i would recommend that you always have the music in front of you... without exception.

I play exposition every week. have done it for five years. We always sing O Salutaris... have never used music for that hymn ever. a few weeks ago, i drew a blank on the hymn tune! (must be old age). time came to play and i couldn't think of it so I started improvising in the usual key and waited for someone to start singing it and then it happened. they started it in the key of Db! Well, I jumped in and finished it out. Whew!

Thanks Ben and Francis. One reason I'm so big on memorization is because I draw blanks looking at music all the time - I guess I'm easily distracted. When I was playing guitar I almost always had a partner to keep me on the right verse or note, whatever. I'm not normally flighty and don't generally have a concentration problem, but when I lose it, I lose it all the way:)

I play and direct 4 masses each Sunday. There is no way I can stay focused and concentrate fully for 7 hours without something going wrong, or distracting me. Give yourself a break.

I recommend that you all drop the modern idea of singing from the ambo since the organist has to be in the back and you should be in close contact with the organist throughout the mass. This modern idea is fine if you are in France where the main organist is in the back and the choir organist and organ are in the front.

It's like trying to drive a car blindfolded with someone giving you instructions. If you are singing a capella, fine....but.

In the foreseeable future extraordinary ministers, readers and all are going to be back in the pews where they belong if only to remove the bad taste of immodest dress from the sanctuary. Be in the forefront, stay in the back.

The organist could not cue your ear because you are too far away.

There is no instant replay at Mass except for nightmares that wake us up at night...

No organist. No pianist. No guitar. No flute, drum, tambourine, glockenspiel, tin whistle. No nothing. When my church was built in 1989 the crappy little home-type organ was up front. When I inherited the music program I put the organ in the back. After visiting other parishes both in and out of state, the only place I've seen the responsorial psalm sung is from the ambo, although as I said it is new to us.

How is anyone supposed to know what to do anymore?

Given that the psalm is technically one of the readings, it makes best sense liturgically to do it from the ambo. But in a big church, the organist is just too far away. and if there's an instrument nearby, it's usually a piano, so the psalm becomes an excuse to use the piano. Having a nice little Roland C180 up front might be a partial solution.

Another vote for "always have the music with you". I hope you're not under some impression that Catholic church vocalists usually sing without a score! That would not be the case. Heck, even professional vocalists singing oratorio in concert use a score!

It's better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it.

I've had some close calls before. I've probably mentioned them before, but here goes again.

The music for the hymnal is in a binder and I take the sheets out that I need and use them loose leaf rather than have the huge binder on the organ. One time I didn't realize that a piece of music was two pages and I only picked out the one so when it came time and I was playing it, I got the end of page one... and the hymn was still supposed to be going. Luckily for me it was one that I knew well and I could just play it by ear (after a quarter second of initial panic).

The funny thing is that quite often I will just sit down at the organ (or piano) and play hymns by ear with no problem, but when it's actually during Mass, it's not nearly as easy to do so.

Another horror story: I decided to use the transpose function on the church's electric organ... and the organ decided that it wanted to play in both the new key AND the old key. Let's just say that the noise that came from the first chord played was AWFUL. I never used the transpose on that organ again.

As for cantor horror stories, my biggest one was the time I had a nasty cold and then last minute the usual cantor told me neither she nor her family (the other cantors) would be available for any of the Masses for the weekend. Singing for four Masses with a nasty cold, heavy congestion, and shortness of breath IS a nightmare.

Also, nobody's seen a flustered cantor until they've seen the one who accidentally sang a verse as "preserve us in sin."

There is a certain amount of tension that goes with playing and directing. I tend to feel responsible for what happens, so it puts me on edge a bit. Things that I would play through flawlessly a dozen times, have a way of not going so perfectly during mass. I think this stress can cause memory lapses, too. Of course, when the tenors decide to sing the wrong verse and the rest of the choir sings the correct one, things tend to go downhill fast. I often say we are 30 seconds from disaster in that choir loft at any given time.

While I was still teaching, the school had a wretched Hammond from the pits of hell. The transposer would act up on it at the worst possible times. I am thankful I don't have to play that thing anymore.

Is there any way you can rehearse it at the ambo? This may help keep you focused at Mass. God bless you!

After just finishing playing my 9th Mass of the weekend, and reading this, I just had to laugh. I can't tell you how many times I spaced out today. No matter how concentrated you are, after so many Masses, your going to make mistakes. We are human. Don't sweat it.

It happens all the time. Don't beat yourself up over it. As you said, the congregation trusts you, and with that trust, comes love. They will still love you despite the occasional mistakes.

Just the other day, I made a mistake that caused my cantor to train wreck in the responsorial psalm. I was using one of Richard Rice's psalms, which by the way are very nice. I missed a cue to return to the previous melody to fit in a second half of the verse before proceeding. Needless to say, it crashed pretty badly. Afterwards, several people came up and told my cantor, wow you guys really held it together under pressure after that little hiccup. They went on to say how much they love our music program... etc... Do your best, stay positive, and the people will understand. God Bless!!

A classic transposer mishap:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_9gBGaB5bwI

Always have the music in front of you. The one guarantee that you will likely have a lapse of memory is thinking that you won't. Having the music before you and confidently not looking at it is better than not having it and wishing that you did.

About the ambo. I must side with those (and, I think, the GIRM) who sing the psalm from it or a lectern. The psalm is a reading (whether a sung one or not) and belongs where the readings are read (sung). On the other hand, it is not required that the psalm be sung by a cantor: the verses may be sung SATB or polyphonically by the choir, which presumably will be, if not 'in choir', then in a west gallery. (SOME post-VII innovations are ill-conceived, but ALL of them are not.)

Christmas before last, I was playing along on the prelude before midnight mass. The last variation in the French noel had a pedal part requiring a reed. I put my foot on the first pedal note, and it sounded like the roof had fallen in. The actual reed in a pipe had dislodged and shifted position. It was an 8' reed coupled from a manual to the pedal, so that put it right in the middle of the keyboard - just where I could not avoid it. There was no postlude that evening. It would have been a trumpet piece in the key of - you guessed it - the malfunctioning pipe. Midnight Christmas Eve is not a good time to get an organ repairman in, so the pipe didn't get fixed until after Christmas. Of course, a visiting Cardinal was the celebrant, so the pastor wanted everything to go well. It's always something, isn't it?

Who knew? It had been fine the day before.

I've been a cantor for a long time - long enough to have developed a system that works really well for me. I use planners, I make lists, I practice a lot and I practice smart when I have an accompanist. My flummox was how this other melody got in my head, and even with the music in front of me I couldn't get back on track. Singing a cappella is both liberating and treacherous!