EVERY mass has sung changing parts

What were you expecting, exactly?

Let's view this from the outside:

When a protestant organist takes on the job of playing at a Catholic church they are overwhelmed with so much music that requires them to begin as part of the flow of the Mass.

In the Protestant form of worship, everything stops for the hymns and service music, what there is of it, the further you get from a liturgical form.

But, with a person standing beside them to tell them when to start, it's not a big problem.

But...they never cut hymns short. So they also have the added stress of needing someone to tell them when to end the hymn.

Now, let's add one more stressful element.

Each week they have to learn to play and follow one of the psalms from say, OCP Respond and Acclaim, with a metrical antiphon and a harder to play and follow set of verses - each week.

And a gospel Alleluia which has a different verse each week.

This, my friends, is why the Catholic Mass can be "too much" to play for an organist who is not strongly familiar with the Catholic liturgy. It may seem natural to you, but totally overwhelming to a non-Catholic.

The creation of an "ideal" Mass has always been the goal, but the reality of the local situation created the Low Mass for centuries, with High Mass being celebrated once on Sunday.

Is that making it all clearer? If you were at a parish that had no music at Mass, what would be the first Mass part that you would introduce? Where should the emphasis be, on getting someone up to sing a psalm or to get the congregation to sing the Lamb of God?

The concept that EVERY mass has sung changing parts dragvery Mass down the tubes.

Ben, I think Noel meant the imposition of music being mandated for every parish Mass over the Vigil/Sunday schedule dilutes the quality of performance/repertoire choice due to limited and capable resources across the board at most parishes.
"Poor singers" I'm sure refers to poorly trained singers in leadership positions. But I don't think that concerns the direct action of glorifying God, but it does not suffice to edify the rites that do return to God the glory he's revealed and gifted to us.
"One...Mass...chanted...." is a mandate with which I concur, and remains an egregious and likely suppressed absence in many if not most parishes/cathedrals.
"Beaten-down" organists is a subjective assessment which is dependent upon many and diverse concerns.

All of the above can be mitigated and managed out of the doldrums by a professional commitment by a pastor to long term direction by qualified DMs and any follow up support for the professional musical staff through peaks and valleys that trusts their knowledge, insight and leadership, and encourages the passion and fire to thrive year after year.

sooooooo, we're dumbing down the Liturgy based on what some protestant organists think?

I'm still confused. Anyone else think there's something wrong with this picture?

In the average parish, there are a few options:
1) If you have enough cantors, use them to sing the Psalm. They can sing it a capella if the organist's hair is turning white over having to learn a new line of music each week.
2) If the organist is a singer, he/she can sing the Psalm a capella or using a pedal drone for the chanted verses and accompanying the antiphon.
3) If you don't have enough cantors, only sing the Psalm at the Masses that it is possible (i.e. the Choral Mass). But it would probably be better if you...
4) Hired cantors (3 Masses x $50 for a local college vocal student = only $150 a weekend)

If the organist is truly so overworked and stressed out over learning to play one line of music and accompanying verses for two pieces of music each weekend, they might want to look into a new career path. Or start practicing sight-reading and learning that skill.

Also, back to the original post,... If I heard two accompanists quit at the same parish at the same time, the last thing I think anyone would assume was that they were leaving because of the Psalm and Alleluia.

Yes.

That's a bear to play.

"It may seem natural to you, but totally overwhelming to a non-Catholic."

Forget non-Catholics - it can be overwhelming to the Catholic who plays at Our Lady of Makingitupaswegoalong when he is asked to help out at the Church of the Blessed Waywedoithere.

I think the more pressing problem is musical mandates from persons, (be they priests, liturgy committee members, Church Ladies,) who have no idea what effort, if any, is entailed in fulfilling their demands.

(Save the Liturgy, Save the World)

Every time a composition has a refrain?

Seems a bit over-the-top.

That's still not every time a composition has a refrain.

< /nitpicking>

Yes.

That's a bear to play.

Are you being facetious? It's the internet and I truly cannot tell these things anymore.

Why don't you ask them why they left? I'll bet my bitcoin their first response won't be "the psalm and alleluia."

So it was having a job while being a full time student that led to it. That makes a bit more sense.

I doubt that it was the working with cantors that was the "straw that broke the camel's back." If they are full time students and were getting overwhelmed, they probably would have left a protestant church or one without cantors too.

Working while going to school is tough.

Not just in the music world - I've known college students who work 20 hours a week at a law firm while going to school. It's hard. Not everyone can do it.

When I was in university, in Canada (ugh, what a place), I played 8 Masses every weekend in 4 churches (often with less than 15 minutes to get between churches that were 10 minutes apart in good weather), in 3 different languages, and using 2 different Missals. I also ran 4 weekly choir rehearsals. And I made $12,000 my last year in Canada. I remember one time showing up at a Church, running to the loft, seeing the singer for the Latin Tridentine Mass, and beginning my prelude (I memorized most things back then and didn't use music for 90% of each Mass). The cantor, recognizing that I was playing the wrong prelude, walked up beside me and whispered, "this is the French Mass, I'm subbing in for Mark."

I would never wish the above lifestyle on anyone. But it can be done. Though now I look a decade or so older than I really am and would never go back.

Richard, don't you keep up on current affairs? Bitcoins bit the dust yesterday as I understand it. MrCopper's offering cash on the barrel in a neighborthread.

I have a little bit of coins in my jar here... they are what an organist (who also doubles as DoM, cantor, composer, arranger, pianist, guitarist, graphic artist, engraver, piano technician, tuner, librarian, buyer, etc., etc.) gets for playing Mass.

Yes, the student/organists in the post-header were wimps--or more charitably, they could not chew what they bit off.

At the same time, the psalm accompaniment (posted by Ben) is WAAAAYYYYY over-written. As the Emperor said to Mozart, there are too many notes.

I know exactly why the accompanists quit...except that the count is now up to three, and the third accompanist is not a student.

Every single one cited lack of time to prepare. Which I can sympathize with, I'm a student myself along with homeschooling six children, running a home, taking care of livestock and filling in as music director since ours resigned after Christmas.

The main issue however, is that parishioners DEMAND a fully sung Mass accompanied by organ at all the Masses all weekend. The priest and I (after making a valiant effort to accommodate) have reached the conclusion that if they want accompaniment, people are going to simply have to get up out of the pew and volunteer.

Most of the people complaining (at me anyway) are also upset that I'm being paid to "pick out four hymns and a psalm." I think if you added up the time I spent on planning this week, I made about .50 an hour. So clearly I'm not in this for the money.

We have sufficient organists to accompany the high Mass and I'm done stressing out over whether its organ or piano or a cappella for the other ones. Quite frankly, I prefer an a cappella Mass once in awhile.

Let me add that our cantors are not the issue. We have a well trained corps of cantors, a couple of them are even certified through NPM. The cantors have all decided that we're fine with a cappella.

Oh and we don't do preludes or postludes unless the organist wants to and then usually only at the "High Mass." Which is in quote because it's OF not EF.

Sounds like that parish should be named for its patron, St. Bitchnmoan.

I understand, Wendi. I have visited other Catholic churches where the only thing we had in common was the Consecration. They were not identifiably Catholic in any other sense. It's almost like we have two churches, culturally incompatible, with the Real Presence.

The main problem is that the parishioners seemingly have the POWER to demand. (Why is that?)

Arthur, that is part of the problem. A number of people in the parish think that parishioners do have that power.

We have large numbers of converts here and they approach things from the perspective of being used to having authority to hire and fire the pastor.

Oh...and the pastor is ALSO a convert, so could possibly have some of that same perspective lurking in his psyche, which would impact how he deals with the situation.

On the other hand...he is adamant that he will protect the High Mass, so I at least have someplace to take my children to Mass without worrying about damage being done to their formation.

I'll be glad when our house sells and we can move. The stress is not something I'm enjoying. I wouldn't mind it so much if I had actual authority to form the program, but I don't. I'm not the music director. I just do all the planning for all the Masses until the committee gets around to hiring a "real" music director. According to more than one member of the committee I'm just a housewife who does sacred music as a hobby. They want a "trained professional", and since I don't have the letters after my name yet, I need not apply. (Yes, I was told this by at least two members of the committee, one in writing.)

I don't really know what I'm talking about you see...I just like the Latin, therefore I'm trying to snow everyone into believing that I've actually read the documents of the church on music...which isn't possible evidently, since being a housewife I'm also too stupid to understand what the church REALLY means when it says Gregorian Chant has pride of place.

Besides...Pope Francis is going to doing away with all that Latin and incense S**T, which doesn't have any place in the modern church. (I had someone say this to my face word for word.)

The only place I have any kind of authority over the music is at the High Mass...which congregation is vocally very happy with my efforts.

Sorry...I'm just a little frustrated today.

Although to be fair, they had the same attitude towards the music director who just quit (who has two Master's Degrees) and the choir director previous to me (who also had a Master's Degree). As I said...it isn't really about the music per se, its about power and authority, and who has it.

Catholic parishioners don't have any formal power. But they have crude informal power, particularly in the form of bothering to show up and bothering to contribute (especially $$); American Catholics have finally learned those are the only two metrics that matter to chanceries considering the viability of a parish. Pastors have lots of formal power; but, if they haven't built up personal capital with the PIPs, the pastors lack enough *effective* authority. (On paper, pastors in the Catholic church start with power at 100; in reality, their effective authority starts at a *much* lower level. Romans understand this well, because Roman culture is quite comfortable with a wide degree of incongruity between paper and reality - folks from northern European cultures, however, tend to mistake paper for reality, while the Romans observe silently at a distance in dismay.)

Of course they'll quit when the reward isn't enough.

And the Catholic organists have little enough sense to stay and be taken advantage of?

I have seen some Protestant musicians who did excellent jobs in Catholic parishes.

I know exactly why the accompanists quit... Every single one cited lack of time to prepare.

I don't understand -- why can't you just give them the repertoire farther in advance so that they have more time to prepare?