Yes, it's eminently sensible, I agree. I don't understand the antipathy some folks have for hymn boards. I guess it seems too Protestant? I don't know, but if the SSPX in Europe use them, how dangerous to Catholic faith and morals can it be? : )

but if I could, I'd stock all the pews with the Mass and Vespers with Gregorian chant, The Hymnal 1982, The Parish Book of Chant and Communio.

Brava! I would probably lean toward The Hymnal 1940 simply to avoid the adulteration of perfectly good texts by attempts at degenderization and the unavoidable messing up of the words by me when we sing out of one of the big-three-publishers' hymnals. (In fact, I scan the hymns before Mass and if the words are truly way off base, I just pick up my flute after verse 1. That's a problem with having memorized about 2/3 of The Hymnal 1940 before one's 10th birthday.

OT re Gregorian hymns and sequences: at our Sunday evening EF, normally Low Mass (all other Masses at the parish are OF), we often sing a Vespers hymn related to the propers or the monthly devotion or to a particular devotion of the parish at the moment at the Offertory. Unless our priest rushes through or it is a hymn with particularly long verses, we can usually finish well before the "Orate, fratres"; otherwise, we just stop. No offense given, none taken.

Julie, we use a hymn board at our chapel I obtained expressly for that purpose. Now they just need to start using the TRHs I got for the chapel, so they can sing with us on the Ordinary. That, and Young Master Organist needs to realize you don't make the congregation participate by bullying them with the Big Bad Fortissimo Organ.

Traditional Roman Hymnal. The Hymnal the SSPX put out.

P.S. Then-Cardinal Ratzinger once spoke of the stereotyped expectations Catholics have of the two forms of the Roman rite:

"The average Christian considers it essential for the renewed liturgy to be celebrated in the vernacular and facing the people; that there be a great deal of freedom for creativity; and that the laity exercise an active role therein. On the other hand, it is considered essential for a celebration according to the old rite to be in Latin, with the priest facing the altar, strictly and precisely according to the rubrics, and that the faithful follow the Mass in private prayer with no active role."

However, I believe it was his ultimate goal that the celebration of both forms be virtually indistinguishable and that could only occur when "the essential criteria of Sacrosanctum Concilium" were observed in both forms of the Roman rite.

"This is why it is very important to observe the essential criteria of the Constitution on the Liturgy, which I quoted above, including when one celebrates according to the old Missal! The moment when this liturgy truly touches the faithful with its beauty and its richness, then it will be loved, then it will no longer be irreconcilably opposed to the new Liturgy, providing that these criteria are indeed applied as the Council wished."