Low Mass Music during Penitential Seasons
  • My understanding is that the prohibition against solo playing of the organ during Advent and Lent (except on the third and fourth Sundays, respectively) does not apply to Low Masses. Nonetheless, I wanted to ask what others do or have done in the past in places where it's customary to have music during Low Mass. I'm considering proposing to my pastor that we have no music whatsoever during Low Mass this Advent except on the third Sunday, but I don't want to come across as lazy! Your thoughts? TLM/EF-pertinent comments only please.
  • BenBen
    Posts: 3,114
    I'd personally recommend no solo organ during low Mass during lent and advent. Don't forget: you can still use a capella hymns and choral music.
  • I second Ben, no solo organ during Advent and Lent.
  • Liam
    Posts: 5,048
    "No music" is not a Catholic liturgical ideal in any meaningful sense.
  • Anyone interested in Catholic liturgical ideals comes to our High Mass later in the morning. The Low Mass crowd is mostly indifferent to music, as evidenced by their lackluster hymn singing.
  • Liam
    Posts: 5,048
    Then: be careful what you ask for.
  • Also, I should clarify that there is generally no choir at this Mass, only organ and (some feeble semblance of) congregational singing.
  • Bad idea to propose "no music whatsoever" to the pastor? I'm not exactly sure what you're getting at with your last comment.
  • Liam
    Posts: 5,048
    People might express a desire to continue without music.
  • 'Twould be fine by me :) In fact, that's the plan for the Christmas Day Low Mass this year anyway.
  • (except on the third and fourth Sundays, respectively)

    ...and feast days.
  • The 1960 Rubrics for the Missal refer to the document De Musica Sacra (1958), of which tranlsations may be had here and here, and although this is done specifically to note that it covers congregational participation, it goes to show that this document is most likely rather current, '62-wise.

    In De Musica Sacra, no. 80 marks the beginning of the section where the times when the use of organ is prohibited are discussed.

    For these times, it specifies the non-use of organ for all liturgical actions, "omnibus actionibus liturgicis" (excepting of course Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament). Further exceptions are then made for certain days, which part seems commonly understood. However, a final exception is also made that "the organ only may be used at Mass, and Vespers for the sole purpose of supporting the singing" (Adoremus' translation), which I find to be interesting.

    For one thing, the way it seems to me, this exception for use "in Missa et in Vesperis, solummodo ad cantum sustentandum" seems to regard the fact that Mass and Vespers are the primary liturgical items which a parish might sing.

    Consider the Liber Usualis, which is at its most thorough with respect to Mass and Vespers, and for this reason.

    The Liber, when it provides Lauds, does not point the psalms for Lauds: because, if you are ambitious enough to be doing Lauds, why would you need the pointing? In a similar fashion, this instruction does not foresee that you would need un-seasonable organ accompaniment to support the singing of Lauds: it limits this exception to Mass and Vespers.

    Then for different thing, consider how everyone admits the singing of English hymns before and after a High Mass, on grounds that they are not part of the Mass. Because of their not being deemed a part of the Mass, I would argue that by this consideration they are rendered ineligible for this "for the sole purpose of supporting the singing" exception, due to the wording "in Missa".

    Thus, it seems that this exception was intended more along the lines of encouraging singing-the-Mass, and singing Vespers, than otherwise.

    Anyhow, I would consider it perhaps arguable that you could use the organ to support singing during a Low Mass (though whether this was intended, I don't know); but as far as I have thought about it, I would say that the documents seem to prohibit the use of solo organ during the same; and I would also argue that organ ought not to be used outside of Mass and Vespers at all, even though it should be necessary to support singing of some random hymn-or-other, as these would be sung during the processional / recessional, and these would seem to be liturgical actions, as far as I know.

    So, that's my thinking on this, at present.
  • matthewjmatthewj
    Posts: 2,698
    The earliest Sunday Mass at the Cathedral is a Spoken or Low OF Mass with organ music. During Advent and Lent (other than III and IV), there is no organ music.
  • BenBen
    Posts: 3,114
    Anyone interested in Catholic liturgical ideals comes to our High Mass later in the morning. The Low Mass crowd is mostly indifferent to music, as evidenced by their lackluster hymn singing.


    If they're indifferent, why not make it a high Mass?
  • In the old rite, any music at Low Mass, whether instrumental or vocal, is considered devotional and extra-liturgical because it is not inherent to the liturgical rite of Low Mass, which has no prescribed music of any sort at any time. Fr. George Predmore (pre-Vatican II) and Fr. Anthony Ruff (post-V2), among others, acknowledge this principle in their writings. It's not explicitly stated in De musica sacra (and surely didn't need to be in 1958), but it's pretty clear from paragraph 14.

    Feast days are a moot point because we only have Low Masses with music on Sundays - and again, I want to stress that these are a supplement to, not a replacement for, the High Mass. And, since it was brought up, there is little or no interest (including the priests, schola, choir, and yours truly!) in having more than one Sunday High Mass. Surely there is someone else on this forum who has some experience with Sunday Low Masses with hymns and no choir or soloist.
  • CCoozeCCooze
    Posts: 1,259
    When I'm not able to get to the nearby (35-mins) Sunday Latin Mass at another parish to sing, they simply have a Low Mass.
    There is a young "Anglican" man who plays the organ.
    Unfortunately, it seems that he may not be interested in my "reminders" to not play during the Mass during Advent and Lent. Sometimes, though, he remembers and lays off the meditative playing during Communion.
    We never have congregational hymns during this Mass, just the processional and recessional.
  • If there is to be music at/during EF Low Mass, I think it is unfortunate that hymns would not be employed. I think this goes to what Thomas Day mentions in his book "Why Catholics Can't Sing", that the differences between German Catholic parishes and most others was, indeed, the amount of congregational participation. I grew up in a parish and parochial school where we had a German-heritage Pastor. We attended Mass every school day. If he had a stipend for a High Mass, we were expected to sing the Ordinary, and a class was assigned to sing the Rossini Propers. If it was only a Low Mass, we were expected to sing hymns - yes, the 4-hymn "sandwich" Mass. We used "Our Parish Prays and Sings" which had a wonderful selection of hymns, and the entire Kyriale. I mean, there's nothing intrinsically wrong with sing during Low Mass.
  • Steve, it's not an ethnic German parish (unfortunately?), but we usually do a three-hymn sandwich with no singing during Communion. Do you remember what the custom was as far as playing the organ during those weekday Masses in Lent? The prohibition on organ playing seems to be widely ignored in Germany and Austria except during the Triduum. When I attended SSPX Masses (High) in Germany during Lent, the organ was used just like at any other time of the year, including interludes and other solo playing during the liturgy. They also substituted German hymns for the sung Proper. An FSSP Mass I went to was the full "German High Mass" - German hymns replaced the Proper, Ordinary, and even the Asperges. Of course, there's no custom to justify such thing in English-speaking countries, and doing so would rightly be considered an abuse.
  • As I recall from my grade school days, no, the organ was not used during Advent and Lent. I realize there are arguments that the music "during" Low Mass is not "liturgical" music, and therefore not covered by the rubric, most priests view the Low Mass to be included in that ban of instrumental music. Here, today, we stick to it - even to some extent in the NO Masses.
    Thanked by 1noel jones, aago
  • CCoozeCCooze
    Posts: 1,259
    at/during EF Low Mass, I think it is unfortunate that hymns would not be employed


    At a Low Mass, there often isn't already-built-in time for hymns. And if the congregation at one is small enough, there isn't much of a point to a Communion hymn, either. You have your time for personal Communion prayers, and then Mass is already continuing on. Unless we just want to ask the priest to sit and chill for a bit so that hymns could be added, meditative organ is usually best at a Low Mass, and it doesn't last all that long, either.
  • If the Low Mass is that short with that few people, then I would agree that it shouldn't have music. We include a Communion hymn knowing that most people are not going to sing along. I have a couple of people in the loft who receive first and then sing. If there is no one else, then I sing and accompany myself. The Prayers at the Foot provide enough time for about 3-4 verses of a typical hymn, likewise at the Offertory. None of this music, hymns or otherwise, is to impede the flow of the Mass, IOW, when the Priest is ready to move on with a V & R involving the people, the music is to have stopped.
  • My practice, when I'm asked to play at a Low Mass with Organ is this: choose an appropriate Ordinary; play Introit, and Kyrie before celebrant reaches the end of the prayers at the foot of the altar, then pick up again after the Credo (or Dominus Vobiscum) with the Offertory Antiphon, Sanctus & Benedictus from chosen Ordinary; post Consecration I borrow from various chants (including the Requiem and Victimae Paschali Laudes and Lauda Sion,... among others). During the distribution of Holy Communion I use the Agnus Dei (from the Chosen Ordinary), the Communion Antiphon, and (as necessary) either a chant hymn or something similar, improvised. At the end of Mass, I intone Salve Regina and then accompany the congregation who usually sing lustily. After this, as Father retreats to the Sacristy, I improvise a postlude.
  • Where I go to church we have high masses throughout penitential seasons, just like at all other times. The only difference is the music and the mood, the lectionary and prayers, the colour, and the spiritual disposition. How else should it be???

    Does God deserve any less from us just because it is Advent or Lent?
    (NO! Not a whit!)
  • We will continue High Masses throughout Advent and year-round. The Low Mass with music is offered earlier in the morning. The pastor is fine with no music at that Mass during Advent except on Gaudete Sunday; therefore, I will look forward to sleeping an hour later for three weeks, without any reduction in pay!
    Thanked by 1Steve Collins