Situation of Sacred Music down in Mexico
  • mantoniomantonio
    Posts: 22
    Hi everyone! I recently attended a liturgical music conference down here in Mexico and was thoroughly impressed. Here is an interview I did with ZENIT news agency about my experience. http://www.zenit.org/article-34351?l=english
    Thanked by 4canadash benedictgal fernandogil CHGiffen
  • benedictgal
    Posts: 798
    Unfortunately, there is a dearth of sacred music in Northern Mexico. Mantonio, I am from Laredo, Texas, just acrosss the Rio Grande from Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas. Sadly, a lot of the music used for Spanish-language Masses ranges from Mariachis, to ranchera, conjunto and Mana (Mexican pop).

    What also makes it difficult is the fact that there is little to no chant in the Mexican Roman Missal. Furthermore, not a few parishes along the border are using a lot of the OCP settings. OCP, lamentably, is not conducive to sacred music.

    I hope that the conference will spur some development in the area of sacred music on both sides of the border.
  • janetgorbitzjanetgorbitz
    Posts: 964
    Great report. I'm glad to hear that steps toward improvement are being taken.
  • mantoniomantonio
    Posts: 22
    Another challenge we have down here in Mexico is that the people generally have less musical education than people in the United States. The sheet music doesn't help them to follow the song; they can't read it.
    One of the goals of the Higher Schools for Sacred Music is to put at least one musically "literate" person in every town or parish, someone who can at least sing the music the way it's supposed to be sung, and enable the people to follow along. I met some amazing, very talented students who feel it is their calling to go back to their parishes and communities and foster traditions of sacred music.
    The next congress will be held in Tlaxcala, Mexico, February 4-8, 2013. All Spanish speakers are welcome to come!
    Thanked by 1eft94530
  • benedictgal
    Posts: 798
    I wish that one of these congresses would be held in Nuevo Laredo. I think that if it were centrally located, perhaps close to International Bridge I (the pedestrian bridge), those of us in Laredo who would like to go (and not have too many safety issues) could attend. Perhaps, Laredo could host it as a joint venture with the Diocese of Nuevo Laredo.
  • Fr. Matthew Spencer
    Posts: 100
    This is wonderful news! I'm so happy to learn of the conference and the movement it represents.
  • fernandogilfernandogil
    Posts: 37
    Here in Mexico, sadly some bishops think that sacred music it's not for the people, they think is kind like a European thing.

    When I was talking to Fr. Luis Martínez Peñaloza, M.Sp.S, he told me that there's a theological mistake on this. He said
    «Music in liturgy isn't to please people attending the Mass, but to worship God, then if the choir sings sacred music according with this intention, people would be pleased because their prayers are truly enhanced».


    At his Mass every sunday, I'm the organist and choirmaster. We are singing chant every single sunday as well as polyphony. On next Easter Sunday we're expected to sing Card. Bartolucci's alternatim setting for Missa de Angelis, so the people would sing the chant and then the choir will sing polyphonic parts.

    We have also a project for bringing back mexican organ music (In the Cathedral of my Diocese there's no organ anymore, but in this parish, thank's to father Luis who is now 86 years old, we have a 3 Manual electronic one) If you are courious about this you can visit my website (still under construction but functionally) http://www.fernandogil.com.mx

    Thanked by 1eft94530
  • benedictgal
    Posts: 798
    Fernando, while there is hope with what you have written, the really lamentable part is that a publishing company like OCP (here in the United States) still believes that music should be "vibrant, culturally diverse and enthusiastic". These buzzwords can be translated into hip and trendy, whatever is of the moment. I just received a copy of the latest version of OCP's Flor y Canto. The musical styles are sorely lacking anything of the sacred. There are only a scant, handful of chants. The settings of the Ordinary are also really bad, as they are set to secularized-sounding music than anything that resembles sacred.

    Maybe with the pending Papal visit, you might see a little more progress made along the lines of sacred music.
    Thanked by 1CHGiffen
  • mantoniomantonio
    Posts: 22
    Thanks for your comments Fernando and benedictgal...Fernando that's a really important point you bring up: what's needed is a whole shift on mentality, from thinking that the liturgy is our work to realizing that the liturgy is God's work. At the same time, there's the entire pastoral challenge of GETTING the people to sing...but the answer is still not to water down the quality and sacredness of the music. I think it's primarily a challenge of proper liturgical and musical education, for the clergy, for ourselves, and for the people. It will take time and patience but it will be worth it.

    Bishop Thomas J. Olmstead just wrote an enlightening series of articules on the difference between liturgical music and religious music: here's the first part http://www.catholicsun.org/bishop/2011/121511.html I myself am still trying to understand the difference better.

    I'm very excited to see what will be done for the upcoming Papal visit.

    benedictgal- about the possibility of a sacred music conference being held in Nuevo Laredo: the bishop who heads DEMUSLI actually asked if any diocese wanted to host next year's conference, but none of us in the north even dared, because of what it implies:the conference is an immersion experience; sacred music choirs are brought in every day to sing the Masses and present new works of liturgical music. Plus you need churches with good acoustics and decent pipe organs, which are scarce even in Monterrey (the cathedral of Monterrey doesn't even have a working pipe organ, I'm told!!). So that's why they've traditionally held the conferences down south, where there is a deeply rooted tradition of sacred music and many more resources available.
    Thanked by 2CHGiffen eft94530
  • benedictgal
    Posts: 798
    Maybe they could have a smaller one up here and make it a joint venture between the dioceses of Laredo and Nuevo Laredo. We always have a rather strange diocesan conference every January, but, this could certainly breathe new life. Laredo has more than enough hotel space and the cathedral has excellent acoustics, as do St. Peter's and Holy Redeemer. They also have decent pipe organs (at least insofar as San Agustin Cathedral and Holy Redeemer are concerned).
    Thanked by 1CHGiffen
  • benedictgal
    Posts: 798
    Do you have contact information for the bishop who heads DEMUSLI? We could get the ball rolling this early.
  • fernandogilfernandogil
    Posts: 37
    I agree with you benedictgal, OCP settings are awful, I also have a copy of "Flor y Canto". The only thing "suitable" from OCP, I think is the "Trinitas" choral series and "Choral Praise Comprehensive" that we're already using. I really prefer GIA books but sadly the "trendy-sound" is mostly generalized.

    Miss Antonio, I searched over the internet about music for Papal visit, but I have to tell you that again... again... they will sing Cesáreo Gabaráin's "Pescador de Hombres" and things like that. I don't want to be negative, but to be honest, I think these songs have reached an age and use that is not fully functional today.

    The interview with the father involved on music for liturgy during the Papal visit, said that although they received a propose from a very known mexican composer, they preferred to use most "popular" songs... let's see

    There's a lack on mexican editors for sacred music, the Sacred Music Comission of Archidiocese of Mexico edited back in 2006 a really good books that included each one the accompaniment, the assembly edition and a double cd with the recordings. The project was for 6 books but they only published 3 packages because for unknown reasons they fired the director. I bought them in Mexico City. The problem is that unless editor's make online publications here in Mexico is so difficult to buy from the US because of the Mail. For the parish I myself edit almost anything we sing

    Let me see if I can reach DEMUSLI
    Thanked by 1eft94530
  • benedictgal
    Posts: 798
    I find it odd that Msgr. Marini would approve such drek as Pescador de Hombres.
  • Claire H
    Posts: 368
    THANK YOU, thank you for this thread! Mantonio, I find it so interesting that you said a tradition of Sacred Music is rooted southern Mexico. Does that mean the north has been "corrupted" by influence from the far-too-long confused state of pop-liturgical music here in the U.S.?

    Mexican musicians seem too often convinced that there is only one "Mexican" way to do music at Mass (mariachi, durango, etc), and I want to know where this lie originated. I mean, electric keyboards have only been around so long...I wish I could time travel back 100 or even 50 years to see what the Mass was like in Mexico.
  • mantoniomantonio
    Posts: 22
    Hi Clare, I'm not really sure why central and southern Mexico has more tradition (maybe Fernando would have an answer), but I asked a few friends of mine who are natives of Monterrey, and they said that the people of Monterrey have always been more focused on work and industry, not so much culture, although the cultural level of Monterrey has greatly increased in the last century. Central and southern Mexico are also just "older": the Guadalajara Cathedra, built in Gothic-Renaissance style, was finished in 1616, and the Metropolitan Cathedral in Mexico City is home to two of the largest 18th century organs on the American continent!

    I've put a few videos of the congress on YouTube and will be posting more as I am able to, so that you can all get a taste of the congress:
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r_bmHLvcAfA&context=C42109fbADvjVQa1PpcFNR3OF2uIZfTkWcr1Gl-pv_6E8rPiEQa7s=
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fqAJgbtXXpg&context=C481624eADvjVQa1PpcFNR3OF2uIZfTkX0QvurNQhHOb5MISo7MZo=
    Thanked by 1eft94530
  • fernandogilfernandogil
    Posts: 37
    @benedictgal: Hope that's only a supposition

    @Claire H and mantonio: there's more musical culture on center and southern Mexico because of the tradition of Spain, when they came, a lot of native people started to learn how to make music. In XVII century Mexico's and Puebla's Cathedrals had a lot of great chapelmasters such as Antonio de Salazar, Ignacio de Jerusalem y Stella and Juan Gutiérrez de Padilla, in late 1700's Manuel de Sumaya. Those Cathedrals and later Oaxaca's cultivated people to understand the liturgy and it's music. Unfortunately, people further didn't receive that so this problem seems to be persistent until today. Other regions such as San Antonio and California have instead wonderful "Mission Music" from that centuries.

    Miss Antonio, thank you for the videos, I edited Fr. Jose Guadalupe Velazquez with popular added lyrics in Mexico.

    God bless you

    PD. Claire, I answered you via e-mail, thanks!
    Thanked by 1eft94530
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