Unidentified Anglican Plainchant Tone
  • ny_ct_fl_ms_organist
    Posts: 33
    I have enjoyed the conversation on this forum since I stumbled upon it a few years ago. Thank you for everything that you do to help people with questions about Catholic chant and the EF. I know that there are a few of you on here that know quite a bit about Anglican chant practices. I need your help in particular.

    Our (Anglican) choir is chanting a psalm using this tone. I found it in our choir's vault of psalm settings and the only information on the page is the tone and the pointed text. I can navigate through the page just fine, but I have a stylistic question that someone brought up in rehearsal tonight that caught me off guard. (I am Catholic, and my choir understands that I'm a little bit behind-the-ball on Anglican practices.) My question-- are the first two notes of the tone only sung during the opening of the psalm and then all subsequent verses begin on the F, or is the tone chanted maintaining the first two notes, as notated, throughout the psalm?

    I would be grateful of any knowledge you can share with me. If anyone has recommendations of books or websites that will help me in the future, please let me know. Again, thanks.
    Unidentified Tone.jpg
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  • MarkThompson
    Posts: 768
    I couldn't speak to Anglican practice, but in the Roman usage the intonation formula (the do-re, in this case) is, yes, only used for the first verse. (There is an exception for the canticles Magnificat and Nunc Dimittis, which traditionally have slightly more elaborate tones, and for which the intonation is repeated with every verse.)
    Thanked by 2ny_ct_fl_ms_organist CHGiffen
  • M. Jackson Osborn
    Posts: 8,414
    Seconding Mr Thompson's remark, only on New Testament canticles is the 'intonation' repeated on every verse, and, for these canticles the tones are somewhat more elaborate than the one you present.

    As for the one you present: it is not an Anglican chant at all, but a Gregorian psalm tone, Tone II, to be precise - whether one is Catholic or Anglican, one sings the intonation only for the first verse. There are a total of eight such Gregorian tones, most of which have multiple possible cadences. You will find a table of them in Liber Usualis, or in St Dunstan's Plainsong Psalter (had from Lancelot Andrewes Press and a must for any Anglican choir, + highly recommended for Catholic choirs).

    Thanked by 3CHGiffen ny_ct_fl_ms_organist ScottKChicago
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