How are you teaching the new Mass settings?
  • Kathy
    Posts: 5,501
    Tomorrow night I'm having a "Parish Music Rehearsal" for anyone who wants to come learn the new setting we'll use for the time being. Hopefully we'll have at least a respectable handful of folks.

    I'm going to make a disclaimer that the evening is not an education about the new translation (we have other venues for that) but just a rehearsal.

    I was wondering how others are educating their parishes. This has been touched on in other threads, esp. threads about Mass settings, but I find myself curious just about this aspect of rehearsal.
  • CharlesW
    Posts: 11,960
    I am waiting for the parish office to produce the English chant handouts for the congregation. You know, the ones I gave them originals for well over a month ago. LOL.
  • Joseph Michael
    Posts: 256
    We have used a short, 5 minutes-before Mass, rehearsal with the congregation. Thus far, at all Sunday Masses, we are using the new Missal text with the "Holy" and the "Mystery of Faith".

    I adapted the first two phrases of our standard "Holy", from David Hurd's "New Plainchant Mass", to the new text. It was a simple lesson that caught on quickly. We are using Michael Olbash's setting of the Mystery of Faith which he kindly posted several months ago. Right now, the cantor sings each phrase with the assembly echoing back. Eventually, we will all sing it straight through. Last Lent, we sang the ICEL chant version of the "Holy" with the new text in echo fashion similar to the Proulx Missa Emmanuel and Corpus Christi Mass.

    The new Missal texts are on thick, heavy weight paper and are kept in the pews. At each Mass, people are reminded, as the Offertory begins, that the new texts for the "Holy" and "Mystery of Faith" will be sung.

    At the choir mass, we are singing different settings of the Gloria. Last week, with the a brief rehearsal with the assembly, we sang the new chant/formula Gloria that will be used in Canada. People caught on to this setting very quickly. We have also sung the Belmont Mass Gloria by Christopher Walker. This morning, with choir alone, we sang the Gloria from the "Mass in Honor of Blessed John Henry Newman" by James MacMillan.

    On the Feast of Christ the King, we will sing the new Missal text of the Creed on just one pitch with chord progressions by Theodore Marier that can be found in "Hymns, Psalms, and Spiritual Canticles".
  • Joseph Michael
    Posts: 256
    I would add...."We learn by doing." I think that it is great to have special classes and discussions on the New Missal. But nothing can replace experiencing the new text in the context of the actual Mass. That's where it all takes root.
  • francis
    Posts: 10,726
    I am starting choir rehearsal this Wed and we are learning the Storrington Mass at the request of the Diocese which will be utilized at all diocesan events. Hopefully will only take an hour to teach the choir. We will review it until November each week at which point we will include the Gloria, Sanctus, Mem Acc in the Mass performed by the choir alone. Then on the 1st Sun of Advent we plan to use the Mass in our liturgies with the congregation joining in.

    After that we will learn the ICEL chants the same way I would imagine.
  • benedictgal
    Posts: 798
    Yesterday, at my dad's parish, we started using the revised Gloria from A New Mass for a Congregation, as well as the revised Sanctus and the Memorial Acclamation. I reviewed it with the faithful five minutes before Mass and we got it right after a couple of tries.

    My parish will be using the ICEL chants starting next Sunday. We had a combined choir rehearsal last week. At least no more "Mass of the Joyful Heart". YEAH!!!
  • Charles in CenCA
    Posts: 2,416
    We have in rotation among our four parishes the Proulx Simplex (one Mass), the Nickel St. Therese (one Mass) the ICEL (all fourteen English Masses last weekend of month) and the most pervasively new Bolduc St. Ann.
    The Bolduc, as I've mentioned, pretty much teaches itself through motivic coherence.
    OTOH, the intriguing Nickel setting is much more demanding to inculcate. So, the strategy-
    First week: one 5 minute introduction to the main Gloria motives, no "Nickel" cong. edition, just a text pamphlet. Schola sings Kyrie, Glory, Holy and MemAcc. unison (which will continue through October, much to our consternation!)
    Weeks 2-4: I decided to do something I've never done before; we have a "lector's podium" near the choir transept. I decided as long as we're singing the choral Mass in unison (soprano is melody) I'd function as a schola director from that podium and use a modified form of chironomy with the whole congregation. Basically that amounts to not only showing the flow of each phrase, but also the curvature of the melody. It's "follow the bouncing ball" meets "watching the rise and fall of the hand." And as my pastor confirmed, that seemed to be of great assistance to the PIPs. I'm very uncomfortable with the notion of anyone diverting their personal attention towards my person during worship, but it ain't the usual deal where a cantor flings an arm upward and holds it up as if it's screaming "Sing, darn it!"
    And as I say, the very noble setting of the Nickel is being taken up gingerly. But my pastor affirmed it as eminently "Catholic" and worthy. We'll likely try the same approach in November or December (haven't decided on wisdom/timing of a switch) to the O'Shea "Mediatrix."
    The ICEL Glory should actually prove a "cakewalk" at our schola Mass. XV has basically three melodic motives, and moves freely and smoothly through all of them. I've found that my school kids "got" it intuively. So I suppose adults could mess that intuition up!
  • Adam Schwend
    Posts: 203
    We had two evening talks about the history of the Ordinary and Proper of the Mass, which ended with everyone present singing the ICEL chants together. We used them the first time last Sunday. It was clunky at times, as one would expect....but the tunes are relatively familiar. We fully expect the congregation to pick it up fairly quickly in the ensuing months and years.

    Adam S.
  • benedictgal
    Posts: 798
    We will also be reviewing the ICEL chants for the youth group. Hopefully, this may help them learn about authentic sacred music.
  • Joseph Michael
    Posts: 256
    At choir, yesterday, we sang the ICEL chant "Glory to God", Gloria XV, for the first time. We sang antiphonally without organ. It went very well.

    With this Gloria, the absence of the organ adds to the splendor of the music. If I were to use an accompaniment, I would adapt the Marier version from "Hymns, Psalms, and Spiritual Canticles". To my ear, the Marier harmonies have the right sound and do not get in the way of the chant. The antiphonal style negates the monotony of the chant and keeps things fresh. It is important to not push the tempo. Take your time; do not hurry. Sing as if speaking the words in a natural voice.
  • Chris AllenChris Allen
    Posts: 150
    At the Mass my choir sings at, I started using Columba Kelly's setting of Gloria XV back in April to teach the melody of the new Gloria (ICEL "default"). I've also taken advantage of the USCCB's and diocesan administrator's permission to introduce the sung versions of the new ordinary, starting with the Memorial Acclamation. I'm going to bring in the new Sanctus Sunday after next.
  • mwa
    Posts: 22
    At our parish they switched 2 weeks ago (without practice) from the default Mass of Creation Sanctus to the Vermulst People's Mass with the new ICEL text. I can't understand why they want to use reworkings--yes, people already know the melody, but music works as a mnemonic, which makes it very hard to alter the words without inordinate attention to no stumbling through the switch, rather than just learning them in a new setting. Also replaced MoC Memorial Acclamation, with a People's Mass version, I think. Waiting to see what they come up with for the Gloria, and it appears that we'll be sticking with our schmaltzy waltz Agnus.
  • benedictgal
    Posts: 798
    At our parish, we began with the ICEL settings. It was worth the three years of waiting as the choir did rather well. In my dad's parish, we are using the revised Gloria from A New Mass for a Congregation and the Sanctus from A Community Mass by the late Richard Proulx. I need to review the ICEL Gloria a few more times so that I can teach it to my dad's parish.
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