Category: Jeffrey Tucker

It seems almost surreal to see a regular news report on something that I care about so intensely. This Canadian Broadcast Corp. on the conference by the Gregorian Institute of Canada is actually wonderful, surprising, and remarkable. There doesn’t seem to be an option to embed it but please go watch it online.

For a long while I was posting comparisons of the Collects from the current and forthcoming Missal. It was a rather time consuming task week to week, and I couldn’t keep it up, sadly. In any case, I think the point was clearly made: we getting a vast improvement in our essential liturgical materials starting this Advent. In all the weeks I posted the comparisons, I saw virtually no disputes about that essential point, here or anywhere. Is the forthcoming translation perfect? No, and there are times when I stumble over the syntax, which is sometimes peculiar. But the point is that it is much closer to an actual translation, and the style of the language is unmistakable sacral in character. These are gigantic changes that will profoundly affect the sense of the faith that we gain from what is happening in the sanctuary – changes that are much more profound than anything taking place within the people’s parts of the Mass that everyone is focusing on.

Fortunately, Fr. Z has kept it up, and this week he posts a very thoughtful and learned commentary on the Collect for the 19th Sunday.

CURRENT
Almighty and ever-living God,
you Spirit made us your children,
confident to call you Father.
Increase your Spirit within us
and bring us to our promised inheritance.

FORTHCOMING
Almighty ever-living God,
whom, taught by the Holy Spirit,
we dare to call our Father,
bring, we pray, to perfection in our hearts
the spirit of adoption as your sons and daughters,
that we may merit to enter into the inheritance
which you have promised.

Papal legislation concerning music has long distinguished religious music generally from sacred or liturgical music specifically. The vast majority of music now heard at Mass is not in fact liturgical music; it is religious music of a general sort, and that’s just not a good thing. Religious music is fine and even spectacular and indispensable for the culture of the faith. It is not however the basis of ritual.

I’m reminded of this distinction having been totally enraptured by this performance of Pergolesi’s Stabat Mater – a piece that has an amazing power, a piece you could listen to 10,000 times and still find more within it, a piece that can become a lifetime favorite for generation after generation. See if you agree. And see if you also agree that a concert setting is the right place for it.

Embedding has been disabled for this but don’t let that stop you. This is glorious.

This is a lament for the death of Jean Ockeghem, written by Josquin, and magnificently sung.

The Simple English Propers have swept through parishes and cathedrals at a pace that has astonished me. Talk about filling a desperate need! Here is a report of how they will be used at a Pontifical Mass in La Crosse, Wisconsin. The director has uploaded the complete order of Mass along with practice videos.

While the schola has tackled some Gregorian proper chants, the repertoire of the Graduale Romanum would have been perhaps a bit ambitious given both the singers’ relative lack of exposure to singing the genre (which, it should be said, is well above the global average) and infrequency of rehearsals. However, the schola’s fluency in English-language chant (every rehearsal starts with Evening Prayer from The Mundelein Psalter) and the publication of the Simple English Propers allowed for a unique opportunity — the singing of the processional propers of the Mass (Entrance, Offertory, Communion) in the vernacular, in their proper liturgical contexts, and in the context of a Pontifical Ordinary-Form Mass.

Furthermore, to highlight the Church’s desire that the Latin language be retained in liturgical services especially for the Ordinary of the Mass, all of the ordinary will be sung in Greek and Latin. Further, many of the dialogues will be sung in Latin.

Everyone knows that Pontifical Masses pose special problems for any Cathedral, and the solution is not always obvious. The SEP is a solution that avoids all the problems associated with picking styles to accommodate the Bishop’s own preferences, which are not always obvious. The fresh clarity of the SEP provides that third option that just hits the mark.

Here is a question that some of us have been batting around for awhile.

Where in preconcilar legislation is it expressly forbidden to sing Latin propers at EF Low Mass?

I ask because many books presume that doing so is forbidden, while it is clearly permitted to sing motets, hymns, or other music, even in the vernacular, at the entrance, offertory, and communion. But I’ve yet to find an explicit citation to liturgical law to back this widely held view that it is not permitted to sing the proper texts from the Graduale Romanum. Surely such a statement from the Church is to be found somewhere, but where?

Msgr. Wadsworth has been profiled and interviewed by the Catholic Herald. He explains the importance of the sung Mass, the role of the new Missal, the problems that we have to overcome, and much more. It is a very good and candid interview with the man who has done so much to bring us a Missal that more music in it than any previous Missal. The full interview and profile can be found at the Catholic Herald.