Sure. Personally, I think the use of polyphonic settings is a bit too much for a simple office like compline, but depending on the occasion it might work.
The Kyrie isn't sung at compline. After the "Misereatur nostri" or "May almighty God" the hymn is sung straight away. For the hymn, alternating between Gregorian chant and a polyphonic setting by Thomas Tallis (or this one, also by Tallis) could be beautiful.
See my booklet Ad Completorium for the Gregorian chants of compline.
The Royal School of Church Music, King's College Course does a fully sung compline (all chant and polyphony) every night of the week-long course. RSCM is an Anglican program, of course, but I think the Order of Worship for Compline is the same, or at least very nearly the same, as the Roman office.
It seems preferable to me to use polyphonic settings of the music from compline than to add extra motets.
We've used a polyphonic responsory before, but the service is already long enough for us as it is part of a combined EF Vespers/Compline (as the rubrics provide for).
I think the Order of Worship for Compline is the same, or at least very nearly the same, as the Roman office
Definitely not the same... I guess we'd have to define "very nearly the same," but not really. You can tell that they're cousins, but the elements are quite differently ordered.
I realized recently that my personal bar for quality liturgy has gotten pretty low. All I want, these days, is to be able to go to church and NOT continuously think to myself, "This is totally insane. Why are they doing that?"
I recently went to daily Mass for no reason other than that I was seriously hoping there wouldn't be any music. Alas, there was.
St. Mark's Episcopal Cathedral in Seattle has been singing (and broadcasting) Sunday Compline for many years, in a mix of Anglican chant and polyphony, including some of the most interesting choral psalm tones I've ever heard. This was a typical excursion for me during my college days (at Seattle Pacific University), and was one of the earliest influences on my own liturgical career.
It has been a while since I've been on musicasacra. During the past 6 years, I have produced about 80 Compline offices for our tiny, gold rush, Holy Trinity Episcopal Church (1854) in even tinier Nevada City California (pop. 2500). After hearing a simulcast of the late Peter Hallock conducting his Compline Choir in Seattle, I was hooked. I struck up a friendship with PRH that lasted until his death in 2014. I wound up engraving 45 of his, as reported above, excellent Psalm settings for men, AATB. I was further spurred to transcribe, compose, and arrange music appropriate for Compline, built around the Seattle paradigm, which includes what I call the 'Big Five' pieces that change with each office. They are: Orison, Office Hymn, Psalm, Nunc dimittis, and (most of the time) a short anthem or Ave or O. We use a realization of the Plainsong and Medieval Music Society's Compline-edition 2005. Seattle uses the 1949 edition by the same Society. Ours could be seen as an Anglican/Roman hybrid, as we use many tunes in Latin and from the earlier ordinarium (pre-VAT II, 1912, 1952). Ours spans pre and post Reformation periods with a lot of material prior to 1450. In working the music available and trying to settle in on a worthy style I've engraved about 1600 pieces specifically for Compline. Of course CPDL and IMSLP are well worn destinations for material for our 'Odd' combinations. What? 1. Trinity Compline Choir, ATBarB, 12-15 men (except one woman who sings the 2nd part). 2. Voces angelorum, 15-17 all women, SSAT. T? Yes, I have 4 or 5 'lady basses' who hold up the 4th part with authority and volume. They are there, so I write for them. I've done about 450 Compline pieces arranged or composed just for trebles. Voces Advent Compline: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/54429594/20151213.mp3 The anthem near the end was composed by Peter Hallock. 3. Renaissance Man, 4 to 7 males, AATB, the 7 man group with 4 counter tenors, a tenor, a baritone and a bass. Here is our recording from January 3rd. We did the Te Deum laudamus in an antiphonal Tonus Monasticum. https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/54429594/20160103.mp3 4. Illuminare, a Reynolds family quartet, S (wife Jean), A (bro Jim), T (me), B (son Matt) all have been professional musicians so this is the group that can get Compline up in a hurry. Nothing in my life as a Christian and musician has been more satisfying that arranging for and directing my four Compline choirs. Nothing. I was drawn back here as one of the tenors in the Seattle Compline Choir emailed me after seeing a post I had on here about starting a Compline Group. He is now in the start up stage with his choir to do a Presbyterian Compline, which is an entirely different animal. I sent him my entire 2-Gig Compline library on a thumb drive, all 3772 items. This is still available free to any of you that send me a note at jefe4x4-at--gmaildotcom. For more info you can go to our face book page: Trinity Compline Choirs or our website at HTTP://trinitycomplinechoirs.org jefe
I used to run an annual early music festival in Winchester, UK and our biggest attendance each year (400+) was entirely in Latin, "Sung Compline from the time of Palestrina" in the enormous Winchester Cathedral, by candlelight. With 6 professional male singers, amidst much chant, we sang, polyphonically, Compline hymns such as "In manus" and "Te lucis", Nunc Dimittis (with antiphon), as well as the prescribed Marian antiphon at the end. Composers included Palestrina, Victoria, Whyte, Byrd, Tallis and Sheppard. While mainly a festival of music concerts, this particular event was free and open to the public, and we found that Catholics from all over the south of England were making a special trip for this each year. People are hungry.
We presented an Order of Compline by candle light at our EF Church during Advent - we largely used the RSCM resource for traditional Compline, with some modifications to make it conform more closely to the traditional form. We sang polyphony, faux bourdon, and chant with no issues. It was well received by the assisting congregation and clergy. We plan on singing another service in March for Lent... we're working toward a monthly presentation. This is my favorite office to sing. It's beauty and simplicity are something to behold.
I seem to remember singing a Kyrie Eleison toward the end of the service - we sang chant, but perhaps a simple setting like the Byrd for 3 voices would work for a setting like this?
Richard and ModTrad, It's good to hear other views about Compline doins'. The Compline Choir in Seattle does Compline every Sunday night at 9:30 p.m. Pacific Standard time, except if it falls on Christmas. You can listen to their live broadcast by opening KING FM Seattle on your computer and following the prompts. We seldom miss listening to this group. Of course if you live in a far off time zone, you takes your chances with the schedule. Last May, my son and I made the pilgrimage to Seattle for a Festive Memorial for Peter Hallock. We drove our truck camper north and stayed in the church parking lot. It was a festival of his music and more. At a tribute supper, Matt and I were invited to sing with the Compline Choir on that Sunday Evening, about an hour hence. Wow, those guys are good. There were 32 men chanting Compline that Sunday night what with all the returnees. I was standing next to a very old guy in the second alto section (who looked like he could have been in the band in the 1950's), back for the Memorial Compline, during the short rehearsal, and he turned and looked at me and said, "I don't remember seeing you here before." I said, " Oh, I've never sung with this group before, I just came in off the street." In conversing with Peter Hallock, he stressed the importance of making the Office of Compline into your own template. That way, you will own it. He discussed the importance of certain parts of Compline as they morphed over the centuries and put the immutable singing of the Psalms as ground zero. He said in the Order for Compline all else may fall away except for the Psalm. In his own work, he also pumped the mystical. For me, the apex of Compline is in the singing of, "In manus tuas, Domine, commendo spiritum meum", which is the last thing said by a dying person in the Roman tradition, which brings me to what I call the Compline interface. The window into your own death is Compline: the last 25 minutes before you meet your maker: going into that dark night; your soul laid bare. When I started our first group the most difficult music to find were Psalm settings. So using Peter Hallock's style I started making my own settings, along with realizations of Roman and Harmonized Anglican Chant Psalms. I now have about 250 Psalm settings of all stripes, not counting the 45 of Peter Hallock. Plainsong. two part harmonized. 4 part harmonized. More than half of our members are instrumentalists, (aka: notation means something) so it geared to them. I now have about 100 pieces that call themselves, Nunc dimittis. The most important thing for me was to make the arrangements very accessible to the singers in terms of notation. You never have enough rehearsal time, and we've gotten a couple of our groups down to one rehearsal for Compline. For a year, we prayed Compline every fortnight, and one June had Compline all 5 Sundays. Even with 4 groups, it was too much for them so we bailed back to once a month; alternating. Thanks for reading. jefe, bass trombonist; 22,000 services with the LAPhil, 1969-2006.
In 2011, I composed an ATBarB Nunc dimittis in English for the Trinity Compline Choir, which jefe graciously performed, along with a setting of the corresponding antiphon "Preserve me, O Lord" (Salva nos). I later made transposed editions for SATB and TTBB, as well as a Latin SATB edition. Some of these have been posted here already:
Shortly after that, I also composed a (for me rather personal) ATBarB In manus tuas, Domine (both Latin and English text underlay), subsequently transposed for SATB and for SSAT choirs. Also, the German octet InTakt performed and sent me a recording of the ATBarB version. These have all been posted here at the forum.
Edit: The InTakt recording link seems to be broken, so I've attached the recording instead.
To participate in the discussions on Catholic church music, sign in or register as a forum member, The forum is a project of the Church Music Association of America.