Responsorial Psalms for School Masses
  • RevAMG
    Posts: 162
    I am currently a chaplain at a Catholic middle and high school and our weekly Masses are held in the school's auditorium. I want to update the music repertoire and I am having difficulty in figuring out what to do with the Responsorial Psalms. I would like to keep them sung instead of being recited. The accompaniment is piano-only (played by students) and the cantors (usually SATB but sometimes SSAA) are also students. I would certainly be okay with unison voices for the psalm. What I inherited when I arrived were standard Haugen/Haas settings.

    I would love to use the Chabanel Psalms, the Parish Book of Psalms, or even just a psalm tone (Meinrad, Conception, Bevenot, Murray, etc.) but neither the pianists nor the accompanists are very strong. I feel there needs to be piano accompaniment before moving into plainsong melodies or doing it a cappella. Most of the psalm settings that also work with piano aren't what I'm looking for but perhaps the Gelineau or Guimont settings are a good stepping stone? Any ideas or solutions?
    Thanked by 1JonathanLC
  • bonniebede
    Posts: 756
    I have been using the Parish Book of Psalms, but with psalm verse to St Meinrad tones. St Meinrad tones offer simple accompaniment also. With only 8 possible tones, it was possible for me to assign a particular tone to a particular singer, when that came up it was their turn. Means they got really comfortable with one tone. One would eventually move on to expanding their rep.
    To accompany the antiphon from the Psalms, it was easy enough to see where the St Meinrad thing went, and figure out what to play.
    Thanked by 2David Andrew JonathanLC
  • David AndrewDavid Andrew
    Posts: 1,206
    I used the St. Meinrad psalm tones as well.

    In speaking with Rev. Columba Kelly, OSB, who was largely responsible for their development, he said that they were designed to be used in this way, and can be very easily applied to any psalm refrain and text from the lectionary, or indeed even canticles from the daily offices.

    Basically one uses the first and last bar of the particular tone for the psalm refrain, then chants the verses using either the 4-bar or 5-bar formula according to the rules for them. There are accompaniments in two keys for higher or lower voices, and recommendations for which tones to apply depending on the "mood" of the text. (These annotations can be found in the accompaniment booklet).

    One of the benefits of using the St. Meinrad tones is that they soon become singable without reference to the music itself, and can even be carried over into other parish liturgical celebrations such as morning and evening prayer for chanting the psalmody and canticles.
    Thanked by 1JonathanLC
  • doneill
    Posts: 208
    I recommend getting the Lumen Christi Missal, which provides responses for all the daily Mass psalms. The verses are not pointed, but I have done so to the Meinrad tones for many of them. If you like, PM me with what you need, and I can send them to you.
    Thanked by 1JonathanLC
  • matthewjmatthewj
    Posts: 2,700
    Yes, you really should probably just buy a set of Lumen Christi Missals for your chapel. I'd be glad to help you with that if you'd like to send me a message.
  • David AndrewDavid Andrew
    Posts: 1,206
    Key words in the OP: chapel and student musicians.

    As they would need to use something like the SM psalm tones for the verses anyway, why not take the less expensive and more accessible route and start with the SM tones as I've described and then build from there.

    I would rather see slow and steady growth in the right direction than saddle the chapel of a school with expensive books that would also require storage and easy access for the Masses.

    YMMV.
  • RevAMG
    Posts: 162
    I appreciate all the comments so far. I would love to buy a hymnal or a missal (like the Lumen Christi Missal and/or hymnal) but the price, storage, and difficulty of having one in an auditorium is prohibitive.

    The biggest issue with the music (hymns and responsorial psalms) is that we have only a few student musicians (some only freshmen in high school) so the repertoire has been severely limited. The cantors need accompaniment and the student body barely responds (except when singing Lead Me, Lord). Years (really decades) of poor catechesis in the parish and very lackluster liturgy and music within the deanery has been detrimental to the school's ability to have decent liturgy.
  • rogue63
    Posts: 410
    RevAMG,
    I sent you a PM.
  • doneill
    Posts: 208
    Perhaps Matthew could shed some light on this, but it might be possible to get permission to reprint a psalm response from Lumen Christi in a one-time worship aid. Or, as David suggests, you could simply sing the response to a psalm tone.
  • noel jones, aagonoel jones, aago
    Posts: 6,611
    For the school Mass I was able to teach the high school girls a simple Anglican chant, explained the pointing and after two weeks they took over and sang it in parts, pointing and rehearsing it themselves.

    Anglican chants work nicely with English (for obvious reasons) and are easier to sing than Gregorian chant ones since each line ends with a cadence they can recognize and sing. This will prepare them for sing Gregorian chant sometime in the future.

    Since ti was girls, S the first week, SA, second SAT(by sopranos) B( by altos) in their usual octaves.

    Music attached. Father if you'd send send me three or four week psalms in advance, I'd do the pointing to get them started.

    And, you sing the same chant melody week after week - I'd do this for half the school year and then a different one for the second half if need be, but with the limited amount of time for teaching and learning music (if any) I'd use the same tune for the entire year and into the beginning of the next one.

    The antiphon and verses are all sung to the exact same tone. This has, in many cases, the best chance of actually being sung by the congregation.

    And IT"S FREE and legal to share and copy.

    noel@frogmusic.com if anyone wants to email me docs of psalms to point and try this.
    Thanked by 1JonathanLC
  • canadashcanadash
    Posts: 1,501
    Yes to what Noel says. My son was 13 when he began cantoring the psalm and then my 15 year old took over when the voice changes happened.

    My son sings the psalm every Wednesday for evening Mass. I use the same melody for every refrain. (mi---re, do, ti, la) Yes, it may be boring, but people like it and participate. There isn't need for a great deal of preparation and it works well.

    I pointed the psalms for the first three weeks, using Gregorian tone 2; the boys picked it up quickly and now they do it on their own.

    I taught the same formula to kids at a summer camp and all picked it up easily and participation was good.

    Thanked by 1JonathanLC
  • Earl_GreyEarl_Grey
    Posts: 904
    Pointing the psalms yourself is really the best way to go for daily Mass since most commercially available collections cover only the Sundays and Solemnities. There is, however, this collection that sets the daily antiphons for Advent, Christmas, Lent and Easter: https://www.litpress.org/Detail.aspx?ISBN=9780814632611

    The verses are then set to the aforementioned Meinrad tones available on the Abbey's download page in both melody only and accompaniment versions. The verses can be copied from the USCCB website, and for ordinary time the antiphon can simply use the psalm tone as mentioned above.

    The tones are quite simple to learn, though it may take them some time to get a feel for them. Perhaps you will find a young composer who will be inspired to set the antiphons to a less formulaic but simple melody in due time. I used to do this when I was playing for a weekly grade school Mass, and the student cantors were very quick learners. The grade school students also had no problem picking up the simple composed antiphons in one hearing.
  • HeatherD
    Posts: 2
    While this is two years later, I ran across this during my searches and it may help with the daily psalms.
    http://www.modernpsalter.com/us/Default.aspx
    Thanked by 1JonathanLC
  • Priestboi
    Posts: 155
    I would highly recommend the following:

    For Liturgy:

    - Clayton Ps Tones (http://thewayofbeauty.org/psalm-tones-2/)
    - Cameron Upchurch's Work (https://trinityjhb.co.za/revised-grail-psalms/)

    For personal devotion:
    - The Psalm Project (https://thepsalmproject.nl/)
    Thanked by 1Andrew_Malton
  • Andrew_Malton
    Posts: 1,187
    +1 for Clayton psalmody
    Thanked by 1JonathanLC
  • musicformass
    Posts: 8
    Dear RevAMG (and anyone else in a similar position)

    I started writing psalm tunes for precisely this sort of set-up and resources. You might like to try them. They are all free to download as pdfs, and use with students or congregations. The website is www.musicformass.co.uk. We find we get a good response.
    Thanked by 1JonathanLC
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