We have studied it and already have used it in a Mass two weeks ago where the Communio was chanted from the Graduale Romanum and the same Communion chanted then in English from TAG.

It's the work of years by Bruce Ford who decided to do it and involved the setting of text to the original chant notes with modifications to the melodies to make English work. When it comes to using it with a choir of any size, being able to copy and use the copies is less expensive than purchasing a book at a market price for each choir member. It helps to understand that this is the premise that this publisher works by rather than liturgical Press's approach of selling individual books to each choir member in Paul Ford's By Flowing Waters, which we also use. BFW does permit copying of music for the Assembly.

Also note that Bruce Ford created TAG for use in the Anglican OR Roman church.


For those new, or confused:

Latin - English
Graduale Romanum in English: The American Gradual
Graduale Simplex in English: By Flowing Waters

The Simplex is called in full: Graduale Simplex in Usum Minorum Ecclesiarum

So I guess we are a minor church leaing to....major?

It is of great interest to be able to sing these back and forth in English and Latin....when people hear BYF and TAG and suddenyl realize that they can understand the words it is fun to see their reactions. I think using them is a very valuable way to return chant to its place in the church.

Yes, I know that they are not in Latin....but they open the door to singing Latin in ways that....guitars never do.

I'm still looking for an affordable used copy of the Graduale Simplex....paying more than $40 for a paperbound book rankles a bit. But it also indicates that they did not see much market for it, otherwise it would have been priced for the mass market...pun semi-intended.

noel at sjnmusic.com in Tenneessee, hardly a hotbed of liturgical spearheading. At times there are calls for my....beheading instead. No one can survive at this without the strong support of at least a few....and I am pleased to have that here. My own chant terrierists.

copyrights. my headache is coming back.

"I'm ever more tending toward the school of thought that the closer we are to a pure Psalm tone, the better off we are."

That's part of what inspired me to start transcribing chants. I looked at some of them and realized that they are mostly embellished psalm tones. Many of them end in the same termination depending on the mode, have similar melodies, etc. At the very least, one can take psalm tones and just embellish them. For example, I wound up doing that for communion quite often: singing the antiphon to a psalm tone and adding the final melody of the antiphon at the end. And again, it's about vowels. Get a bunch of us Michiganders with our whiny vowels singing an "er" sound for a couple seconds and it's painful.

It seems to me that vernacular propers need to START with the psalm tone model and then evolve organically from there.

I use it quite a bit in the summers when the choir is on break. I agree that the English language seems less suited to the melismatic writing (though maybe that's partly because it's our native language), but psalm tones every week would make me want to leap out of our choir loft.

So overall, it's not bad. You have the whole liturgical year in there, so you can find whatever you need in a pinch. I actually wish there was a version with the actual Gregorian neumes; I find it much more difficult to sing chant from modern notation.

I digress and go tangential here, gentlemen; apologies.

So, were you literally faced with only one option for both congregation and choir, that being modern notation only (ala LAUS TIBI or J.M.Thompson's "SIMPLE KYRIALE," you would forsake that option on principle rather than move minds, hearts and souls toward chant?

I really just am interested in answers to that question, as opposed to answers that have the "Oh, it's so easy for people to learn the neumes" component.

Just because I find it more difficult to read chant from modern notation doesn't mean I'm opposed to it. When I put the common "Jubilate Deo" chants in our pews for all our Masses to sing during Lent, I put them in modern notation.

On the other hand, we have a weekly Latin Mass (Novus Ordo) here, and I gently introduced neumes to the congregation there. They seemed open to it . . . well, I didn't hear any complaints, let's put it that way! : )

And another thing...

Where did the English propers from the opening Mass of the Colloquium come from? I thought they were beautifully rendered, and more of the kind I'd like to see for parish use. Someone suggested they might have come from Fr. Weber's project, and while this might be true of the psalm, the English square-note notation for the Offertory looked more like that of the Anglican Use Gradual. However, the chants I have looked at in that resource seem to be based more on psalm tones than on the traditional melismatic melodies from the GR.

incantu - I have to wonder what the point is then of melismatic propers in English. Why not do the original in Latin, given that it's just as easy?

Jeffrey and Heath has stated that is seems easier to sing from Gregorian Chant notation rather than modern. I've been working on a very simple guide to reading chant and to me the ease of reading chant over modern notation is that chant is made up of small patterns of notes that are strung together.

The brain recognizes and interprets these little chunks of notation much quicker that the same phrase written in modern notation, especially if written in modern without stems, since the brain does not have to analyze the individual notes to figure out what the pattern is....and Solemnes episema, while it may help with chant notation, further confuses the mind with modern notation.

frogmusic brought this up, so I'll comment, based on my limited experience with The American Gradual (TAG).

A few Sundays ago at Communion, I sang the Communio for the day from the Graduale Romanum (GR), followed by the Communion proper from TAG. A couple of the members of the congregation commented favorably, and I think perhaps people liked hearing that chant can be done in both Latin and English--and liked the "aha" moment when they could say to themselves, "so that's what she was singing in Latin a minute ago. Now we get it. Maybe it's not so strange." In the future, I hope we'll have handouts to help the congregation grasp the Latin propers . . . but that's another story and another expense.

As a singer, I nearly always prefer the original language in which a piece was written. I also prefer chanting from square notes. The old notation communicates more to me, offers more guidance. For these reasons I'm always going to prefer the Graduale, but I see no point in excluding other forms of chant.

We've also been using the *other* Ford's By Flowing Waters, with its simple chants, and I think it's a useful and beautiful addition to our repertory.

So back to that Sunday Mass. Once I had learned the Communio from the GR, it was easy to pick up the TAG version in modern notation. I sang it down about a third because in my view, the TAG Communion proper was set too high for relaxed chanting. Pairing the two chants was a nice experiment that I wouldn't mind repeating.

Would I want to replace the GR with TAG? By no means. But I see no reason not to use TAG when it makes sense to do so--for example when it is easier for singers who are not so comfy with square notes, when it helps a music program make the transition to a more perfect liturgy, and so on.

Mary

incantu: I realize the necessity of such a "via media" as an English offertory. I was more commenting on the irony of the situation: you are singing something which will take great concentration for a hearer to understand well. And yet a Latin offertory would require LESS work to understand and it is discouraged! Alas, we often have to do such odd "compromises" in our jobs.

Francis: To split hairs, I'd question to what extent 1 and 2 are necessary towards the goal of getting the church to sing the chant. This discussion is over ways to get around 2. The American Gradual, By Flowing Waters, Fr. Weber's work, and my own is about preserving the music of the chant without the language barrier. Also, chant need not be non-metered. I recall that one hymn sung at the colloquium was a chant hymn arranged in a rhythmic fashion. This is an ancient practice in the history of chant and indeed the development of music. I'm reminded also of the Episcopalian hymnals which contain "of the Father's Love" with a triple meter, and the setting of the Pentecost gradual in some GIA books which does the same. So while I myself wouldn't throw out any of those 3 barriers, there's no reason one in a difficult situation couldn't do as much.

Right, incantu. It seems to me that is the only barrier to chant that can't be gotten around.

Dear Friends:
Though there is no doubt that, at this moment, mountainous liturgical and musical difficulties beg redress, it is a privilege to scale these heights as it provides rewarding challenges to ingenuity and creativity. I do employ TAG at our parish. Given the parameters of producing such a book – arguably a task that, by its very nature, may inevitably fall short of a completely satisfactory result – we owe Bruce Ford our thanks for his thoughtful and tremendous effort. It serves well, not least as a transition to the Graduale Romanum. I would argue that accusations of awkwardness or other difficulties in this edition should be addressed to Mr. Ford. Yes, English texts set to these melodies pose difficulties; nevertheless, many, many of those (e.g. intelligibility of text despite melismatic passages and Michiganian vowels) can be effectively overcome (to most ears) through graceful singing. I have been repeatedly complimented on the use of this resource and assured that the text is correctly understood. Now to pair this with the Graduale permits far easier access to the Church's musical treasure.

This discussion might be worth bumping. Heath writes "psalm tones every week would make me want to leap out of our choir loft." For too many of us there is only the front pew to fling ourselves from, like Gloucester in King Lear :-D

If people find singing psalm tones annoying, the group probably isn't doing them well. I don't think people can get them without making them a habit: e.g., by singing Vespers or Compline every week at rehearsal. That way, the group gets to know how to sing them together, pronounce together, etc.

Richard, I just read Lear this summer, so I could actually chuckle at your comment!

I do love re-reading old threads. Great quote from Incantu above: "The tyranny of TI-DO is as difficult to overthrow as the barline." Very nice!

Gents, I didn't mean to rail against psalm tones;of course, they are wonderful . . . in their proper place. AFAIK, they certainly weren't meant to be used as antiphons, and when they are, it seems very perfunctory, no? Stepping-stone, yes; beyond that, I question their use to replace something a bit more neumatic.

An interesting thread, isn't it, since we now have a great piece of the puzzle in the Simple English Propers?