I am a Permanent Deacon in the Parishes of ____. Both are small parishes, with small churches and a small choir. We had a meeting today to sing through some of the new mass settings, to select one to use in the parish with the new translation. None of the Mass settings we have been using in the church – a fairly traditional place – has been “upgraded” to the new words, and so I traweled through the internet looking for what was available. I have used the musicasacra web site for items in the past, and was pleased to find the Mass of the Sacred Heart setting. It is one of those settings which sticks in the mind, and I have found myself humming it continually. Suffice it to say, that out of the six settings we sang through, this Mass setting was universally accepted by the Parish priest and the choir (and more importantly, organist) as the one to teach our congregation.
5 Replies to “Praise for Mass of the Sacred Heart”
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I am staggered; this setting is beautiful, even in the minimalist presentation (which, after all, is the most that many parishes can muster). One can have only the gravest doubts, however, that it will be heard 'live' here in N Ireland any time soo – or at all! Who knows, there may be something of a major miracle brewing, well in a wee way to begin with at the first session of the 2011 Fota IV international Liturgy Conference. This is to be held in Cork, Ireland, on 9 – 11 July 2011. (The Conference will be opened by His Eminence Raymond Leo Cardinal Burke, Prefect of the Apostolic Signatura, who will also give the key-note address.) Well, now, don't you go holding your breath, it'll just make you go blue.
http://verbumpatris.wordpress.com/2011/01/22/fota-2011-list-of-speakers/
It's a puzzle of a setting. The Gloria I find a particularly skillful piece of melodic writing – an object lesson in how to structure the new text in terms of thematic material.
But at the same time this same Gloria is littered with what to my eye look like musical errors – an abundance of consecutive fifths and octaves, unresolved discords, out-of-place second inversions and so on. What's happened here – is the composer untrained in these things, or is he writing in an idiom that deliberately flouts the rules? To judge the piece by the way it sounds, the latter explanation doesn't hold true – this is a fairly 'orthodox' piece of melodic and harmonic writing; unfortunately it seems to be littered with (musical) grammatical errors.
I guess that's self-publishing for you. An editor for a reputable publisher might have sent it back to the composer tactfully requesting the needed corrections. I wonder if there's still time to fix it? It's a setting I'd like to see in widespread use, but at the moment I can't really recommend it.
Copernicus's comment raises some interesting points. First, I can assure you that I'm neither ignorant of nor flouting the rules of voice-leading (I better not be, since it's my job to teach them!). That said, in writing this setting (my first music for congregational/parish choir use) I treated these rules in an admittedly utilitarian way, which I would never recommend to Freshmen or Sophomore music theory students. For example, I avoided parallel fifths and octaves because they either (a) have the effect of canceling out another voice, thus thinning the texture, or (b) are difficult to sing. If neither condition was particularly offended, I didn't lose sleep over it.
Admittedly, most of my work as a composer is in post-tonal or post-triadic music, where I use all rules (harmonic or otherwise) in a similar fashion — how do they affect the actual sound of the music, and how do they make the performer's job easier or more difficult? I make no claim that such an approach in this case was either correct or successful, and certainly I'm open to revising this setting if someone were to recommend amending specific passages.
That said, I hesitate to explain voice-leading errors as a byproduct of self-publishing, and I would venture to guess that anyone with knowledge of mass-published Catholic materials will agree with me.
Thanks, Jacob, it's interesting to hear this account of your methods. As for whether you should revise the setting, my view is that it wouldn't hurt. 🙂 Whether 'correct' voice-leading would improve the feel of the piece is open to argument, but I take the view that the 'rules' are there for a purpose, and divergences from them do to some extent impose themselves on the ear.
But I happily repeat my earlier words of appreciation for your setting! I hope there are more to come.
p.s. If there's one place I might suggest a concrete revision in the Gloria, it's the words (we adore) you, we glorify (you), where a rhythm of crotchet-slurred quavers-quaver F#-quaver G-crotchet would (to my transatlantic ear, anyway) do much better justice to the natural rhythm of the text.