I would like to, at some point, teach and begin to use the mass VIII Gloria, in latin.
The trouble is, I don't want to just "do it" without any regard for the people singing. It appears in the hymnal. But I see two problems: The melody, although repetitive, has enough turns in it to confuse a person. Secondly, the latin. We did use Salve Regina after mass every Sunday in October for the 2nd year now, and I think they finally have "got it" for the most part. But this is a lot more words, I think.
If any of you have successfully began using this Gloria, I'd love to hear if you did anything to prepare the people for it and how you introduced it.
PGA, A few years ago Aristotle Esguerra arranged the Angelis GLORIA using both the intonation as a "refrain" and choir in alternatim. We used that with modest success that year throughout Eastertide. Maybe Ari can repost that.
This is not a refrain treatment, but I took out individual musical phrases that were all similar and had the congregation learn those. You are welcome to share this microsite with your congregation if you would like. That is what it is there for.
(I changed the audio files... my vocal rendition was terrible! What was I thinking!) Was having a egotistic soloistic moment... Mea Culpa.
Of course, this is just a primer to get them singing the whole Gloria after doing this the first time.
Honestly, I've always just... done it. I just figured it's familiar enough to the old timers that they'd carry it, and it worked well. Of course, your parish may be different. If it will fly pastorally, I'd suggest having the choir sing it alone for about a month.
Ari, How's married life? That pic with you and your lovely in front of the console and the mirror was stunningly beautiful. Anyhoo, mon ami, I think you might have just used stars or a coda compass to indicated where you'd interpolate the congregational repeat of the intonation. Don't mess with the memory of an aging Californian, dude! And Jeffrey's fingerprints were all over this too as a recommend. I think this is all so quaint. But it was back in ought six or there abouts. And, fair warning- I'm driving to Madeleine with CASES. So, behooves to be on the old coot's good side! ;-) C
Use the ancient habit of antiphonal singing to your advantage. Celebrant intones. Choir sings. Cantor leads congregation on Laudamus Te. Choir and congregation continue to alternate, with cantor leading congregation.
At our smallish rural parish, when we switched to the Jubilate Deo settings, we introduced Gloria VIII last. We practiced Agnus XVIII immediately before the Mass we started using it in since the parish had used it during Lent. We practiced Sanctus XVIII for two weeks before starting to use it. Then we started on Gloria VIII, practicing it three weeks before starting to use it; repeating more and more of it with each practice week. Led by cantors, no choir.
My parish has been singing an English language version of Gloria de angelis for 8 years. Our organist made the arrangement then and made an updated arrangement for the new translation. We switched over to the new words about a month ago. Our pastor has been very supportive, encouraging the people to sing when they should and to embrace the new translations. The people don't always share his enthusiasm, but enough of them sing that I can hear them from the choir loft. I believe our widespread use of the English Gloria de angelis will pave the way for the occasional use of the Latin Gloria de angelis. Years from now, the Latin Gloria may be more frequently used than the English.
I recall that Jeff Tucker, when teaching Mass XV, would make practice CDs available to those in the congregation that wanted them. I'd be interested to try that idea myself and see how it works out.
I did do it. I put a link to the Gloria (on youtube) in the bulletin, then for 2 weeks I stood up in front of everyone and went through, line by line, first the first half, then the following week the second half. I never noticed a dramatic change, but I did notice that around 1 year after teaching and and using it, people were really singing it. It was fabulous.
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