But 70 years later the Latin Ordinaries remain my preference. Familiarity is a key aspect of liturgical participation.
When I was teaching in a Catholic high school, at a school Mass in the gymnasium filled with 1,500 students the music was all P&W, and students were encouraged to use hand gestures during some songs to show their "enthusiasm." The class I brought to Mass included a freshman girl whose father was gravely ill in the hospital, near death (although he lived). The praise band and student leaders were singing "Lord, I Lift Your Name on High" and encouraging all the students to make the "enthusiastic" hand gestures. All I could do was notice the contrast between the forcibly contrived enthusiasm generated by the music and the gestures and my grieving student sitting next to me. If I were her, I would have wanted to run out of the gymnasium and cry and ask God why he hated me so much that everyone else was so happy but my dad was dying.
And Latin Ordinaries will still be sung 70 years from now.
Praise & Worship - probably not.
People are still singing songs today that were the forefathers of praise and worship in their time. For example, How Can I Keep from Singing? was written in 1868, and Leaning on the Everlasting Arms was written in 1887.
My favorite P&W song remains (maybe do to lacking repertoire knowledge) the four-brands-of-tea all time hit: "Laudamustee, Benedicimustee, Adoramustee, Glorificamustee..."... if I liked praise and worship music ... 'Oh my, I certainly do! My favourites are Alleluia Pascha nostrum on Easter day and Tallis's Spem in alium nunquam habui'
So what is are P&W composers searching for?
And Latin Ordinaries will still be sung 70 years from now.
Praise & Worship - probably not.
One of my core principles is that I never program music with lyrics that make potentially false statements about what the person singing it is feeling. Anything along the lines of "I feel so in love with Jesus right now" or any other statement of emotion I on principle don't program.
It is good never ever to allow certain people a monopoly on the implications of given and otherwise positive verba which their coteries have preposterously abducted, presumptuously commandeered, and whose meanings they have warped beyond reason and then put in partisan chains.
Anything along the lines of "I feel so in love with Jesus right now" or any other statement of emotion I on principle don't program.
Doesn't this, effectively, rule out most of the Praise and Worship genre?
the new rite, which explicitly bans polyphonic Sanctus settings
I hope to see something suitable for a Parochial Office (as the ⁁ monastic LOTH is not), something we have not had since the Quiñones model was suppressed.
That is the basic purpose of a monastic communiy. Over the centuries an obligation to a form of this has been imposed on clergy not living in community, and LOTH reduced the amount to be said considerably, but never having the needs of the average member of the faithful as a primary consideration. When I was small, the pious faithful would try to meet their need by communal recitation of the Rosary, which is not a 'liturgical' form.L’office divin, d’après l’antique tradition chrétienne, est constitué de telle façon que tout le déroulement du jour et de la nuit soit consacré par la louange de Dieu.
There's an apparent subtext in the above quote that I really disagree with, and that subtext is that emotion in liturgy is bad. On the contrary, emotion is why we have music in the first place. If this was a purely intellectual endeavor, we could read the words and think about them and not need music at all. We use music because it unites the entire person, intellect and emotion, into a single act of worship. Good liturgical music should make you feel emotionally convicted by the text of the song.
My understanding is that liturgical music is not about emotion,
I don't know about anyone else, but I'd be interested to see some examples of which particular P&W songs @jclangfo finds most suitable for the NO Mass. Perhaps I'll be convinced!
I would like to see not merely the names of examples, but what set of criteria he uses to include or exclude.
To participate in the discussions on Catholic church music, sign in or register as a forum member, The forum is a project of the Church Music Association of America.