Or, seriously.....my organ teacher told me that the tempo for accompanying congregations should be a couple of ticks "upbeat" to keep the congregation from dragging the anchor. One should also take into account the lung-capacity of the singer(s). Obviously, the primary consideration is musicality.

And with the menu of choices you gave above, the choir director should be the tempo-setter, or the organist, in that order. NEVER the cantor/ette.

Love your comments dad...

Who reports to whom? Subordinates have a duty of obedience to the reasonable directives of their superiors.

I follow the tempos of the choir director when accompanying choir anthems; I was speaking of hymns sung by the congregation when I asked who should set the tempo.

And, yes, cantors (including music directors ... and hijackers like priests) should not be singing into a microphone during congregational singing. They can sing, but unamplified (or at least only very distantly amplified - step back far enough not to have your voice dominate by amplification, please).

I am the organist and the choir director. My cantors do not use microphones. I don't like draggy hymns so the tempo is reasonable and what the congregation can sing, but there are times I pick things up a bit more. Like when the sermon was too long and I am trying to move things along. Or maybe I had too much coffee between masses.

FYI the song in question was " Shall We Gather At the River" out of Gather. I see this as a rather happy hymn- we're finally meeting our dead loved ones, we're with the saints in a beautiful place( near the throne of God!), So I think of it as a bit of a picnic, not a dirge. I was singing myself so It wouldn't be too fast for breath- but I wanted to paint a joyful scene. the cantor seemed inclined to misery. Thoughts?

Matilda

I suspect the cantor may have been influenced by the solemn tempo of Aaron Copland's arrangement under the name of "At The River" which is marked to be sung "With dignity".

I begin to think that the problem is I am working with an individual who prefers a public showdown ( so everyone will know who is in charge) to cordial personal communication and joint planning. I've always knuckled under before but now I've kind of had it. Joint planning and a good work relationship would be much preferable though. I doubt we'll be able to get rid of Gather, Charles, but I enjoy your very opinionated comments!

the most knowledgeable church musician should be setting the tempi. This should be the organist,

The organist MAY be 'the most knowledgeable....' There are many instances where that organist is a Prot, or merely a well-trained organist with zero 'church' smarts.

" . . . is this hymn a dirge or a celebration?"

Neither.

It may be an act of hope.

Thank you Liam- yes I am afraid we had " an unseemly tug of war", like to avoid in future. Good to have your input on different interpretations and how to avoid future wars. Amazing how churches, supposedly holy places, can descend into pits of anger and resentment! This I wish to move away from...

Agreeing on a tempo in advance, right down to putting it in numerical form, would be a good thing. But of course tempos have to be adjusted at times as the acoustics of the church vary: summer or winter, empty or full.

The words "dirge" and "celebration" aren't helpful: when I hear someone say "dirge" in this sort of discussion, the person is just expressing annoyance, not talking about something real: after all, how many of us have ever heard any dirge in a Catholic service?

Not with you chonak , annoyed with being unable to express my point of view musically. Annoyed because I feel my rather childlike take on the hymn is not musically sophisticated and therefore I'm overruled at church...

"but not at all the way my Protestant ancestors would have sung the tune!"

I think of how a dear friend and former liturgical music trenches colleague of mine described the brisk, almost double-time martial, tempo and feel of hearing .... "Here I Am, Lord" in his sister's Methodist church 20-25 years ago. He hardly recognized it and had to suppress near-laughter. But he also reconsidered, and engaged the text in a different light. Because he's a liturgical musician, and if you share that vocation you learn to turn problems and annoyances into opportunities where feasible - and to exercise your feasibility muscles, as it were.* Truly professional musicians develop an inspired light touch when pivoting from "mistakes".

That said, recognition is not the only value in liturgical music (it has *a* value when congregations are asked to sing but one that coexists with others).

* It helps to have at one's mental and spiritual ready the following aphorism for self-management: "Because people." And to mean that as "Because [us] people" not "Because [those] people". It's an exercise in humility through solidarity. It's why we need - and celebrate - Redemption.

Matilda,

Do not fret that you have the opinion "a good hymn can be heard a number of different ways". There is more than one right way to do many things. On the other hand, for your personal and spiritual formation I encourage you to not assume that modern hymns (i.e., anything from Luther forward) are necessarily the proper choices for any given circumstance. " Muscular Christianity" doesn't necessarily lead you to "The Old Rugged Cross" or "Onward Christian Soldiers" or even "Faith of Our Fathers" or "Gather us in".

Copeland's introduction is a reminder that Lowry wrote in the midst of a cholera outbreak when the opening line was in fact a question. The piano score has no mm but only "With dignity", Hampson's tempo (8:30) being more reasonable than (yikes!) this.

Nevertheless I'm much more apt to remember Joel Cohen's guitar (2:20).

As an aside related to the issue of arrangement and setting of well-known hymns, Joel Cohen likewise wove an arrangement of Joy to The World that is influenced by the shape note/white spiritual tradition (melody in tenor but with voices doubling at the octaves), the brass bands of mid-19th century American singing music, et cet., yielding a certain anachronistic winsomeness:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yPj_SsQV-Fg

Wow... if the organist cant play a “good” tempo get another organist

But I'm not convinced...

In the case of the song in question here, the question to be asking is not how fast or slow, but whether to or not to sing this anthropocentric song at a theocentric mass. (The correct answer, should there be any doubt, is 'not to'.)

Please explain...

Well, God is, after all, mentioned in this song. Rather, his throne (upon which he presumably sits), and only his throne, is mentioned. This oblique reference is hardly enough to baptise a spiritual song which, really, is all about mankind (anthropo-centric) and the joy of the faithful who gather to cross a purely metaphorical and imaginary river which is said repeatedly (as in over and over - and over again) to be beautiful. It is, in a word, all about 'us' and the river. God's throne is mentioned, but he himself is not. No praise or worship of him is mentioned or offered. All this makes this a religious song which is unfit for liturgical, ritual, use in a mass which must be totally theo-centric, God centred. There may be times and places for religious songs such as this; but the mass or any other ritual celebration is not one of them.

And, as if all this were not enough, we haven't even touched on the unworthy literary drivel that is this text.

Aren't we supposed to approach God as little children

Well, we start out as little children, but we ought to mature; the imagery in the New Testament speaks of moving on from milk to solid food (1 Cor 3, Hebrews 5).

Well this has certainly been interesting. Now I will have to go find a cave somewhere so I can sit and give it some thought.

You are correct, I have very little control over hymns. My position is sometimes very uncomfortable. I only get to select precludes and postludes. I'm really a highly trained cog. Aargh!!

"I don't care where the water goes,
as long as it doesn't get in to the wine."
G.K. Chesterton

Matilda,

Take some comfort from the fact that machines whose cogs break.... quickly cease proper function.

Remember also that if you give good advice ("look out for that iceberg"; "should we take a funeral dirge at the pace of a sprint?"; "Father, we should wait a week to sing that piece we've seen for the first time this morning") and those to whom you give it fail to heed it, and if the catastrophe you foresee comes to pass..... you have done what you are able to do.

I would avoid outright conflict with the Choir Director, but I encourage you to try to work out details before full rehearsals. Of course, this presumes that your director lets you know what you're supposed to do in enough time for you to accomplish it reasonably and professionally.