Our little schola did work last week on the propers for this coming Sunday, but because I was absent, I hadn't seen the Introit until yesterday. I was amazed to find this seemingly impossible piece of music, which alarmed me to such an extent when first looking at it:
Here we have the exuberant text to Psalm 83, verse 10 and 11 ("Behold, O God our protector, and consider the face of your Anointed; for one day in your house is better than a thousand elsewhere..."). It is a difficult mode (IV), tricky Latin text, daring intervals, wide range, and enough rhythmic ambiguities to start a full-scale war among chant scholars.
The melismatic phrase on the fourth line really took me by surprise--it struck me as highly unusual for an Introit. Ah, but look at the text: Super Millia. Better than a thousand years. Of course we must have something of a musical exaggeration here. It is not only vast in length but vast in range, from rae up to doh and back again in a short space. This is great drama.
In any case, I found this chant incredibly difficult. And yet, the schola learned it, thanks to the aid of good pedagogy (Arlene Oost-Zinner led the session), persistence, and a love of the challenge that comes with singing this music.
Yes, learning something like this requires far more work than singing the greatest hits of 1972 every week, over and over again. But musicians love challenges.
It's one of the great tragedies of our time that musicians in Catholic parishes rarely face challenges, and so they don't enjoy the personally and spiritual satisfaction that comes with overcoming them, nor the sense of group comaraderie that comes with dealing with a chant like this. Why would any choir bother? Because the liturgy calls singers to undertake it. This repertoire helps the singers feel needed, and not expendable.
This is not the sort of chant a new choir can do in the first year or two, but it comes in time, and with such satisfying results.
Thursday, August 17, 2006
Is Chant Just Too Hard for Regular Parishes?
Jeffrey Tucker
More recent articles:
Passion Sunday 2025Gregory DiPippo
The Vespers hymn for Passiontide Vexilla Regis, in alternating Gregorian chant, according to a different melody than the classic Roman one, and polyphony by Tomás Luis de Victoria. ...
The Feast of Saint Mary of EgyptGregory DiPippo
The feast of St Mary of Egypt has never been on the General Calendar, but it is often found in the supplements of the Missal and Breviary “for certain places.” April 2 is the most common date, but in several places it was kept on April 9, and in the Byzantine Rite it is on April 1. The Golden Legend and the Roman Martyrology note that she is also...
Sitientes Saturday, The Last Day of LentGregory DiPippo
In the liturgical books of the traditional Roman Rite, today is the last day of “Quadragesima”, the Latin word for Lent; since the mid-ninth century, tomorrow has been called “Dominica de Passione”, usually translated in English as “Passion Sunday.” The last two weeks of the season are collectively known as “Tempus Passionis – Passiontide”; the cu...
My Interview on Holy Week with Christopher Jasper on Pipes with AugustineGregory DiPippo
A few days ago, I gave an interview to Mr Christopher Jasper, the founder and director of the online Gregorian Chant Academy. The main subject of our interview is the various reforms of Holy Week, but we touched several related issues as well, such as the mindset of the whole project of liturgical reform in the 20th century. I make bold to suggest ...
The Offertory Incensation, Part IMichael P. Foley
Lost in Translation #122After preparing and offering the gifts and himself, the priest blesses the incense. As he places three spoonfuls of incense onto a live coal, he says: Per intercessiónem beáti Michaélis Archángeli, stantis a dextris altáris incénsi, et ómnium electórum suórum, incénsum istud dignétur Dóminus benedícere, et in odórem suavit...
Music for Lent: The Media VitaGregory DiPippo
The hour of Compline is far more variable in the Dominican Office than in the Roman, often changing the antiphon of the psalms, the hymn, and the antiphon of the Nunc dimittis. This was true of most medieval Uses, and especialy in Lent, a season in which the Dominican Use brings forth some its best treasures. The most famous of these is certainly ...
Tenebrae: The Church’s “Office of the Dead” for Christ Crucified Jennifer Donelson-Nowicka
The Catholic Institute of Sacred Music cordially invites you to the final event of its 2024–2025 Public Lecture and Concert Series.Tenebrae: The Church’s “Office of the Dead” for Christ CrucifiedLecture by James Monti (Dunwoodie, New York)Saturday, April 12, 10:00 a.m. PDT (1 p.m. EDT)From at least as far back as the sixth century, the Church has b...
The Twentieth Anniversary of the Death of Pope St John Paul IIGregory DiPippo
Today marks the twentieth anniversary of the death of Pope St John Paul II, whose reign of almost 26½ years is the third longest in history, after those of St Peter (traditionally said to be 32 years, one less than Our Lord’s earthy life), and Blessed Pius IX (31 years and nearly 8 months.) In the days leading up to his funeral, roughly 4 million p...
On the Sanctification of TimePeter Kwasniewski
In “Processing through the Courts of the Great King,” I spoke of how the many courtyards and chambers of the King’s palace prior to his throne room, or the many precincts and rooms of the Temple leading up to the Holy of Holies, could be a metaphor of a healthy Catholic spiritual life that culminates in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, but surrounds...
“Now About the Midst of the Feast” - Christ the Teacher in the Liturgy of LentGregory DiPippo
Today’s Gospel in the Roman Rite, John 7, 14-31, begins with the words “Now about the midst of the feast”, referring to the feast of Tabernacles, which St John had previously mentioned in verse 2 of the same chapter. And indeed, the whole of this chapter is set within the context of this feast.The Expulsion of the Money-Changers from the Temple, th...
