Those who pessimistically say that the new Missal portends no change in parish music programs might point to a story like this. Here we have a director of music dismissing all style concerns except to put down “nostalgia,” and otherwise showing absolutely no knowledge of or interest in anything other than non-liturgical songs that “fit the sensibilities of the specific congregation.” His views, he says, are based on a 2007 lecture by Robert Batastini, which recommends a 5-star rating system for such songs along the lines of Amazon.com.
20 Replies to “Will the New Missal Make a Musical Difference?”
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"You want to be faithful to the church, yet serve the people in your parishes." In that "yet" lies a whole ecclesiology – and not a Catholic one.
His concerns are textual. In its limited way, that schematic system would improve many, many music programs! 5 stars to praise God (Holy God, We Praise Thy Name), 1 star to pretty much ignore God (Gather Us In).
It doesn't address musical concerns, but it "outs" inferior texts–a badly needed service!
Kathy, my answer to that is so obvious that I won't even type it.
I really don't know what your response would be, Jeffrey.
I applaud the work of restoring propers and dignified music. The simple, beautiful melodies that are being generated through Chabanel and the SEP are wonderful and will affect many parishes. But that workshop had something to offer the majority of parishes who could not possibly be receptive to the SEP, because "propers" aren't even within the realm of the imagination of the priests or dms of the parishes.
No, nothing will change at all in most parishes. At least not for several decades. Come this Advent we'll still be singing the same trite 70's folk songs, still be listening to responsorial psalms that aren't in the Mass of the day, still be singing the same antiphonal Glorias, and still be accosted by blaring guitars, bongos, and tambourines. Nothing will change.
I am overjoyed that there are at least a few parishes out there that are implementing what the Holy Father has envisioned, but this is not the case in an overwhelming majority of parishes. For instance, my diocese has 52 parishes and 600,000 souls. Not one of those souls can hear Gregorian Chant or a single proper on any Mass on any day of the year. Not one. And this won't change.
I'd like to know your answer too, Jeffrey. He seems to be agreeing with the idea that the wild period in liturigcal and sacred music needs to be slowly excised and that textual evaluations that give primacy of place to doxological texts (which, yes, may or not be Propers) should be employed. Seems like a basically positive development.
Ok David and Kathy, it strikes me as rather narrow to evaluate music based on whether the texts "directly praise God." That would rule vast numbers of Mass propers. See the Second Sunday of Easter entrance, for example. This is also what is wrong with the "Voice of God" critique of hymn texts: many Mass propers use the voice of God: e.g. 6th Easter communion chant: I will not leave you orphans, I will come to you again."
It is no secret that I have grave doubts about the endlessly shifting standards for how to evaluate the merit of what are essentially non-liturgical texts. Ultimately we are substituting the Church's judgement with our own.
None of this would be a problem if we would just sing the Mass as it is given.
Ok, you say that this is not the current ethos, not what parishes currently do. That's true enough, and precisely why we need to push for change.
I was also directly commenting on the text of the article itself, which advanced the theory that "the role of music in liturgy is community, and community is all about unity."
I don't know how many time B16 has to refute this idea to make it go away.
This IS a push for change. This is a diocesan employee telling parishes that they have to think about their texts, not just do things by custom.
I agree that the criteria are imperfect, but they're memorable and would measurably help. I also agree, obviously, with your vox dei argument. I don't think it's at all fair to say that he shows "absolutely no knowledge of or interest anything other than non-liturgical songs that "fit the sensibilities of the specific congregation."," nor to compare his rating system to Amazon.com, which has to do with satisfied customers, rather than the worship of God. This workshop is exactly the kind of thing that makes things improve on the parish level. We can't always have a revolution, you know.
I wonder if the fault is with the author of the article, rather than Mr Gorman? The author plainly doesn't know what Order of Mass means, so you have to wonder how much of the remainder of the article involved putting nonsense into Mr Gorman's mouth.
Certainly the basic idea – that the main problems with present-day Catholic liturgical music are textual rather than musical – seems to me a viable argument.
Copernicus, you could be right. One never has any control over what appears in these stories. So true.
Servus Tuus, I understand your comments, do not loose hope, the Spirit is at work!
Chris
"We are not called to be successful, but to be faithful."
-Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta
The five star approach a la "Amazon" is part of the problem that we have; in other words, equating everything and anything sacred/liturgical/church-like to a secular model. Rather than taking the church into the world we are reducing it to the banalities of secularization as exhibited in popular culture at its worst. In so many cases the musical and textual insipidness of what is now considered by many to be the Catholic norm, and more sadly, "Catholic traditional music", is insulting the intelligence of everyone. It is sad to see (and hear) how far we seem to have wandered into the garden of unweeded mediocrity.
The Answer: Education. Education. Education. and leadership from educated, informed, pastoral and qualified leaders/musicians. After all, isn't Catholic education supposed to be superb?
Of course expressing this opinion here is really preaching to the choir. Isn't it?
Andrew Greeley in his book "The Catholic Imagination" extols the elevated sensitivity Catholics have to high art (good liturgy, good hymn texts supported by good music should be included in this definition as well). He exudes about the number of Catholics involved in promoting the arts. And historically, looking back to past centuries, he is right. Yet to walk into the average Catholic parish on a weekend one would wonder which Catholics he is referring to.
Sorry to be so "wound up" about this, but what the new Missal presents as a golden opportunity to improve the deplorable mess that occurs on Sunday mornings in so many parishes will, I fear, be missed.
Out of curiosity, how many who read/contribute to this blog have a position on the Diocesan Music/Liturgy Committee of their diocese? And if a member of such a committee how seriously are you taken if you bring up chant, solid hymnody, solid texts that are poetic yet understandable?
Look at St. John Cantius in Chicago and the souls who are fed by the richness of that Parish's rebirth. Perhaps that is Fr. Greeley's parish?
Again, my apologies for the zeal of this posting.
I attend mass at the parish where this music director serves. He is an excellent music director. He is both technically capable, and has an firm sense of the sacred.
We regularly hear Mozart and Handel. Almost all of the hymns are from John Wesley, and are sung with joy and humility. During Advent and Lent, the propers are chanted in Latin by the entire congregation.
We never sing "On Eagle's Wings". There are no guitars, saxophones, or accordions. Readings from scripture are never slurred, and the Eucharist is celebrated with awe.
The parish offers Mass in the Extraordinary Form, but many tradition-minded parishoners attend the Novice Ordo masses.
The comments made about an Amazon-style ranking system are odd, but should be interpreted in a charitable way.
Catholic liturgy is emerging from a long time in the wilderness, and it is ministers like this choir director who are reviving to its former glory.
Well, that does provide the context. It seems likely that the story writer didn't know what to look for, and this further demonstrates that you can't tell anything from a short piece like this. Again, what I wrote was based entirely on the story I linked and from there I jumped to a wrong conclusion.
Actually, this has happened to me many times, where my words are chosen to fit with the story writer's own sense of things. It can be very frustrating.
Kathy warned me that I had the wrong target in mind when I wrote the post. It would appear that she was right, so I am happy to apologize to this DoM.
I also apologize for my snarky first comment, and for reading rather too much into one word!
I have to drive over 50 miles to get away from the guitars and trite "music" in my parish.
And the only Latin mass is at 1:30, so I neither
start nor end with Mass.
that workshop had something to offer the majority of parishes who could not possibly be receptive to the SEP, because "propers" aren't even within the realm of the imagination of the priests or dms of the parishes
Umnnnhhhhh….so?
I'll get this out of the way: to my knowledge, Gorman's a pretty solid guy. He is no '60's revolutionary, and he knows which way is 'up' in the general (and specific) sense.
But he also lives in a VERY liberal environment: Madison, WI. That shapes his understanding.
Now to my snark:
In 40 years+ of working in the Church, my experience has always been that the choirmaster is a teacher, (given the musical sensibilities, education, etc.) So while I like what Gorman suggested regarding hymnody, his elision of Proper (and to some extent Ordinary) Chants is shocking.
It's possible that the reporter missed that part of the lecture; it's possible that Gorman was told NOT to discuss Chant; and it's possible that the topic he was assigned simply did not open the door to a discussion of Chant.
But that hole-through-which-trucks-drive is sad.
I appreciate Gabriel's comment. I too drive more than 30 miles to sing in a church that has good music. But that's because Sharon Hershey, or organist/music director, is an honest-to-goodness musician at the keyboard of our new $100,000 digital organ — yes, it's an organ that sounds almost as good as a million-dollar pipe organ.
Sharon Hershey has a Ph.D. in music and, with the pastor's support and that of several key people, has built the Corpus Christi choir in Colorado Springs back from practically nothing.
But the issue with Catholic music is bigger than people think. The book "Why Catholics can't sing" hinted at the problem — when it comes to music we are decades and maybe even a century behind our Protestant brothers and sisters.
Go in one of their churches — you won't find a dinky hymnbook with melody lines only. Instead, you'll find hymnals with polyphony on every page. Protestants grow up looking at hymns (they're not called songs in Protestant churches) and by the time they are grown they know how to sing parts.
Yet Catholic composers continue cranking out the simplest of melodies and spoon-feed them to congregations as if the parishioners are too stupid to handle anything more difficult. So it's no surprise that Catholic choir directors have a heck of a time finding singers to fill the choir stalls.
But the clergy is to blame for this too, for many of them came from parishes without much of a music program. And parishioners themselves have a long way to go — if you don't believe it just take a look at them filing out of church before the recessional hymn is over. That would never, ever happen at a (fill in the blank) Protestant church.
But we are making progress and we are a long way from the garbage of the 1960s and 1970s. And we will continue to make progress and we should not give up. We simply must understand the issues involved and realize that real change will be a one-parish-at-a-time proposition.
BTW, since I don't care for anonymous postings, my name is Jere Joiner and I sing at Corpus Christi. I was also a paid soloist for more than 30 years in my prior life as an Episcopalian. I sing for the glory of God these days and like it much better that way.