Well, everyone has finally arrived last night, and while unfortunately I forgot my camera at dinner, I did get it for some snippets of the organ concert by Dr. Ann Labounsky, followed by compline. Below are a few clips from both those events. and keep an eye on the Cafe tomorrow morning for clips from today!
Looking Forward to Colloquium Vlogs?
Looking forward to vlogs from this year’s just-began CMAA Colloquium for some vicarious participation of your own? Fear not, they will be returning this year! Stay tuned here to the Chant Cafe!
E’en the Spirit of Truth
At the Holy Father’s Mass tomorrow in honor of Sts. Peter and Paul, judging from the words of the libretto, it looks as though the choir will sing Tallis’ simple and beautiful If Ye Love Me.
Plenty of reason to post a couple of favorite renditions.
A Plea to Bishops and Pastors
Dear Fathers,
We as Catholics are losing a culture war that we have the means to win.
In every diocese there are wonderful musicians who are talented, prepared, and eagerly awaiting the opportunity to lead. Our parishes, our diocesan celebrations, could easily, quickly, and cheaply bring to life the “soundtrack” of Catholicism that has fostered the faith through centuries of cultural changes: Gregorian chant.
Our children could be learning the faith through singing these stunningly beautiful melodies that foster the interior life and immerse the singer in the liturgical year.
Our Sunday Masses could be sublime, ethereal experiences that sustain the faith life of our people in a way the world cannot give. They could be immersion experiences in the joy of salvation and the beauty of our Catholic faith.
The Church must flourish again, green and youthful. We must return to beauty and truth. The Mass must support prayer rather than distracting from prayer. Our ceremonies must announce the good news of the faith. And our music must become much, much more prayerful than it currently is.
There are several reasons why musicians who think with the mind of the Church do not have the opportunity to help you. One reason is our own fault. We can be impatient and demanding, and for this I for one apologize.
But most of the reasons are systemic. We cannot overcome them without you. They have something to do with the system of music publishing, and with the large pastoral music organizations, and with profit. But most of all, they have to do with a certain pastoral preference for whatever is “mainstream.”
This preference, very Reverend Fathers, is getting us nowhere.
For fifty years, those of us who have advocated for beauty in the liturgy have been marginalized for mostly baseless reasons, the single exception being the Second Vatican Council’s unmistakable call for a greater participation among the faithful, including sung participation. But participation is first of all not excluded by the recovery of chant, and secondly is not currently happening in most parishes. Despite every effort to water down both music and text so our parishioners will find music “uplifting,” many still do not sing. At almost any parochial school Mass, where the music often aims no higher than the Barney level, the choir and youngest children are the only ones singing. By the third grade most of the boys have dropped out. By the fifth grade, all of the girls. This is a defeatist programming model, a straightforward case of planned obsolescence. Where exactly is this sung participation happening–except in the first 10 pews at a Sunday Mass?
One place it is happening is this coming week at Duquesne University where the Church Music Association of America is holding its annual Colloquium. It is probably not like anything most people have ever heard in person, outside a university music school, or on an unusually good day in Rome. The big 80s Chicago sound, with timpani and trumpet, will probably not be there. Some more modern pieces will be. Hundreds of musicians will be singing together. And overwhelmingly, what is heard is a sound highly conducive to prayer.
Anyone who can make it to Pittsburgh will not be disappointed with the music and liturgy. For those of us with other plans, the music of past years may be heard from the comfort of our own homes.
Sacred music, and chant education for children in particular, is the silver bullet for the Catholic faith and culture. All it needs is a chance, a real chance to gain a foothold in our cathedrals and parishes. The current model has had fifty years of ascendancy, with disastrous results.
I truly believe that a strong, well-led movement to recover chant and polyphony would make a beautiful change, a recovery of American Catholicism, in less than five years. Not just the New Evangelization–but the Fast Evangelization, strong and confident and sure.
Hymn for the Saint of the Day
Antra deserti
June 24th, Office of Readings
You sought the solitude of caves,
The desert, from an early age.
You fled your kin, and disavowed
The risks of life among the crowd.
Rough clothing made of camel hair
Was all your sacred limbs would wear.
And water, and wild honey sweet,
And locusts were your only meat.
The prophets sang, in mystic sight,
The coming of the future light,
But you their last, could point to Him:
The Lamb who takes away our sin.
Of woman born, through all the earth,
Was never known a holier birth.
You washed with water Him who cleans
The world from all its world of sins.
The citizens of heaven sing
Your praise, O One and Triune King.
And we pray too, that we may live:
Lord, those You have redeemed, forgive.
Liturgical Calendar for OF and EF on Google Calendar
As both a musician and Master of Ceremonies, it is very useful to have the liturgical calendar available at all times on my phone, and especially alongside my other events (“Oh, you want me to come to a party on August 15? Sorry, that’s Assumption, we’ll probably have a pontifical Mass that evening…”). I’ve found this most useful in my own life, and I’d like to share it with others too! If you use Google Calendar and would like me to share this with you as well, sign up below and I’ll add you to the list, which will make the liturgical calendar appear in your calendar.
Click HERE to be added to the list.
“O ye of little…hope?”
In today’s OF Gospel, the disciples are threatened by a storm. Jesus rebukes the wind and the sea and calms the storm.
Then he asked them, “Why are you terrified?Do you not yet have faith?”They were filled with great awe and said to one another,“Who then is this whom even wind and sea obey?”
What is this “faith” that Jesus speaks about? It is easy to suppose that what Jesus means by “faith” is the same as “trust.” But it seems to me that trust comes rather under the virtue of hope than of faith. Hope clings to God, leans on God, trusts God to bring a happy outcome at the end of all of life’s winds of change.
If that is hope, then what is faith?
The disciples respond to Jesus’ rebuke of the wind and the sea–and of them–with a question. Who is this? That question is the beginning of faith, properly so called. It is easy to say to anyone at all, “I trust you to lead me through all the storms of life, and even through death, to a happy ending.” But, to say this to anyone but God would be foolish.
Who is he? He is God. Faith keeps us from terror, not because it is hopeful, and certainly not because it is soothing, but because Jesus is God.