Hail Holy Queen, Holy is Your Name, Sing of Mary, and Immaculate Mary. We're also singing the Proper antiphons, but I didn't bother telling her that yet since they'll be unaccompanied.
If my hymns seem "a little heavy on the 'Mary Songs'", wait until she hears what the Church has prescribed!

I'm inclined to agree with you, but there is no other choir to threaten by moving. Our only other option really would be to stand in the front row, but that's very distracting and we don't fit anymore.

CarsonHaupt,

Don't skip the loft. Skip the pianist and her instrument.

It is disheartening that you would have to have permission to use the choir loft, since it was designed to house the choir during Mass anyway, but if you really want my whole spiel on such things, you should PM me. To the point:

1. I second the advice to go ahead and use the loft if you can. It is definitely the preferable option in any situation.

2. Ditch the piano as soon as possible. Immediately is preferable here. As we musicians would say: prestissimo!

3. The organ situation depends on what type of organ you're dealing with. I will give advice on the three situations I can reasonably think you might encounter:

a. If the organ is one piece (no separate console), or the console is otherwise immovable, just make sure the organist can see you in the loft from the console. This way, your conducting should keep everyone together. Good musicians will use their ears to accommodate for any delays due to distance. The only real problem in this case would be if the organist could not see you conducting to follow along. Eventually, the choir and organist would be able to coordinate tempo and rhythm, but it might take a measure or two. If he can see your conducting, it will greatly improve the situation.

b. If you are dealing with a portable organ, such as a Hammond model, or a pump or reed organ, then you could simply have it moved to the choir loft. That would resolve the entire situation.

c. If you have an organ with a detachable console, you can simply have the console moved up to the loft.

Situation a or b are probably your most common scenarios, while c is rarer, but not unheard of, especially with wireless technology and electric action.

4. Chant the proper of the Mass from the loft, unaccompanied if possible, for the appropriate feast day. If you can, use the Graduale Romanum, but if you cannot, you can use the Rossini proper set as well. If Latin is the problem, as it likely is if you're in an OF parish, I suggest you use Simple English Propers (SEP, you will see abbreviated on this Forum), or the Lumen Christi Simple Gradual (LC). There are other English settings of the proper of the Mass, but I have forgotten their titles at the moment.

5. Prepare at least one motet for the feast day with the choir. It doesn't have to be in Latin, but should be something appropriate to the Marian feast day. If you don't have the Ravanello Anthology already, you can get it from IMSLP (a free website hosting public domain sheet music, which means you can download, print, and distribute freely without copyright concerns). I highly recommend the Ravanello Anthology because it is written for 3 or 4 equal voices and can be sung SATB, or SAB, or whatever you need, and the works are not difficult. There are also composers on this forum who would be happy to put something together for you if you need. All you must do is ask, and let us know what your ensemble consists of so we know what we're working with. You should also peruse IMSLP to see if they have anything else you'd like in your repertoire: they have a wide selection of music.

6. If you have to go with the common, 4-hymn line up, as is common in most OF parishes nowadays, I would have the following general guidelines:

a. Marian entrance hymn

b. Marian or Eucharistic offertory hymn or motet

c. Eucharistic communion hymn

d. General recessional hymn, such as "Holy God We Praise Thy Name"

Do you have more-than-basic keyboard skills? If not, I recommend beginning to develop these ASAP so you are not beholden to whichever pianist volunteers first. You can do a lot on the organ without pedals, provided you learn proper manual technique and play with the right "ethos" / play repertoire that is well-suited to liturgical use.

Get yourself the Stainer method book or the Gleason method book. You can learn a lot of what you need to know from either one of them. Play around with the organ when you can get out to the church to do so. Experimentation with the information you find in the method books will yield much fruit.

If you're going to seminary, get yourself as much music education as you can before you go: we need more musically educated priests!

You're welcome!

Who's conducting? If it's not the organist, then the organist needs to see the conductor easily while playing.

Regarding the communion hymn: the title is a bit misleading, as only the first line mentions Our Lady. After that is switches to speaking about the incarnation and passion of Our Lord, which I felt worked very well as a communion hymn.

Since I'm leaving for college after this mass, and therefore giving up any direct influence I have in music at this parish, I'm hoping to simply make a good impression and make people realize that we have a musical tradition that is not impossible to return to.

Besides the jokes I hear in this weather about singing from behind a rail without wearing pants, the chief advantages of a choir loft are musical: the sound can take on an extra bloom if the acoustics are favorable, and the congregation is encouraged by singing coming from behind. These are far more than offset if the choir is trying to keep together with an organist (and pianist!) at a distance: what would you be trying to prove?

The organ and the ambo are half a city block apart in my parish. I do not have cantors in front for that reason. Also, when the cantors are out of sight in the loft they behave better and don't try to call attention to themselves.

You could ask the pianist if they could play the organ, but the techniques for the two are different from one another. It is quite possible that the pianist can also play the organ, but it doesn't necessarily follow that the pianist can play organ just because they are a pianist, and vice versa. You have to ask if the individual person has the skills and is comfortable before you assign them to do it.

I think there's a few misunderstandings going one here- they're probably my fault, so allow me to clear them up.
There's no preexisting choir in this parish. Apart from this same group singing one other time, this will be the only time a choir is used. Therefore, there's not really any concern about "changing where the choir stands". I think that by putting the choir in the loft, it'll just cause people to think "when we do have a choir, they're in the loft".
Additionally, there's not a lot of opposition per se to Propers and the like, just a general lack of knowledge. I don't think my friends staying behind are at any risk of fallout, or I wouldn't do this to them.

I might've misspoke, but I believe I stated we don't have a huge nave. After actually testing it, the delay is not noticeable, which defeats the whole purpose of this topic. Regardless, I'm glad I made it, because I've gotten some great help anyways.

After reading what everyone had to say, I won't ask her to try the organ. I misunderstood the amount of similarity the two instruments had.

Regarding the hymns: I believe that earlier I stated that one of them only mentioned Mary once, and then transferred to singing about Jesus. The other is simply Mary's words to God, but never mentions Mary herself. That leaves the processional and recessional hymns as the only thoroughly Marian hymns. Do you still think that's a problem?

Hail Holy Queen, Holy is Your Name, Sing of Mary, and Immaculate Mary.

In that order?

"Holy is Your Name" -- the one by Talbot? -- wouldn't be ideal for offertory. It's slow and you'd only get to sing half of it before the offertory rite compels you to end it. Also, it has irregular rhythms -- it's designed for a soloist -- so there's no way the congregation would be able to join in. Not much fun there. There are better Magnificat songs to choose from.

For example, this one:
https://hymnary.org/text/tell_out_my_soul_the_greatness_of_the_lo
(except that one should change "God's" back to "His" throughout, to undo the PC-ification.)

Is it the Talbot or the WILD MOUNTAIN THYME?

Well, that's certainly better than the Talbot for use at Offertory. I think you could use it safely, but that's just my opinion.

If you're feeling like you need to compromise on the Marian-heavy music line-up, I recommend using a Eucharistic hymn at Communion.

For those unfamiliar with it, here's a video of "Holy is Your Name" (tune: WILD MOUNTAIN THYME)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cMVxEfsNKZY

This is sort of cute and precious, with its odd rhythm, and certainly won't be familiar to the congregation. Since the hymnal is limiting your options, then you may as well sing this one at Communion, when people tend not to sing much anyway. Putting "Sing of Mary" at offertory would give the congregation something familiar.

@CarsonHaupt I noticed that too and went to search for other videos to make sure.... it definitely is ad orientem. Though there are other videos that are more recent where they are using a portable altar in front of the high altar "versus populum"

[With apologies to The Princess Bride, and a wry smile to Jes,']
..."Australia which, as everyone knows is peopled entirely by criminals"

Of course, Buenos Aires is the former seat of the present Bishop of Rome, so would South America be a good place to send the choir?

Charles,

If you send the choir from Tennessee to Buenos Aires, the choir would really by on the periphery!

Why does the pianist have the authority to change your music selections?

I honestly don't know.

I think for a while in this parish, the accompanists were of limited ability, so a convention of allowing them some influence in selecting music developed. However, that's never been a major factor as long as I've been here, and she's been here almost the same amount of time. Additionally, she's very talented and could play anything, so it doesn't really apply.

I'd say she doesn't have the authority, but there's not a lot I can do to point that out to her. I really don't want to make an enemy over one song, but I also really despise that song.

I also want to avoid implicitly giving out approval to that genre of music. I know that seems a bit arrogant, but so far we've been successful at singing traditional music fairly decently. A few people have commented on how it's good to see young people that appreciate our tradition. By singing this song, it would seem to defeat the purpose of demonstrating the potential for good music in this parish.

Don't be embarrassed: it happens all the time.