"Great" Amen for Chant Masses?
  • StephenMatthew
    Posts: 115
    Has anyone found a good Amen to use with what is otherwise a simple Latin or English chanted mass, but retains a bit of the character of a "great" amen.

    Background: pastor does not like the traditional amen in the Roman missal for that specific application, wants something a bit more engaging for the congregation, but still wants something that fits with the chant of the missal.

    I am thinking maybe something with just a hint of melisma, but without the repetitions of "amen" as are common in some many modern compositions. Unfortunately, I am drawing a blank on an example.

    Suggestions?

  • MatthewRoth
    Posts: 2,599
    No, because the great Amen is made up. At least if one does the Per ipsum out loud, with chant, the Amen is the same as in the preconciliar rite.

    If he wants something that fits with the chant, he only has that. Otherwise, you are doing something else. Which is fine, I guess, but it’s doing something at the whim and fancy of the pastor and which is by its nature unstable and unpredictable.

    (I hate not answering the question but I’m just really, really flummoxed by this attitude, that it’s not engaging enough.)
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  • ServiamScores
    Posts: 2,984
    Funnily enough, I had a retired priest approach me this morning after mass asking why we didn’t do a great amen. I explained that it really was a post-conciliar novelty and, ultimately, would feel very out of place in the midst of missa xvii… but I suspect this isn’t the final word on this issue.
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  • chonakchonak
    Posts: 8,956
    Here's an option from Theodore Marier's Hymns, Psalms, and Spiritual Canticles, with a more ornate, but not repetitive, Amen.
    image

    and a more grandiose alternative:
    image
    post-doxologiam.jpg
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    amen-iii.jpg
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  • Liam
    Posts: 5,194
    I suspect what you're imagining is something like the Amen that concludes sequences like Victimae Paschali, Veni Sancte, Veni Creator, and Stabat Mater (the Amen of the Dies Irae is a bit more elaborate).
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  • Liam
    Posts: 5,194
    And Marier's worked very well for decades.
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  • CHGiffenCHGiffen
    Posts: 5,234
    The "grandiose alternative" seems to have been cribbed from the Dresden Amen (prominent in Wagner's opera Parsifal):

    https://hymnary.org/flexscore/GG2013/599/Accompaniment.png
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  • CHGiffenCHGiffen
    Posts: 5,234
    Here are a couple of my own settings, two of which are 3-part (one of these is derived from Byrd).
    7-Amen-revised-b.pdf
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    Giffen-Amen.pdf
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  • monasteryliturgistmonasteryliturgist
    Posts: 331
    I think the "vatican" Amen works well because, it incorporates the missal Amen and then adds to it. I have found that as a good in between to please both crowds
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  • davido
    Posts: 1,000
    Latona has a three-fold chant Amen that goes with the ICEL chants. I can’t find it right now but maybe someone else can point you toward it.

    Gather 3 has a threefold chant amen in the ICEL chant order of mass section, No 183. Similar to Latina’s not quite as melodic.
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  • CGM
    Posts: 721
    Here's an Amen that the Dominican Friars in Poland use. It's written in D Major, but it's meant to be matched to whatever key the priest sings the intonation. (Ideally it would be sung a cappella, but it can of course be accompanied, especially when it's new to the congregation.)
    DominicanAmen.png
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  • Bobby Bolin
    Posts: 423
    If you look in GIA's Worship IV hymnal in the Order of Mass section there is a threefold chanted Amen based on the simple one.
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  • GerardH
    Posts: 511
    If it's chant you need, how about the Amen from Credo IV?
    image
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  • Chaswjd
    Posts: 279
    One could also add a polyphonic extension onto the amen sung by the people. There is an amen by Praetorius on cpdl that works well as an extension to the chanted amen.
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  • GerardH
    Posts: 511
    Actually, rethinking this, you're better off using the Amen from a Gloria in mode II, such as Mass III option B:
    image
    or Mass XI:
    image
    or Gloria ad libitum II:
    image
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    Screenshot 2025-03-17 220049.png
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    Screenshot 2025-03-17 220202.png
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  • DavidOLGCDavidOLGC
    Posts: 107
    Here's an option from Theodore Marier's Hymns, Psalms, and Spiritual Canticles, with a more ornate, but not repetitive, Amen.


    We use the first example shown.

    Sometimes I alter the chord changes to cadence v - i rather than bVII (1st inversion) - i.
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  • atblehl01
    Posts: 3
    If you have a copy of the Hymnal 1982, S-144 and S-145 could fit the bill. I believe they were adapted from Henri Dumont's Cinq Messes en plain-chant, from the Gloria and Credo of the Messe du Second ton, respectively.
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  • M. Jackson Osborn
    Posts: 8,419
    See if it works to have the choir to sing the 'amen' in 'organum'. This might please your pastor. Beyond this the 'amen' unadulterated is really as 'great' as it can be.
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  • PaxTecum
    Posts: 322
    I think it's dumb, but on occasion I have used the attached (lifted from vatican). excuse the shoddy typesetting -- done in haste
    Amen - Full Score.pdf
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