The order of Compline is in the Liber Cantualis. There is the Antiphonale Monasticum.

The more I look at the post-Vatican-II breviary, the more it becomes apparent that it was confected for the private recitation of the vast majority of priests who have little experience and less interest in the sung office. Let's face it, even before the Council, very few priests, aside from those in the religious orders, had the occasion to sing the office. Many of them did not even observe the hours of the day: I was told by a priest that the best policy was to say the entire office the first thing in the morning and get it out of the way, so that you could get down to work. So I recommend simply following the old rite for the office, the one that arose from the sung office.

One solution is to follow the Monastic Antiphonary, but the other is simply to use the EF, i.e., the Liber Usualis. Here you have, at least for vespers, all the psalms pointed. The regulation of the office is quite different from that of the Mass; if you do not have a canonical obligation to the office, and no lay person does to my knowledge, you may follow any form you choose, including the traditional one. My choir has sung vespers essentially straight from the Liber usualis for thirty-four years. Some of us sing lauds Sunday mornings, though I had to prepare the psalms, since neither the Liber nor the Antiphonary points the psalms.

I have a particular reservation about the Liber Hymnarius: it contains Latin hymns by some of the great hymnodists, St. Ambrose, Venantius Fortunatus, etc., a few by each of them, and then over forty by a certain Benedictine, Fr. Lentini, the editor of the Liber Hymnarius. I submit that the traditional repertory of hymns should have been the source of practically all of the hymns, with less recourse to the editor for his own compositions.

Mahrt,

Can you confirm?? The LH hymns are mostly not Gregorian hymns?

Do you mean that the Latin texts are new, or that the melodies are neo-Gregorian?

In my version of the Liturgy of the Hours (Christian Prayer) the instructions for hymns call for them to be
'...from the Four Week Psalter or from the Proper of Seasons" (for Morning and Evening Prayer) and "suitable to the time of day" (for the other hours). Somewhere along the line I remember reading "or other suitable hymn" but I'm not finding it.

The hymns are generally in English in this book, but are traditional Catholic hymns and do not fly in the face of the meaning of Catholic teachings. We will begin in February holding Vespers on the first Friday of each month. The current plan calls for a primarily English session. The schola will sing a Latin prelude and the Regina Coeli at the end. We also plan by way of meditation to chant the Magnificat in Latin after the people recite it in English. By the third or fourth first Friday I'm hoping that the people will join in.

As for a homily, I agree that it would be out of place on a daily basis. But I think it is a wonderful idea in this public monthly forum as a chance to catechize the people as to the meaning of the Liturgy of the Hours, Exposition, and Benediction. I'd bet that over 99% of the congregation is clueless. They shouldn't be after February!

On the subject of singing the OF Office -- there are a few resources that have become available just in the last decade, some official, some not so much.

First, the Solesmes monks are nearly done with an Antiphonale Monasticum for the post-Conciliar monastic Office. The first three volumes are available now -- the first is the Proper of Seasons, the second is the Psalter, and the third is the Sanctorale. The fourth book, which I think is supposed to come out in 2009 or 2010, will contain a revised form of Matins based on a two-week cycle of Psalms. (This represents a break with Benedictine custom, but they're following many other groups in the OSB.) This is only rarely a resource for the secular Office, however, as the Benedictines chose quite different antiphons than the LOTH has.

Another incomplete resource is this one:

http://www.nocturnale.de/Nocturnale/Liturgia_Horarum.html

It is a "proposed antiphonary" for the LOTH, produced by some Catholics in the Archdiocese of Köln (Cologne). It contains the Psalter, most of the Temporale, and not much else. I've been tempted to start filling in the bits that are missing, but I don't really have the expertise to compose new antiphons -- and since the compilers of the secular Office created a large number of new antiphons (for which there is absolutely no music) and rehabilitated some long dead ones (so the music is a little harder to get ahold of than just pulling up a PDF of the 1912 Antiphonale or other books available online), composing new chants or fitting the texts to old, unrelated chants is necessary to fill out the antiphonary. If you look at the books I linked above, you'll notice a number of antiphons marked "HPS", composed by the man (one of the men?) who edited the collection.

I read something online about Westminster Cathedral -- someone cobbled together some books to make Vespers possible, but I don't think they're readily available. (Which is a shame -- if anyone has connections there, please prevail on them to publish them!)

Fr Augustine, OP, who posts on the NLM blog, mentioned to me in email that some Dominican nuns, I think from Indian, compiled some antiphons for singing the post-conciliar Office in Latin, too, which the Dominicans used at their chapters for some time. I don't think these are readily available, either.

In the end, I gather that most religious orders who use the Liturgia Horarum just sing the antiphons to Psalm tones. This is probably the easiest way to manage it without editing your own books. It is lamentable, though, that no one has bothered to put together anything official. There are many Catholics who love the Office, especially sung, but it doesn't seem to have many friends in high places these days. :-(

"The regulation of the office is quite different from that of the Mass; if you do not have a canonical obligation to the office, and no lay person does to my knowledge, you may follow any form you choose, including the traditional one."

My reading of the Motu Proprio "Summorum Pontificum" is that all priests are always free to use the extraordinary form of the Roman Breviary, so it seems as if the canonical obligation to recite the office is fulfilled by reciting the Office in this form.

It never occurred to me that any of the hymns in the Liber Hymnarius were new compositions, let alone 43, by one author. The author index of Te Decet Hymnus confirms that Fr. Lentini is the only living author of hymns in the Liber Hymnarius. After quickly paging through Fr. Lentini's hymns and notes in Te Decet Hymnus, these are a few observations.

Many of the hymns fill in holes where there were no proper hymns, whether because the feast didn't have a proper hymn (e.g., St. Luke, Oct. 18, which used the hymn from the Common of Apostles) or because the feast was new (e.g., the newly merged feast of the Holy Archangels Michael, Gabriel, and Raphael, Sept. 29). Many are Office of Readings/Matins hymns, which are rarely heard outside monasteries. Occasionally he gives brief explanations for the new compositions, but most of his compositions he passes over without any comment.

The biggest shocker was finding the Christmas Matins hymn authored by Fr. Lentini (previously the Vespers hymn was use). There weren't any suitable hymns in the patrimony of hymnody for this one (one of the few Matins offices that are supposed to be sung in cathedrals and other secular churches annually)?

Fr. Lentini authored all the hymns for the Office of the Dead (which previously had none).

His explanation for his two new hymns for the feast of St. Mary Magdalene (July 22) is one of the longer ones. He explains that the "copious hymnographic tradition" reflects the confusion of the Magdalene with Mary of Bethany and the sinful woman, and so "it seemed necessary to compose new hymns" based on the explicit Gospel references. Granting, for the sake of argument, this need to change hymns, I'd be surprised if the Dominicans didn't have something suitable for the "Apostle to the Apostles"? Anybody know?

I'm also a little surprised that the lack of a proper hymn for St. John Chrysostom (new calendar, Sept. 13, old calendar Jan. 27) had to be supplied with a fresh composition. I would have thought the East would be replete with hymns for this great Doctor of the Church, Patriarch of Constantinople, and author of the most-used Divine Liturgy outside Western Christendom.

I’m assuming that since Fr. Lentini doesn’t comment on the provenance of the texts of his hymns (except in a couple cases), that these were fresh compositions. But even though my Latin is weak and my familiarity with Latin hymnography weaker, and I’ve only thumbed through the lyrics of his hymns, it looks to me like they bear a strong resemblance to the poetic phrases found in the Latin hymns of the patristic and middle ages.

Has anyone analyzed the lyrics and music of Fr. Lentini’s hymns or know anything more about how he came to write them? I guess it surprises me that all the new compositions came from just one man. Granted there are probably not a lot of folks today capable of writing new Latin hymns after the classic fashion, but it sure seems like there should be more than one such person.

This topic is interesting to me because I am a lay Carmelite and we are obliged to pray Morning and Evening Prayer, and to pray Night Prayer if we have the time.

I would love to start singing Lauds and Vespers daily. When I can, I join the St. Ann choir in singing Sunday Lauds and Vespers. Does anyone have any hints about how I could start to figure out what to sing and pray for each day, either in the extraordinary or ordinary form?

Roseanne --

For the extraordinary form, all you need is the Antiphonale Romanum, which you can download here:

http://www.sanctamissa.org/EN/music/gregorian-chant/choir/antiphonale.html

For the Liturgy of the Hours, there are a number of resources named above, but there's nothing very easy for singing the Office in Latin. (In English, try the Mundelein Psalter -- it gets repetitive, but it's solid.)

My thanks to gsmisek for his clarification; that indeed is the blog entry I spoke of. It proves that not everything we find in the ether is reliable.

By the way, it seems that the book that I am looking for was discussed extensively in a thread over at WDTPRS. Unfortunately, I don't think the page with that thread exists anymore. If anyone knows anything about this specific book, I'd really appreciate the information.

Michael --

Yes, the Antiphonale has the Psalms, capitula, short RR, etc.

There should be a simple form in the Liber usualis. Free download right here on CMAA.

The proper chant antiphons for the LotH are found in the Ordo Cantus Officii, which was never published as a separate book but can be found in Notitiae 20 (1983) 244-47, 359-528 (the volume number might be off or the year, I can't remember which). It does itself contain the music for the antiphons, but it references several other books, including the Liber Hymnarius, the Graduale Romanum (1974), Antiphonale Monasticum (the 1934 one, plus some from the Antiphonale for Solesmes, portions of which are found in the recent reprint of the '34), the Psalterium Monasticum, the Corpus Antiphonale Officii, and others. It also indicates certain which antiphons do not have chants associated with them. I've looked briefly at the Ordo, and it seems that some of the antiphons are different from those found in the Latin version of the LotH (at least the first edition). Note that the Ordo does reference antiphons for both the Temporal and Sanctoral cycles.

In short, no official Antiphonale Romanum exists for the LotH (except the parts in the Liber Hymnarius). Part of it will require new compositions, which may or may not already exist in the new Antiphonale Monasticum (2005 and onwards). Has anyone heard any news about it? Perhaps Solesmes will publish it once it has finished publishing all the volumes of the new Antiphonale Monasticum. In the meanwhile, it is possible to put something together from the aforementioned sources, and the General Instruction of the Liturgy of the Hours states that "at a sung office, if a [Gregorian] melody is not available for the given antiphon, another antiphon should be taken from those in the repertoire, provided it is suitable in terms of nos. 113 and 121-125" (no. 274, http://www.ewtn.com/library/curia/cdwgilh.htm).

It would be best if we could legally get a copy of the Ordo Cantus Officii online; then a collaborative effort could ensue.

Geoff --

I have the complete diurnal of the new Antiphonale Monasticum (the volume for the night office, in a two-week cycle, is due in 2010 as I understand). It does not contain all the music needed for the new LOTH antiphons, as the Solesmes monks seem to have stuck rather closely to the traditional monastic Office. I have a sinking feeling that no music will ever be composed for the secular LOTH; either it will remain an entirely spoke Office (because really, who in the Roman church is agitating for a sung Office? practically no one) or it will be swept away to be replaced by a more traditional revised Office.

I admit, I am rooting for the latter. The new monastic Office is quite good and not too onerous (especially with a two-week vigils cycle). The secular Office could be replaced with it wholesale in my opinion.

I don't want to judge too harshly the people responsible for the contemporary LOTH, but I think the worst parts of it go beyond merely wanting to reduce the obligation for priests. I know a lot of folks dislike the Quinonez-like Psalter schema, and that is an odd feature.

But even given that goal, they could have chosen music that already existed instead of making up antiphons that have never been part of any Office. And the litanies are a bit excessive in my opinion, taking necessary emphasis away from the already-reduced recitation of the Psalms. It is not worth destroying completely the old cathedral elements of the secular Office in order to introduce changeable litanies where the old Office used only a fixed one, and occasionally at that.

I used the LOTH for some time, trying hard to defend it against the attacks that have been mounted against it. But try as I did, I have to admit that I finally agree with those who say its revisers did not really understand the Office. Even as a private prayerbook for priests and laypeople it is seriously deficient.

If anyone is still following this thread--see the announcement of a new LOTH Latin-French sung version (Community of St. Martin) at:

http://www.communautesaintmartin.org/spip.php?article93

The price tag is steep (US $310), but it looks promising ... the Latin editio typica of the LOTH is indeed beautiful when compared to current vernacular editions.

On that note (hopefully civil?), are there any plans underway to make future English vernacular LOTH editions correspond to the new Roman Missal translation?

Jonathan

The current LOTH in Latin is a revised edition that postdates the current English translation. The updated edition corresponds to the 3-year Lectionary cycle, I believe at least with the Gospel canticle antiphons. (This is what I recall almost a year ago from a conversation with J. Michael Thompson....FWIW)

Anyone looking to sing the Liturgy of the Hours in Latin should be interested in the Ordo Cantus Officii, which was so graciously posted as a PDF to this forum not too long ago. Previously, it was available only in print in the 1983 volume of Notitiæ, a journal that surprisingly few libraries seem to carry.

You won’t find any actual chant in the OCO, but it makes appointments for the existing repertoire for the modern LotH, much (not all) of which can be found in CMAA’s online editions of books like the Liber Usualis.

Now that I think of it, I believe the aforementioned 2nd edition of the LotH in Latin postdates the OCO...

Just finished that section of the book (purchased a colloquium). Also a must-read. I still see no sense in using the modern LOH except where there is a need to render it in the vernacular. Those of us who are not required to recite the LOH daily may use the superior Classical Roman Office and relax.

I have to say that I was not consciously aware of the changes in the Little Hours made at Trent. I agree with Dobzay that these could be returned to their medieval versions.

In attempting to sing the LOTH, you really do need the Mundelein Psalter (or an equivalent) because all the other editions have the psalm verses arranged in "little clumps," instead of verses. Mundelein has the verses properly arranged to move back and forth between choirs (or sides of your brain, if you're doing this alone).

However, I'm with Michael. Just use it as a source for vernacular psalms since people will have some familiarity with them.

Gilbert, you are correct, the antiphons always end on the tonic (unless transposed) though the psalm tones might not, the repetition at the end of the psalm giving it a feeling of completion ending on the tonic.

I have just re-read all the postings here to assuage my frustration at preparing a Vespers that will be within the musical compass of my neophyte schola, will not freak out anyone attending with "too much Latin," and will be worthy worship of God.

The comparison between the LOTH and the Roman Breviary is enlightening. And thanks to Dr. Mahrt's comments above, I feel discharged from any obligation to stuff my Vespers into the structure of the Liturgy of the Hours. He shall serve as my "higher authority." I was sorry that I didn't stay for the Colloquium this year for many reasons, not least of which was Dr. Mahrt - a gentleman who combines scholarship, musicality, and grace.

Mike - I know what you mean. One time, one of my singers overheard someone saying, "Oh that group - I don't know. They were singing weird music in a strange language."

I'll put God first, the schola second, and the random complainers way at the end of the line of considerations.

But, my goodness, what impoverished antiphons in the LOTH. It's more than sad.

I found, that Radio "Vatican" transmit every day (!) song Laudes, Vesperae, and Completorium from monastic communities using Liturgia Horarum. Text of the hyms, psalms and its distribution is according Liturgia Horarum, but antiphons are other. I believe antiphons are according to Ordo Cantus Officii. I decided to collect all offices of the Psalterium.
Here is a Link:

http://www.radiovaticana.org/en1/on_demand.asp?gr=ltg

I don't know how the situation is in Europe, but it has generally shocked and surprised me that the Liturgy of the Hours is held in such low regard in the U.S. Latin church. Why is that? In the eastern churches, the "Divine Praises" are part of a package with the Divine Liturgy. The hours are so important, that one can substitute attendance at Vespers for Divine Liturgy attendance, although one should do both if possible. To only go to mass on a feast day with out the preceding "hours" is like throwing half the focus, context, and intent of the feast day away. I don't get it.

Please do no idealise Orthodox Church praxis. Here in Moscow [Vsenotschnoe Bdenie] i.e. Vesperae+Matutinum+Laudes+Prima = Vigilia is celebrated in each parish every Saturday it is true. But It takes two or three hours! It is a heavy and empty office for lay majority. Main part of this oversuper "Vesper" takes so called Kanon, which is every day particular. No possibility to do something like Breviary. And this Kanon of course read in Church Slavonic language very quickly, and never is song except East. Besides that patriarch Alexis II prohibited to follow Tipicon i.d. Ceremonial (of course medieval one !!!) in celebrating thise "Vsenotschnoe Bdenie", because in some parishes doing that many people were falling down (Tipicon postulate many rites and reading so the office became more longer than 4 or 5 hours!!!) So orthodoxes have crazy cut version of it.