.

(I can't believe I'm actually suggesting this...)

I can't believe you are, either.

If I get the response I expect, I will be able to link to this thread every time someone says "CMAA should do a hymnal, blah blah blah" explaining why that isn't gonna ever happen.

I can engrave in Gregorio and Lilypond. Willing to do so. I could possibly help with other aspects, but at least engraving I can promise in some substantial measure (sorry for the pun).

(I'm new here and I understand that fact raises red flags. I'm committed to helping a project like this if it happens.)

Adam, why?

I thought about doing this for years.

I even started gathering digital hymnals and depositing them into a folder, created a page template for SATB hymn engraving, etc.

But my philosophy concerning promoting "hymnals" within the confines of the RC liturgy short circuited. I believe the best model for a pew book is more like the LCM (however congregational singing of propers I believe is misguided, and at the risk of being labelled something else, a pew book without any Latin somewhat betrays our Latin heritage, or in the least leaves one asking "what about our Latin patrimony and GC holding pride of place? What will the children (and converts) think over the years?). It truly appears that we are a schizophrenic Rite.

I realized I am also finished supporting the misled model of music in the OF with my composing, publishing skills. Hence why I am sticking to Latin motets, Latin ordinaries and organ works. I believe THAT defines the true essence of a RC composer, and I have been accused of being arrogant, apodictic, and narrow minded as a result. So be it, that was the model for Catholic composers for centuries, so I am OK with the abuse I suppose.

Therefore, all my efforts from here forward are given toward promoting the best three aspects of sacred music: GC, polyphony and organ whether that be as a DoM, organist or composer. I believe hymnals are on their way out (in the long run).

Perhaps you read my comments in the thread about the 1940. Vernacular hymnody replaced the essence of what should be performed at the liturgy and in my mind, that thread truly bespeaks the continuing confusion about authentic sacred music. (I am glad you are including chant in your model, however.)

In my own projected model to create an all in one pew resource, I was intending on putting the Latin ordinary and common chant hymns in the front (basically the PBC), and vernacular hymns in the back. No one needs 500 hymns in a Catholic pew book. 250 very good hymns is more than enough, and many of them would have been directed toward use in the Office. Congregations singing the propers to me is wishful thinking, and I feel that really should be the job of the schola. Roles, for me, dictate pertinent content for a musical pew resource and the OF has truly blurred, muddied and confused the lines both in theology (active participation) and musical content.

There is alway another twist that someone comes up with in creating a pew resource and I wish you the best in your efforts.

I forgot to add a mention about the question, "How does one define a Good (musically and theologically) hymn?" In other words, 99.99 percent of hymns or songs authored this side of the 20th century I don't feel are worth considering for a Catholic hymnal. (Ie., On This Day, O Beautiful Mother, Amazing Grace, Gift of Finest Wheat, etc.) Certainly very close to nothing the big three have authored, although there might be five or six if you would care to mention them. And the texts have mostly been made PC, inclusive, multi-cultural, eocumenical and more.

I think "The Book" is best, and we should devote our efforts to getting it back in circulation.

You are welcome to use the Lilypond hymn collection that I started as a jumping off point. I can try to move it all to GitHub, but I don't know anything about it and am swamped with school right now.

It looks like all your stuff is online already, so if it doesn't bother you I can just move things over myself.

- Woudn't including chants duplicate material CMAA provides in the PBC?

Some of it definitely would. But I don't see that as a problem.

- How would this hymnal be different from Ostrowski's yet to be published hymn? St. Michael Hymnal? Adoremus Hymnal?

The core material would be free and open source - it would be an online resource as well as (eventually, if there is enough support) a print resource. It would be forkable.

Is this to be a small, stop-gap hymnal of some kind, or a comprehensive, ideal English language Catholic hymnal?

I imagine a complete, comprehensive hymnal which could be used in either an OF or EF setting. Not a missal. Not a pew gradual. A hymnal with good English and Latin hymns with a built-in Kyriale.

Adam Wood, you are crazy and I like it. If such a project actually takes place, I definitely want to take part.

I offer and would enjoy
- writing scripts (Python, Ruby, or similar) for automating score building
- helping with final layout, etc in LaTeX
- building lilypond templates
- engraving SATB hymns with Lilypond (typing source code)
- engraving chant with Gregorio (typing source code)

(In this order of preference. I believe among the forum users there are quite a lot of people mighty with Gregorio, not so many skilled in LilyPond and just a few who can typeset in LaTeX or code, so I offer the rarer skills first.)

MusicXML is not a good document authoring language.

MusicXML seems to be great for purposes of archivation and interchange of musical information between different applications. The information I create today will most probably be readable years and hopefully decades later.

However, for an open source hymnal project, other features are crucial. I would mention
1. source readability and conciseness (when I fix an error in someone else's engraving, others should be able to see the extent and meaning of the change quickly even without compiling the score) and
2. stability of output (what I see when engraving is what Adam will see when assembling the final product)

Great to see all this interest! Rah!

Yes.

Very conversant in:

Lilypond (esp. SATB hymnal-style engraving)
Gregorio

Also very busy.

Would like to help in a minor way…or just look over someone's shoulder. Especially if that someone is expert in integrating the above two with LaTeX (which I'm starting to play with now).

I'd be interested in assisting with research related to texts and PD harmonizations.

SATB music source will be written and engraved in Lilypond. Chant in GABC (Gregorio).

I think it would be a good idea to have MusicXML as an output from a build process, but it is not a good score authoring language. It has to be something that can authored in source code, not a visual editor.

.

This is an excellent project and I cannot think of anyone in the group, including myself, that would be better than Adam to undertake and make it succeed. Seriously. Get behind this project to make it happen.

I also meant to mention that in addition to engraving and any required LaTeX services, I'd be happy to provide some recordings of organ parts, if that's appropriate and my playing is deemed suitable. (Absolutely no offense taken if it is not...) Ditto for chant (I have decent recording facilities), but I cannot supply an SATB choir recording (unless I am supplied with a choir!).

I would be willing to proofread both texts and music (being only a mediocre keyboardist, I don't automatically correct things!). I do have a number of hymns set in Sibelius that can be exported via xml, but that does not sound like it would be useful.

Um, is it going to have 'The head that once was crowned with thorns' to St Magnus in it? How about This Endrys Night?

MJO, if you build it, they will come!

I can help with some of the technical aspects (including writing code).

I am starting to work on this, but if you have a proposal or idea, feel free. I am super busy and may not have anything concrete for a little while.

There's a bunch that seem like definite yeses. Off the top of my head --- Let All Mortal Flesh (PICARDY) and the Salve Regina (Simple).

Important things about structure:
music needs to be separate from texts (at least for hymns, maybe/maybe-not for chants), and that formatting should be separate from that --- like a single (or small handful) of templates, with collections of texts and collections of musics, and then some kind of build process that could look at a specially formatted Table of Contents file to construct the hymnal.

I don't think anything has ever been made public.

I confess I didn't even prepare the proposal mentioned two comments (and three years) earlier.

Thank you. I'm new here and still discovering resources. Just found PBEH. I keep thinking I've found all the resources in one place, and then finding more somewhere else. It's a bit overwhelming.