generally. I don’t think anyone could hear this and think: “oh, this music is alienating and forbidding and won’t strike the right mood we are trying to achieve for Holy Week.” I can’t imagine that anyone could think such a thing. Attending the services presented here would be an unforgettable and life-changing experience, one that causes us to leave the mundane world of secular time to enter into a heavily timelessness. This music is beautiful, holy, universal. This OCP production shows this in so many ways.

Finally, let me add that this product is not just an accidental effort by a company that otherwise has neglected this genre of music. This is in fact the third CD that OCP has recorded of Cantores Ecclesia. Just as wonderful are the two previous volumes. All three make a perfect set. It is a fact that bears thinking about: if we learn again to listen and sing like Catholics again, granting Gregorian chant the first place that the Vatican Council said it should have, the OCP will share in a large part of the credit for making this a reality.

I see every reason to support this project, knowing that every time you spend a dime, you are making a kind of vote and advancing values you believe in.