An Anglican Plainsong Breviary (BCP 2019)
  • father_ben_jefferies
    Posts: 22
    Coming for sale soon. This has been my passion project for the past several years:

    https://youtu.be/OsFOxhLYo5M

    also more can be seen at https://www.BernardBreviary.com
    Thanked by 1CHGiffen
  • M. Jackson Osborn
    Posts: 8,368
    What a beautiful book - both inside and out!
    I thought that I must have a copy even though the psalm tones were on a five line staff with a G clef.
    But when I saw that the 'Anglican Chant' had the top voice only I decided that I didn't need it after all.
    Everyone (I think) knows that Anglican Chant is by definition harmonised into four voices.
  • father_ben_jefferies
    Posts: 22
    Thanks!
    & Yes, the purpose of the AC-that-is-not-AC was to introduce some non-plainsong monody -- akin to the popular Lutheran styles etc. And single-voice "Anglican Chant" has been working really well in my parish setting. Of course, if you want to sing a known part, one could easily do so :)
    The entire psalter is plainsong tho.
    Thanked by 1M. Jackson Osborn
  • chonakchonak
    Posts: 9,160
    For people not familiar with the 2019 BCP, it's the edition for the Anglican Church in North America, and it can be seen on-line at
    https://bcp2019.anglicanchurch.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/BCP-2019-MASTER-5th-PRINTING-05022022-3.pdf
    Thanked by 3CHGiffen M. Jackson Osborn ServiamScores
  • M. Jackson Osborn
    Posts: 8,368
    I notice on the title page of the BCP that Chonak provides that there are lines reading 'Together with the New Coverdale Psalter'. This is very curious as the only Coverdale Psalter is the one in use for five hundred years. A 'new' Coverdale Psalter is, as I'm sure Coverdale would agree, an oxymoron - it's either Coverdale or it isn't.
  • michael_in_MI
    Posts: 6
    I just received my copy of the St Bernard Breviary today, and tried my hand at singing the evening office. I'm new to breviaries, but replacing four or more books in one volume, plus adding the variety of tones for prayers and canticles that are either absent from or annoying to locate in any of the hymnals I own, seems quite brilliant. A big thanks to father_ben_jefferies and his fellow editors for undertaking this important labor!

    I actually used the contributing publication A Hymnal of the Heart for a year as the traditional hymnal in our formerly "hymnal-free" ACNA mission church (and if it'd been entirely up to me I would have been happy with that and no other), and chants from the St Bernard Psalter have found their way into our services as well. Both books are also been pretty handy for driving my family nuts at home. :-)


    Criticisms of the 2019 BCP and its psalter are very interesting, but I think are largely academic for many in the ACNA. The usual cases seem to involve having either used the 1979 BCP for nearly 40 years (psalter similar to the NRSV) or, like me, coming from a Protestant background with little to no knowledge of the Coverdale anyway.

    I have also observed that unaccompanied melody-only Anglican (and Simplified Anglican) chant seems to work well enough in small group settings, and common tones for the Magnificat and Nunc Dimittis become quickly memorable (at least for me). So far when I've used either on Sundays I print only the melody and accompany with all four parts (prior to my involvement we never had any notated music). Curiously, the congregation in my area that I'm aware of taking the most interest in Anglican chant is part of the Evangelical Presbyterian Church.
    Thanked by 1father_ben_jefferies
  • LauraKaz
    Posts: 73
    The typesetting is so beautiful! I may try to get my hands on one in the near future.

    I was looking at the preview pictures, and I was wondering why you had commemorations for Martin Luther on February 18 and Billy Graham on February 21. I feel like those have got to be fake...or am I missing something?
    Thanked by 1ServiamScores
  • trentonjconn
    Posts: 544
    I was looking at the preview pictures, and I was wondering why you had commemorations for Martin Luther on February 18 and Billy Graham on February 21. I feel like those have got to be fake...or am I missing something?

    Anglicans
    Thanked by 2M. Jackson Osborn tomjaw
  • father_ben_jefferies
    Posts: 22
    @M. Jackson Osborn -- Re Anglican Chant -- this is what I wrote in the preface on 'how to chant' about that: "Anglican Chant resembles Tonus Peregrinus in that the reciting note “wanders” (peregrinus) between half-verses. Unlike plainsong, which is always univocal, Anglican Chant is is usually sung in four parts. However, again in a Bernardine spirit of simplicity, only the melody line of some of the most famous and most beautiful Anglican Chants has been included. If a trained choir is present, obviously the other parts can be utilized as well, but for the purposes of small communities, the single voice serves ably. Anglican Chant is utilized for all the Canticles."
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