Fr. Rob Johansen is offering chant workshops on the chants of Holy Week and Easter through this February and March, and would like to come to your parish or diocese to present one of them.
Fr. Johansen is a priest of the Diocese of Kalamazoo, MI, and is trained both in music and sacramental theology. His approach to the workshop is billed as “practical and theologically grounded”, which is a very important balance in our times. I’m sure this will be a great opportunity.
If you are interested please contact Fr. Johansen here.
This is a very moving performance of a new composition by Eric Contzius: “Mah Ashiv Ladonai – quid retribuam Domino.” It is Psalm 116 sung in Hebrew and Latin for Second Annual Jewish-Christian Dialogue at the Vatican. It is performed here by members of the American Conference of Cantors, Alan Mason, Accompanist, and Leigh Korn, Conductor. A piece like this strikes me as a very effective means of promoting understanding.
It hardly seems like four years ago that Kile Smith’s Epiphany Vespers, commissioned by the early music ensemble Piffaro, made its premier in Philadelphia. Conductor Donald Nally led his own chorus The Crossing, which specializes in contemporary music, along with Piffaro in a work of singular originality.
Using the Lutheran Vespers service as the structural model, Smith fuses modern compositional techniques with time-tested musical processes for a work that displays the best of traditio and tradere. Like the Lutheran liturgy of the Renaissance era, both Latin and German languages are used. As I recall, Latin is used mainly for the Psalmody, while German is used for the chorales. (Many German chorales, I might add, are more-or-less re-worked Gregorian chant.)
One thing I have been wondering about is the liturgical role of the opening Alleluia that begins the work. Is this artistic license, or is it how the Lutheran Vespers, at least on feast days, began? Or is it representative of the Alleluia which often follows the opening sentences? I don’t know. I’m curious. I should ask him, but I never think of it when Kile is around.
A few years ago, a recording of this magnificent piece was released by Navona records. Now, Vespers is being prepared for live performance once again. The concerts are:
John Paul Dominic Brodeur, a student at Franciscan University, wrote this excellent paper on the music in Jewish temple worship as a foreshadowing of the place of chant in Catholic liturgy.
For sung by cantor or schola cantorum You’ll find none else with this decorum. Gently rising, softly sloping, Ever skipping, maybe troping, It fits the words it fits the tone It fits with others or alone. It fits the mass, it fits the pace, This music’s called chant and the church is its place.
So grab your missal and chant with vigor, Chant with love and chant with rigor. Ord’ and proper chant the mass And chant the hours as they pass. Chant alone or with a friend, Chant the year from start to end. Drop the rest. The chant will last: The best for the future is the best from the past.
