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Posted on by Kathleen Pluth

An office hymn for Palm Sunday

Celsae salutis gaudia

The joy of heaven’s saving ways
Let faithful earth its anthems raise,
For Jesus, Ransomer of all,
Now holds the prince of death in thrall.

The young of palm and olive trees,
The people pave the road with these.
Their voices jubilantly grow:
“Hosanna David filio!”

Then let us all with running feet
Make haste our high great Prince to meet,
And melodies of glory sing,
Our palms of gladness offering.

By blessed gifts may He upraise
Our walking over slip’ry ways,
Our journeys safe, that all our ranks
May pay to Him our debt of thanks.

Be glory to the Father done,
And likewise to His only Son,
And to the Holy Spirit praise
Forever, unto endless days. Amen.

Translation c. 2021 Kathleen Pluth

Posted on by Richard Chonak

Versus Psalmorum et Canticorum now available in hardcover

One of the handy books CMAA offers for use in the liturgy is Versus Psalmorum et Canticorum, which provides Vulgate psalm verses for use at the Introit or at Communion, pointed for the appropriate psalm tones.  The Liber Usualis and the Graduale Romanum 1961, the common books for extraordinary-form Masses, do not contain any psalm verses for the Communion antiphon, and only one for each Introit, so if your schola needs to sing those antiphons and extend them with additional verses, this is a useful volume.  We’ve offered it for some years in softcover and are now introducing a hardcover version, as requested by a reader.

Along with the new binding option, there’s a new cover for both the soft- and hardcover versions, which you can see here next to the old edition.

For ordering information, see the page at the CMAA Shop.
 

Posted on by Kathleen Pluth

Bible in a Year

It’s wonderful to see the internet, for all its faults, being apostolically employed for the new evangelization.

The Chosen, a rather hip life of Christ complete with an on-the-spectrum tax collector is filming its second season and crowdfunding its third.

Meanwhile, Fr. Mike Schmitz  is setting podcast box office records with his Bible in a Year series from Ascension Press. Every day a new podcast is dropped, each containing passages from Scripture, prayer, and commentary.

The effects of the podcasts are Catholic, unifying: they bring together people, writings, events–and us.

In a time when so much seems locked down, it’s great to notice once again that the Word of God is not chained.

Posted on by Kathleen Pluth

Seas and Rivers, Bless the Lord

O seas and rivers, bless the Lord,
The maker of all things.
Today creation is restored:
O bless him, all you springs.

Behold: the Son of God baptized
In waters He makes new.
The Father’s voice above the skies–
Bless Him, you rain and dew.

All natures, let His grace increase–
O Jordan, fill the earth!
In Him the Father is well pleased.
In Him, the world’s rebirth.

Copyright © 2005 CanticaNOVA Publications. Duplication restricted.
Meter: CM (8.6.8.6) Suggested tune: Winchester Old, or others:
Azmon Richmond Saint Flavian
Dundee Saint Agnes Saint Magnus
Graefenburg Saint Anne Saint Peter
Land of Rest Saint Columba Saint Stephen
Newman

Posted on by Janet Gorbitz

SMIA Spring Courses

The Sacred Music Institute of America (SMIA) will offer three 10-week online courses during the Spring 2021 semester, which begins on 18 January.

Each course includes ten video lectures, plus weekly opportunities to ask questions and gain additional experience through live Zoom sessions. For more information on the courses, as well as the Institute’s certification tracks for church musicians and chant training program for clergy, visit www.sacredmusicinstitute.org.

Chant II (taught by Dr. William Mahrt): A ten-week intermediate course in Gregorian chant for singers, directors, and lovers of the liturgy and its music. It will presume a rudimentary knowledge of reading Gregorian notation, and will proceed from the reading and singing of chants in Latin from the antiphons of the Divine Office to the chanted propers of the Mass.

Review of notation and Latin pronunciation will be the foundation for the discussion of textual and musical the chants: mode, tessitura, contour, density, text expression, and co-ordination with liturgical action. Beginning with the simpler chants, psalm antiphons, musical, liturgical, and spiritual aspects of each genre will be studied in turn: introits, communions, offertories, graduals, alleluias, and tracts, with emphasis on the processional propers.

Some chants of the Ordinary of the Mass will be included as well. Aspects of the liturgical year will be addressed, with an emphasis upon the upcoming Holy Week.

History of Sacred Music (Taught by Emily Lapisardi): A ten-week course which will be taught by Emily Lapisardi, director of music at the Catholic Chapel at the United States Military Academy (West Point, NY).

This ten week course provides a survey of the historical role of music in worship from its roots in the Old Testament to the present day, exploring landmark repertoire within the framework of turning-points in ecclesiastical history. While the class will focus primarily on Christian music in the western world, cross-cultural influences will also be explored.

Music Theory II (Taught by Emily Lapisardi): This course builds upon the fundamental skills and concepts explored in Theory I; therefore, some prior knowledge of the subject matter is required.

Topics include: harmonic analysis, seventh chords, harmonization of melodies, transposition, modulation to closely related keys, non-harmonic tones, modes and neumes, basics of counterpoint, and musical forms.

Tuition for each course is $850. Register now by visiting the SMIA website.

 

Posted on by Richard Chonak

Bishops’ Committee on Doctrine addresses hymn texts

The USCCB Committee on Doctrine has offered some help in evaluating hymn lyrics for use in Catholic worship. The paper, “Catholic Hymnody at the Service of the Church” (PDF), lists several kinds of deficiencies that are apparent in the texts of some songs, and gives examples from a few hymns selected out of the 1000 that the committee’s members read.

The bishops’ work takes its model from a 1997 project in which an ad hoc committee led by Abp. Daniel Buechlein examined catechetical materials and described ways in which they were presenting the Catholic faith in a vague, imbalanced, or misleading way. Following the example of that report, the Committee on Doctrine listed these weaknesses in hymns:

  1. Deficiencies in the presentation of eucharistic doctrine
  2. Deficiencies in the presentation of trinitarian doctrine
  3. Deficiencies in the doctrine of God and His relation to humans
  4. A view of the Church that sees her as essentially a human construction
  5. Doctrinally incorrect views of the Jewish people
  6. Incorrect Christian anthropology

Here are some ways that texts fall short in these areas:

  • In eucharistic doctrine, texts that speak of receiving “bread and wine” without expressing that they are changed into the body and blood of Christ
  • In trinitarian doctrine, texts that avoid speaking of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, but instead speak of “God”, “Christ”, and “the Spirit”, as though Christ or the Holy Spirit were not also God; as the committee report frankly puts it, this is Arianism
  • In the doctrine of God, expressions that obscure the transcendence of God and seem to make him come into being as a result of human actions
  • In ecclesiology, texts that speak of human beings creating the Church, rather than the Church as God’s creation
  • In relation to the Jewish people, songs that imply falsely that the entire Jewish people rejected Christ, something which the Church does not believe or teach.

The report quotes from thirteen hymns as examples of these defects, including works by Owen Alstott, Mary Louise Bringle, Sydney B. Carter, Ruth Duck, Delores Dufner, Bernadette Farrell, Fred Pratt Green, Marty Haugen (1, 2, 3), Bob Hurd, and Carmen Scialla.

In regard to eucharistic doctrine, the area which the report says had the most common and most serious deficiencies, the report also listed examples of hymns that avoided such errors. While some of them have their own weaknesses of text or music, I’m pleased to see that the committee was in effect confirming among them that the Church’s heritage of Latin hymns is suitable for mainstream parish use:

  • Ave Verum Corpus (Pope Innocent VI, c. 1362)
  • Taste and See (Moore, 1983)
  • Gift of Finest Wheat (Westendorf, 1976)
  • Seed Scattered and Sown (Feiten, 1987)
  • I Am The Bread Of Life (Toolan, 1966)
  • One Bread One Body (Foley, 1978)
  • Eat This Bread (Taize/Batastini, 1984)
  • Look Beyond (Ducote, 1979)
  • At That First Eucharist (Turton, 1881)
  • O Sacrament Most Holy (Udulutsch, based on the Raccolta, 1958)
  • O Salutaris Hostia (Thomas Aquinas, c. 1274)
  • Adoro Te (Thomas Aquinas, c. 1274)
  • At the Lamb’s High Feast (Campbell, based on Ad regias Agni dapes, 1849)

Thanks to the Committee on Doctrine and its chairman, Bp. Kevin Rhoades (Fort Wayne – South Bend) for this helpful contribution to the Church’s liturgical work.