It’s no secret that I’m not down on vernacular chant, but occasionally, it’s done really well. The native Christians of the Holy Land are almost all Arab and Palestinians; the major services, particularly in the shrines guarded by the Franciscans are in Latin, whereas Arabic is used in the parishes, and so the clergy have adapted chants accordingly, with a playlist now available on Youtube.

Most of the chants are easily identified by the melody, and virtually all of them sound like they have been adapted in only the smallest ways. The Exultet in particular suffers from very little in the way of compromise, and the English sounds flat in comparison.