"St. Andrew" Novena - chant?
  • CCoozeCCooze
    Posts: 1,259
    Is anyone aware of a musical setting for the St. Andrew-Christmas Novena?

    My children love learning chant for their prayers, and today displayed that they had learned to sing the Salve Regina well enough to simply recite the entire prayer (yay!).
    While the novena prayer is learned quite quickly because of its number of repetitions, I still think it would be nice for them to be able to sing some iterations.

    Thanks!
  • sdtalley3sdtalley3
    Posts: 263
    Hi CCooze,

    can you clarify? Do you have access to a musical setting, or are you asking if anyone else knows? I searched around, and as far as I can tell the Novena is relatively new, and I could not find any musical setting to it. I even searched for a Latin text from the English versions available on line and was not met with much success.
    Thanked by 1CCooze
  • CCoozeCCooze
    Posts: 1,259
    I've found the same lack of results.
    I was wondering if anyone else had better luck or some such.

    Thanks for your response.
  • Chrism
    Posts: 872
    To expand on "not much success":

    • A certain Genevieve Florence Palmas copyrighted an unpublished composition "Hail and Blessed Be the Hour" in December 1952. (Note: I found only one earlier copy of the prayer, from an Irish Little Treasury of Leaflets dated 1914.) I assume this is likely the St. Andrew's "Novena" because Palmas had earlier copyrighted other Catholic-themed music, e.g. to the Infant of Prague. A woman of the same name lived in the Kenosha, Wisconsin area. Perhaps she held some post at one of the Catholic churches there.
    • A Google search found this 2019 paraphrase for SAB choir.


    The text is irregular and long-- I was thinking one could set this to an Advent introit chant like Rorate caeli, and use Psalm tone for the two verses, followed by the Hail and blessed.

    -- 37 syllables
    hail and blessed be the hour and the moment (11) (blessed = 2, hour = 1)
    in which the Son of God was born (8)
    of the most pure Virgin Mary (8)
    at midnight, in Bethlehem, in piercing cold (11)

    -- 21 syllables
    In that hour vouchsafe, I beseech Thee, O my God (12)
    to hear my prayer and grant my desires (9) (desires = 2)

    -- 20 syllables
    through the merits of Our Savior Jesus Christ (11)
    and of His Blessed Mother, Amen. (9) (blessed = 2)

    79 syllables
  • Chrism
    Posts: 872
    Sample setting of the text to Rorate Caeli -- pdf, with gabc.
    Saint Andrew Christmas Novena.pdf
    20K
    Saint Andrew Christmas Novena.gabc
    855B
    Thanked by 2CHGiffen CCooze
  • CCoozeCCooze
    Posts: 1,259
    @Chrism, what a neat idea!
    I'll have to play around with this to see what fits best for our use.
    Thanks for such a great idea.
  • sdtalley3sdtalley3
    Posts: 263
    Here's my humble attempt at this. I can easily transcribe it for English as well later on.
    S. Andrew Novena.pdf
    166K
    Thanked by 6Chrism m_r_taylor CHGiffen CCooze francis Patricia Cecilia
  • m_r_taylor
    Posts: 326
    @sdtalley3 - that's very nice!
    Thanked by 2sdtalley3 Patricia Cecilia
  • sdtalley3sdtalley3
    Posts: 263
    I'm having trouble attaching the English/Latin chant files so I'll try and see if its possible to make this on a new thread.
    Thanked by 1Patricia Cecilia
  • Patricia Cecilia
    Posts: 400
    @sdtalley3 - any luck with English or Latin? I very much like your Latin version. It will make the novena more intentional for me, at least. Gracias tibi ago!
  • sdtalley3sdtalley3
    Posts: 263
    Well it seems "Old Scratch" really has it out for me, no matter what I try I could not upload the pdf's; maybe its just me. If any one is interested still, they can PM me and I can send either the Latin or English chants via personal email. They are both identical with a very slight alteration to the chant ( I think I removed one note because it sounded garrish in the English version).

    Thanks
  • chonakchonak
    Posts: 9,216
    If the PDF file name contains any spaces, then the system can't handle it. Is that possibly the problem?
  • sdtalley3sdtalley3
    Posts: 263
    That was the problem...Thank you very much @chonak.

    S.Andrew_Novena_Eng.pdf
    158K
    S.Andrew_Novena_Lat.pdf
    153K
    Thanked by 1CCooze
  • CCoozeCCooze
    Posts: 1,259
    @sdtalley3 , do you think that perhaps the episema in "sanctissimae" might be over the antepenultimate "-ti-" rather than "-mae"? To me, the episema on the ultimate just seems to beg for a break before "Matris;" which would (of course) be nonsensical.

    Thank you, by the way. It's pretty & prayerful.
    Thanked by 1sdtalley3
  • sdtalley3sdtalley3
    Posts: 263
    @ CCooze,

    I could definitely see where that works, but I was shooting for an "unofficial" break in the scheme of it, instead of slamming into Matris without some type of prolongation beforehand...I can add the episema on the antepenultimate "ti" and dotted punctum on the ultimate "mae" if that makes more sense?
  • Chrism
    Posts: 872
    (and/or replace the episema on mae with a clivis down to do)
    Thanked by 1sdtalley3
  • sdtalley3sdtalley3
    Posts: 263
    @Chrism
    Going down to a „do“ also works out quite nice and provides a subtleness before Matris I could be looking for.
    gregorio5fc696d0b54182.95777618.pdf
    15K
    Thanked by 1CHGiffen
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