I'm looking to create the full set of extraordinary form Tenebrae translated into English and using chant notation. I'm wondering if this already exists somewhere, and I just don't know of it. The closest thing I can find is Fr Weber's Good Friday Tenebrae, which is truncated. So, is there anything like that out there, but containing all the texts?
Makes perfect sense to use EF structure of the office but substitute English. This model should have been a much larger part of the postconcilar project.
The seminary in Denver, St John Vianney, has been doing "Tenebrae" for some time. However, its the ordinary form office of readings with an abbreviated morning prayer, and the Lamentations tacked on. I learned it was created by a well-meaning and pious yet...ignorant seminarian. It's really difficult for me to attend because I've sang at Tenebrae, and so I know how much beauty of the stripped away nature of Tenebrae is being missed at the seminary. Knowing that the actual Tenebrae in Latin will not fly at SJV for many years, my hope is that if it's in English, they might actually consider doing it. Not ideal, but better than the status quo.
I have developed an Englished EF Tenebrae (Thu–Fri-Sat) based on psalm tones. The tone for the Lamentations is adapted to account for English cadences. We have tested the Holy Saturday version as a private devotion for the past two years and it takes about an hour to complete. PM me if you wish to examine a copy.
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