MUSIC AND ACTIVE PARTICIPATION
  • gafidelebs
    Posts: 3
    I would like to know how music education or formation of the Clergy, Choir and the congregation can be a boost to active participation in the Liturgy. I would be very glad if i get materials that I could read more on this. I am from Nigeria, am trying to work a roadmap on how both the clergy and the laity could be musically formed so as to promote active participation in the liturgy. Nigeria is a very big country, with over 270 different tribes and cultures, with hundreds of churches all over the place. this has adverse effect on the liturgical life of the church. I believe that liturgical music formation is pertinent for the church in Nigeria and this could really be a boost, and could help save us running fast and well but out of the track.
    God bless you as I look forward to your kind contributions.
    Thanks.
    Thanked by 2CHGiffen Priestboi
  • JulieCollJulieColl
    Posts: 2,465
    Hello, gafidelebs! This is a wonderful question, and I share your desire that the congregation learn to sing the responses and parts of the Mass. I am part of the music ministry at a traditional Latin Mass community, and it has taken us several years to teach our small congregation to sing some of the chant Mass settings in the Kyriale and to learn some congregational hymns.

    I print out handouts every Sunday with the parts of the Mass, readings and hymns, and the choir sings the same chant Mass every Sunday for about two months until the congregation is familiar with it. It's a small chapel which helps since the choir is in close proximity to the people and they absorb the music pretty quickly.

    There are excellent free resources at Corpus Christi Watershed here with videos, organ accompaniments and scores.

    Perhaps it might work best if you develop a working program in a small parish with an enthusiastic pastor and congregation. This way, you can train the priest, choir, accompanist and people to be a model for other parishes to imitate and would have a "flagship" music program which could be a training ground for musicians and choir leaders.
    Thanked by 1Priestboi
  • M. Jackson Osborn
    Posts: 8,415
    I'm giving thought to your fine question. I am also fascinated by your description of Nigeria's cultural and tribal diversity. One question comes to mind, With 270 different tribes, presumably many languages, what are the things that bind them all together into the singular nationhood of Nigeria?

    Is the mass celebrated in a great variety of languages, in English, French, or another dominant language?

    You might approach your people with a multi-tiered presentation of singing the mass such as:

    1. Teaching them to sing Kyrie, Gloria, Creed, Sanctus, Agnus Dei to simple chants either in Latin or English. Teach one or two of these at a time if they are all new to your people.

    2. As a separate 'chapter' of their instruction teach them (and the priests!) to sing all the dialogue portions of the mass. Those preceding collects, readings, the Eucharistic Prayer, and so forth.

    3. If your psalm is sung responsorially, a brief explanation of responsorial singing and its place in the mass. Each mass will have a different, very simple responsory for the people to sing in response to a cantor's verses of the psalm.

    4. The Alleluya is the second responsorial form in the mass. Teach your people a few alleluyas to sing on different occasions in response to the verse sung by a cantor.

    With these few basic elements of the liturgy the priests and people will have all they need for active participation in the mass as envisioned by Vatican II.

    Any other music should be sung by choirs, or specialist chanters.

    You may find it very helpful and encouraging to hand out copies of any or all the above that you wish to teach. You may need to take one or two items at a time, going slowly so that your people don't get 'overloaded' with new things that they can't assimilate. (On the other hand, you may have fast learners?)

    You will find Julie's suggestions very prudent and helpful.

    Are we at all addressing your situation and needs?
    Thanked by 1Priestboi
  • Chris Garton-Zavesky
    Posts: 6,902
    May I suggest the Kyrie from Mass IX, and the Sanctus from Mass IV?
    Thanked by 2M. Jackson Osborn Priestboi
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