So, once more, how does George I's river cruise party mix fare better than more subdued, meditative, contemporary selections? Or does it?

Actually, this is a very good question arising from a very perceptive gaze. I have thought many times, but never shared it with anyone, that there is really no reason that secular music of past ages should be any more acceptable at mass, or in connexion with it, than secularly inspired music of our time. Objectively, the one should be as objectionable as the other. Of course, the music for 'George I's river cruise' is far better music than, say the fare one is likely to hear on a river cruise of our day, but still, it really isn't sacred music, nor does it have a spiritual dimension (nor was it intended to have!) such as one rightly expects of music within or associated with the mass. The church is not the place for unbridled gaiety before, during, or after mass. All this leaves us holding a bag full of favourite wedding music by Handel, Charpentier, Stanley, Moret, Elgar, and on an on, which, if one really thinks about it, doesn't really belong in church. This bag of music belongs at the reception. But! Some of it is in such gloriously fine taste and has such a fine ceremonial gravitas that, surely, it does belong - but it doesn't - but we will play it just the same whilst rightly castigating lesser, tasteless, and definitely unceremonious music of recent times. Such is logic brought to bear on Nihil's question. If we were to hang a painting within a church it would be of a religious subject, it would be the finest art we could afford. It would not be a Watteau picnic or van Gogh's Starry Night, beautiful and tasteful as these are. So it is with music. It must be religious or excite the religious intellect and emotions. It must be spiritual food, an icon in sound.

In my selections for voluntaries for church ceremonies I tilt heavily to plainchant, chorale, or hymn tune cantus firmus literature. For other pieces balancing out what is in effect a pre-wedding recital I choose from literature that was or was likely written to be played at mass, such as canzonas and such from Frescobaldi's era, English voluntaries, German praeludia, and so on. Taste is everything. But even every thing that is tasteful is not appropriate for church - to wit, operatic masses and similar organ music.

The finest of musical craft, being inspired, is an aural icon (or, not to mix languages, a phonic icon), an icon in sound. I observed this long ago. All music played in church, whether within mass or connected to it, should have something of an iconic dimension which reflects or relates the sacred. With organ music it may be anything from a Titelouze cantus firmus piece to a Howell's psalm prelude. With such music there is more to it than mere 'music'. Like an icon, it reveals something ever so faintly of what lies beyond even while its subject, like that of icons, may be what is or was here and now. It is 'other'.

The Water Music is suitable for a lavatory interlude.

Charles

Well, that music still has *lots* of secular use.

* * *

We need a species of music called: Wedding Involuntaries or Wedding Compulsories.

I would just add - what would actual "sacred" non-texted music look like anyway, if we had to define it? Monophony or chant-based repertoire only? Contrapuntal, to mirror polyphony? But there is nothing inherently sacred in a fugue (or secular, for that matter).

Sorry, I should have been more explicit.

From a letter from the CDW concerning concerts or music played in Church outside of the Liturgy.

"In a sacred place only those things are to be permitted which serve to exercise or
promote worship, piety and religion. Anything out of harmony with the holiness of the place is forbidden. The Ordinary may, however, for individual cases, permit other uses, provided they are not contrary to the sacred character of the place:'
The principle that the use of the church must not offend the sacredness of the place determines the criteria by which the doors of a church may be opened to a concert of sacred or religious music, as also the concomitant exclusion of every other type of music. The most beautiful symphonic music, for example, is not in itself of religious character. The definition of sacred or religious music depends explicitly on the original intended use of the musical pieces or songs, and likewise on their content. It is not legitimate to provide for the execution in the church of music which is not of religious inspiration and which was composed with a view to performance in a certain precise secular context, irrespective of whether the music would be judged classical or contemporary, of high quality or of a popular nature. On the other hand, such performances would not respect the sacred character of the church, and on the other, would result in the music being performed in an unfitting context.

http://www.ccwatershed.org/media/pdfs/13/11/09/23-54-00_0.pdf

Music composed with a secular intent has no place being played in a Church at any time. Let alone during or surrounding a Liturgy such as the Nuptial Mass.

One line of reasoning is that the original secular and pagan associations have faded into the past, leaving only the association of monumental elegance for the Corinthian column. Something architects are happy to exploit in secular and sacred buildings, and elegant restaurants.

The problem is that here, you're considering an accident divorced from the whole, the substance. While a corinthian column might exist in secular buildings as well as churches, it's the intent, context, and form of the whole—not merely that part—that determines whether that whole is a cheesecake factory or a romanesque church.

Certainly, if a piece of religious music contains a trope from a secular piece, it can "baptise" that trope within the context and intent of the whole, much like a corinthian column in the context of a Roman church (though here again, the Tra le sollecitudini Chant rule applies), but music of a secular composition and intent has no place in the liturgy or Mass at any time, any more than Mass belongs in a Cheesecake Factory at any time.

TLDR: According to Church law, music composed with secular intent has no place in the Church at any time, ever.

Actually, Charles, I'm not 900 years old, nor do I think that I should want to be. Already, with each passing day, this world is becoming less and less familiar and alien to all that I believe and wish to relate to. When I was around fifteenish my grandmother said 'this is not the world I grew up in'. Perhaps I am not alone in understanding just what she meant.

Have often thought the same.

Vilyanor -

Thanks for this response. The CDW document is interesting, but I do wonder about the canonical force of each and every sentence within it (especially where no supporting documents are cited). For example, in paragraph 6:

"Any performance of sacred music which takes place during a celebration, should
be fully in harmony with that celebration. This often means that musical compositions
which date from a period when the active participation of the faithful was not
emphasized as the source of the authentic Christian spirit (SC n. 14; Pius X Tra le
sollecitudini) are no longer to be considered suitable for inclusion within liturgical
celebrations."

Extremely vague (references an entire document, no less!), and displaying at best a failure to give any guidelines for how to judge suitableness. At worst it could demonstrate a lack of understanding on the part of the writers of what makes something suitable. I.e., in reality the time period a piece dates from is irrelevant, regardless of the disdain with which you view that time period - what matters is the characteristics of the music in question (text, instrumentation, scale, style, etc.).

Similarly, the paragraph you quote (#8) takes a simple statement from canon law, and expounds on it in a way that is...intellectually incomplete and unsatisfying. Particularly:

"The definition of sacred or religious music depends explicitly on the original intended use of the musical pieces or songs, and likewise on their content."

And yet, then entire liturgical history of the Church is packed with examples of appropriating things which in their original intended use were not for Christian worship. Such as (drumroll please) the PIPE ORGAN itself! I am not intellectually satisfied with a document that holds up intended use as the key criteria, and then talks glibly of pipe organs.

Not to mention, the idea of non-texted music having inherent extra-musical 'content' is a very complex one that has been debated for a long time.

There are so many other wrinkles here - not enough time to go into them all. What about Protestant music (e.g. Bach Lutheran chorale preludes). Close enough to Catholic worship for government work? What about non-texted organ music written to interest an aristocratic patron in Weimar (i.e. many major Bach preludes and fugues)? If Bach is ok, do his Vivaldi concerto transcriptions make the cut? How about his trio sonatas? Is a trio sonata only ok if it is explicitly titled "church sonata"? What about music written for use in church by non-religious composers (i.e. no sacred intent)? What about a piece on Biblical texts, written for a civic singing society and premiered in a concert hall? What about an organ piece stylistically identical to a "sacred" organ piece, but without an association? In other words, can we only use Bach's fugue on the Magnificat, or does that piece baptize other fugues by association?

I could go on, but the point is: there is more nuance here than a black and white "sacred intent" definition allows for. "Sacred" is not a passive concept, in the sense that something is magically, instantly sacred forever. It involves an active, human and historical process of "setting apart" for use in the worship of God.

Maybe what the document is - clumsily - hinting at is theatrical music (music for a specific secular context). And yet - Schubert's Ave Maria...and what about Bach/Gounod? A student composition exercise. Or the Faure Requiem...or...

All of that said, I think the SPIRIT of canon law, and of this document, makes sense. I would not schedule a performance of a Bruckner symphony in a church. However, as much as we might like a black-and-white assessment, judgment, critical thinking, and discernment are required to deal with the myriad real-world questions and applications.

Jared, I agree with much of what you're saying, but I also think that you're trying to make too much of an argument from complexity. Just because there are grey areas or areas of discernment doesn't mean that the basic principles are invalid, anymore than they are when bioethics gets sketchy. You do concede this more or less in your last paragraph. In many circumstances (as in the music of Palestrina, Victoria, Byrd, etc.) it's easy to tell that the intention of the composer is to compose music for the Catholic Mass, or at least something very like it. And if the music itself is fitting (meets the standards of TLS of measuring up to Gregorian chant), then it passes. The further the piece in question is from these standards, the more reluctant we should be to allow it to have a place in the Church or the Liturgy.

You're right that not-textual music complicates things considerably. And justifiably so, since instrumental music was universally condemned for a significant portion of the Church's history, and remains so in the East (please correct me if I'm wrong, Charles). Given that one of the standards of Liturgical music is its approximation of chant, the use of instrumental music in the Mass should be limited and we should therefore be extremely discriminating when choosing instrumental music for Mass.

Everything resembling the examples cited by Nihil would instantly be eliminated by the broad strokes of the law. There might be more complexity when it comes to Bach or Beethoven, or even Mozart's orchestral Masses (for the Mass, in this case, I can't see why any of the particular tough cases you mentioned couldn't be used outside of Mass, excluding blanket terms like fugues-by-association), but I'll let you professional choirmasters discern that in accordance with a well-trained conscience ;)

The paragraph on participation is quite reasonable if you have the context of a proper understanding of participation as a participation in the act of God. "Concert Masses" where the schola sings throughout the course of the Mass with little reference to the liturgical action would fall under this. Even the polyphonic Sanctus would not be excluded, if we have the correct understanding of participation.

And yet, then entire liturgical history of the Church is packed with examples of appropriating things which in their original intended use were not for Christian worship. Such as (drumroll please) the PIPE ORGAN itself! I am not intellectually satisfied with a document that holds up intended use as the key criteria, and then talks glibly of pipe organs.

This is a category mistake. You're talking about an instrument, rather than the effects produced by that instrument, which can be good or bad, fitting or unfitting. The intended use of the pipe organ (instrument) is categorically different than its product (music), which can vary, and thus this argument is categorically inconsequential to this discussion.

Vilyanor - Thanks for this. I don't think I'm going down rabbit holes, though, with the complexity argument. The myriad complexities don't tell me that the proposed rule ("original intended use determines sacred vs. secular") has many exceptions. Rather, they suggest to me that the proposed rule itself is flawed.

The operative word here being "original". I actually think the pipe organ example highlights this well. The original intended use of the pipe organ was not liturgical. However, the *current* intended use of *some* pipe organs is, in fact, liturgical. There is nothing inherently sacred about the pipe organ, either in its original intended use, or in it as a mechanical construct, or in its current cultural associations. We currently have theater organs, recital hall organs, symphony hall organs, house organs, etc. And yet, we put some organs in churches for liturgical use, thus rendering them sacred instruments. The same could be said of corinthian columns and many, many other architectural and artistic artefacts in our churches (such as Romanesque arches and domes). The proposal from the CDW seems to be that music is the ONLY human cultural artefact that cannot be appropriated for liturgical use (or even brought into a sacred space), unless its original intended use was for liturgy. This seems overly restrictive to me, and it seems to go well beyond the letter and spirit of canon law.

Of course, with texted music we have a clear point of judgment - is the text sacred in nature? But even there, the "original intent" clause would disqualify many, many pieces, from the Faure Requiem to the Schubert Ave Maria, to the Brahms German Requiem. It would seem that the ultimate judge of suitability is the musicologist, able to sift through documents and find out how pieces were premiered. And there is a very thorny question - does the intended sacred use have to have been specifically Catholic liturgy?

With untexted music we are even further from any substantial criteria for judgment. Because a composer three centuries ago wrote one sonata (literally a "sounding" of an instrument) for chamber and one for the church, we are supposed to believe that one piece is inherently unsuitable for use in a church today. One is immediately tempted to propose a "drop the needle" ear-training exam for the writers of the document! Frankly, the CDW document seems to be built on an anachronistic conception of sacred and secular art where music is concerned. In fact, a Baroque composer might choose to write a french overture as the opening of a sacred work or a secular suite. Or write a secular cantata. Or a Renaissance master might write a polyphonic secular song. Or include a secular melody as the cantus firmus for a Catholic Mass setting. Or re-text a secular polyphonic piece for use in Mass. Untangle that one!

Now back to my Holy Week prep. First, an Easter prelude and postlude: Bach Clav. III Prelude, a mish-mash of french overture and italian concerto. And postlude: Clav. III St Anne Fugue, beginning with stile antico treatment of a Lutheran chorale tune, and ending with a lovely Gigue! Then, Beethoven - Hallelujah from Christ on the Mount of Olives, premiered at a theater in Vienna. As well as the Randall Thompson Alleluia, composed for the Tanglewood festival! And some excellent Lutheran hymns. :)

I think the pipe organ usage timeline is ..

200s BC invented
xxx AD used in roman circuses
500s last coliseum
757 from east to west
812 organ in chapel
1800s teaching studios concert halls municipal halls
1900s movie theaters

What we have is a 200 year period of non use for secular purposes
followed by almost 1000 years sacred use
followed by commercial expansion in to secular uses.

Eft's tmeline is roughly accurate - as the skeleton he intended it to be when he wrote it. Missing are some essential details. The organ's history is in our time beginning to resemble the history of some Christian holidays (holy-days) that we absconded with from the pagans, which the pagans are now making every effort to reclaim, though not in Jupiter's or Odin's name, but the name of a pure and shameless secularly driven commerce and freedom from religion.

Specifically, as Eft makes clear, the organ is fast becoming a secular instrument as well as a sacred one - even though most organs continue to be built in churches. By way of clarification, though churches continue to build impressive instruments they are increasingly catering to the organ concert public and attracting impressively skilled concert organists to their staffs. St Paul's, K Street, in Washington is but one of quite a number that might be included.

Truth be known, even this is not entirely a new development. The renaissance and baroque eras knew the town council, not the church or its vestry, as the hirers of musicians for their churches and the securers of organs for their churches which were, it was to be hoped, more impressive than the ones in neighbouring towns. The organ was the greatest technological marvel of those times and any town of any means wanted a fine example of one. (It remains an impressive technological marvel in own own times, and will ever remain so despite the devious efforts of organ simulacra manufacturers to cast it as an antiquated heap so that they can sell more bundles of wires, circuit boards, and tuned buzzers, which they market as digital (wow! digital!) organs, to astonishingly credulous people who somehow swallow that this is an improvement.)

Following the example of earlier town councils, the nineteenth century saw a brisk business in providing mammoth organs for town halls; nor were the rich satisfied until they had organs in their Hudson Valley palaces and 'cottages'. Yes, organs can be found in the unlikeliest of places, so much so that many (even some of our colleagues on this forum) seem to think that the organ is a secular instrument whose presence in churches has a dubious claim to legitimacy. Au contraire, an organ anywhere besides a church is not altogether less absurd a pilfering of dignity than a clown wearing episcopal vesture. It is musical lese majeste. I make an exception for legitimate concert halls. In Europe, in stark contrast to the few in this land, every concert hall, Amsterdam's Concertgebouw, Vienna's Musicverein, and London's Royal Albert Hall, to name but three of very many, has a respectable organ.

Here is where we must 'draw the line'. It is the secular usage which is burdened with a dubious claim to legitimacy! The organ, the king of instruments, despite its origins, is the instrument of the King of kings and lays claim to an existential relationship with the Lord of lords and his Church than to which no other instrument can lay even a tenuous claim. But for the Church the organ would have disappeared with the demise of the Roman circus, Roman military, and ceremonial surrounding the Roman emperor. It was the gift of an organ by the eastern basileus to Charlemagne which determined its continued existence and its identification with the worship of God, an identification that trumps any and all other rather presumptuous defilements of its majesty by musical idiots and their gullible, foolish, publics.

Yes, indeed! The hydraulus' tale was of quite an evolution from its humble origins at the hands of a Graeco-Aegyptian engineer, Ctesibius by name, three centuries before the birth of our Lord. God chose to become not just any man but an humble one born amongst beasts in a tiny village. It is fitting that the instrument singularly and existentially identified with his worship was humble in its infancy and speckled in its path to his sacred courts - speckled, just like the people he has redeemed.

All of which the Second Vatican Council made clear as day. Not a single other instrument was so much as mentioned in all its storied pronouncements.

Why should we regard mere 'things' in a more stern manner than people themselves. Easter is upon us and many, very many, will be baptised or become Catholic whose original intent in life was never to be Christian - and certainly not Catholic Christians. If we can baptise people we can 'baptise' whatever seems meet for our worship - we not only can, but have done so with regard to many cultures throughout history. (I did say 'whatever seems meet'. This rather obviously lets out love songs from broadway musicals and similar stuff that have no liturgical or theological references.)

http://forum.musicasacra.com/forum/discussion/comment/23850#Comment_23850

Documents On The Liturgy 1963-1979 Conciliar, Papal, and Curial Texts (pages 129-133)
DOL 37 (29 December 1966) SC Rites, Press Conference
A Bugnini regarding the Declaration of 29 December 1966

there would have to be a great deal of sacralization before that kind of
music can legitimately cross the church threshold.

Maybe for example .. 200 years of desuetude.