SATB for Flor y Canto III?
  • DominicanCantor
    Posts: 9
    Hi everyone... Yes... I know... Flor y Canto... but this is how my Spanish community prays, and I'm doing the best I can to dignify the liturgy within the resources and tastes that we have.

    It feels like OCP thinks that musicians in Spanish-speaking communities are musical simpletons with colorful sombreros and seven tamales locked and loaded in their ponchos at all times. They provide such shallow coverage of Spanish-language music:

    EVERY OCP Flor y Canto III resource I have seen includes only melody on most things, the occasional poorly written alto line, and like maybe 10 usable SATB arrangements.

    Does anyone know where I can find the SATB arrangements that they include in many recordings, like this one? The hymnal resources are all in unison or lame 2-part harmony. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QoDxiLHlGyI&list=RDIn-UV6wEKFo&index=3
  • TCJ
    Posts: 1,040
    We use FyC3 and I agree, hardly anything is written for harmony. There are a few hymns written in SATB in the keyboard accompaniment. I have written a few, but I have never distributed them for obvious reasons (copyright). You might have to go the same route if you really want SATB.
  • ChurchMusician
    Posts: 16
    DominicanCantor,
    My parish also is a Flor y Canto parish. The congregation and Spanish choirs use the Flor y Canto hymnal that contains lyrics only. In general, our Spanish choirs learn the music by listening to recordings like the one you cited: unfortunately, the recordings are not always those sponsored by OCP. Within our Spanish worship community, SATB singing is not the tradition; for vocal harmonization and instrumental improvisation the norm is ad lib. The choirs may take liberties by repeating where there are no (notated) repeats in the score, changing rhythms, etc. There are parishioners from multiple Latino backgrounds and sometimes even those cultural traditions conflict over how a particular song is sung. We have a few English cantors who are not bilingual but serve at major bilingual liturgies; due to their familiarity with a traditional hymnal style, and the language barrier, they use the Flor y Canto hymnal with the musical notation. The unexpected musical additions or adaptations can make it frustrating for them but somehow everything comes together as one joyful noise unto the Lord!
  • OrganistRob320OrganistRob320
    Posts: 178
    SATB Harmony

    I believe with the new Flor y Canto quarto they will have everything on the
    Digital Library
  • GambaGamba
    Posts: 652
    I was about to post the same link as Rob, ha. Any supporting materials will be on the OCP site if they exist.

    It looks like there is also a rough Spanish equivalent to Choral Praise. https://www.ocp.org/collections/dg/136/alabanza-coral

    I hope the part-writing is better than CP!

    (Also, I’m not sure whether or not adding SATB arrangements is worth much time, as it’s pretty foreign to the style of most of the FyC music, in the same way that a requinto or bajo sexto doesn’t belong on Grosser Gott. Time spent on that could perhaps be better spent learning the chant or some New World polyphony).
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