For those parishes who might be looking for an accessible way to sing the Entrance Antiphon this Lent, please feel free to sing these Lenten Hymn Tune Introits.
The Hymn Tune Propers Project combines the familiar experience of hymn singing with the new experience, in the life of many parishes, of singing the proper texts of the Mass. Hopefully this will be the beginning of a smooth and painless transition which eventually leads to thorough use of chanted and polyphonic propers. In the meantime, parishioners have the benefit of the proper texts, in a congregational, familiar form.
Kathy (and Chuck)-
THIS IS SO COOL! Thank you. We have opted for the last two years for SEP Introit and Richard's beautiful Choral Communio's (not the Simple Choral…)
Your use of ERHALT would enable us to "stuff" the Antiphon (and maybe even verses) upon the celebrant's arrival at the sanctuary to "The glory of these…" etc. texts.
Brava/Bravo.
Thanks, Charles (and Chuck). Best wishes for a good Lent!
This is great. But these Introits could also be sung to any Long Meter Hymn Tune (LM or 88.88) for example Jesu Dulcis Memoria, I Know That My Redeemer Lives (Duke Street), On Jordan's Bank the Baptist's Cry (Winchester New) or From Heaven Abovem giving the Congregation some more latitude or variety week to week.
Thank you, Deacon, I quite agree. That is why I have resisted publishing the full annual cycle in musical settings. Like you, I feel that the flexibility is greatest when the words can be adapted to a Long Meter tune that is right for a given congregation at a given time.
I chose "Erhalt uns Herr" for the Lenten Introits because of the association of this tune with Lent ("The glory of these forty days"). Other LM tunes could be used, but I would not recommend using for Lent any of "Winchester New" (associated with Advent, via "On Jordan's bank the Baptist's cry"), "Vom Himmel hoch" (associated with Christmas/Advent), or "Duke Street" (precisely because of "I know that my Redeemer lives").
Indeed, my Hymn Tune Introits for Advent employ "Conditor alme siderum", "Winchester New", and "Veni, veni Emmanuel", while the correpsonding Hymn Tune Introits for Christmas through Baptism utilize the tunes "Swabia", "Vom Himmel hoch", "Eisenach", and "Puer nobis nascitur"
All of the hymn tunes that I have selected for these Introits have been provided with harmonizations of my own that may be used instead of the ones usually found in hymnals and which, in my estimation (and hope) , match somehow the mood of the particular season, as well as match up with my Anglican chant settings of the Psalm verses.
However, if "Creator of the stars of night", "I know that my Redeemer lives", "From heaven above", "On Jordan's bank the Baptist's cry" make sense to you for Lent, by no means let my doubts about their suitability stop you.
I suppose the issue is not whether some judgments are better than others, but whether there is any form of sung propers currently available for congregations with no in-house musicians.
Before Advent a couple of years ago I was sitting in a university library preparing that year's Advent Calendar of Hymn Tune Introits, and a priest came by who had been a classmate of mine. We got to chatting, and I explained what I was doing, and he, a non-musician, sang the introits readily. He said that if there had been music on the page–a foreign language to him–he would not have dared.
There are many musical settings of the propers in English, but none to my knowledge goes that extra step that makes musical knowledge a non-factor, a non-excuse, for congregations that wish to sing the propers.