Responsorial Gradual?
  • brahms8
    Posts: 24
    The Introit, Offertory, and Communion Propers have recommended (albeit optional) psalm verses to accompany the antiphon. What about the Gradual? If such verses do exist, and we as a Church are hooked on this idea of responsorial singing, why not just use the Gradual and its verses? Does anyone know if such a publication exists? Perhaps Mr. Bartlett et al. might consider adding these to their simple Propers publications! :)

    Just throwing ideas out there.
  • a_f_hawkins
    Posts: 3,442
    The USCCB CDW Newsletter for April 2022 listed the official music publications for Mass
    Principal books of music for the Eucharist
    • Graduale Simplex (simpler Gregorian chants of Mass parts and propers) 1975
    • Ordo cantus Missae (Gregorian chants of Mass parts and propers,
    cross-referenced to the pre-Conciliar Graduale Romanum) 1988
    • Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ 1989 (1971) 1998
    • Graduale Romanum (Gregorian chants of Mass parts and propers) 1974
    • Liber Cantualis (assorted Gregorian chants) 1983
    • Ordo Missae in Cantu (Gregorian chants for the Order of Mass) 2012
    (Note that the final three items were published by Solesmes Abbey. Other publications contain various excerpts of these books in different forms.
    Interestingly none of this is in English except the Passion readings. There was an approved ICEL translation of the antiphons of GS including those of the chants between the readings, but AFAIK the ICEL translation of GR was not approved, possibly CDWDS was refusing to talk to ICEL by the time it came out. A version of GS in English can be found in By Flowing Waters by. Paul F Ford
    NB the Gradual chants of GS are generally responsorial, as are the Alleluias.
    Thanked by 1Paul F. Ford
  • GambaGamba
    Posts: 546
    If such verses do exist, and we as a Church are hooked on this idea of responsorial singing, why not just use the Gradual and its verses?


    I for one do not see any advantage to this and it seems rather like feeding dogs off Grandma’s china. Violently divorcing a brief text from the ornate, beautifully virtuosic melody it has borne for more than a millennium, and fitting it to Gebrauchsmusik, really results in something quite different from a real Gradual and foreign to the liturgy. If the people really need something to do, then why not use the RPs, which were designed for that and at least cover more of the psalms than the 52ish Sunday graduals?
    Thanked by 5tomjaw Richard Mix Andrew_Malton ServiamScores LauraKaz
  • Jehan_Boutte
    Posts: 264
    I don't think that would be a great idea, since the Gradual is more a responsorial chant than an antiphonal one.
    Thanked by 1Gamba
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