Requiem Mass 1962
  • Palestrina
    Posts: 562
    Has anyone put together any easy-to-follow booklet for choirs for the 1962 Requiem, including the absolutions?

    I could see a way of splicing this together from ‘Mass and Vespers’, but even that will require obvious truncations eg. The circumstances in which the burial immediately follows Mass are so rare as to be virtually non-existent now, yet I rarely hear the ‘Ego sum’ and Benedictus following the ‘In Paradisum’
  • MatthewRoth
    Posts: 3,494
    The Ego sum etc. are to be done if burial is delayed, so in practice they should be done more often than not.
  • MatthewRoth
    Posts: 3,494
    but also your question needs more context.

    Do you need the orations and readings? I only put those together separately for the day of burial, and in the hope that the prayers are left as is and not substituted for another set (which is legitimate, but ruins what I'm trying to do). The readings for the 3rd, 7th, and 30th days are the same, but not the orations (and you can also use the appropriate ones just like on the day of death or burial).

    If not, the Institute of Christ the King packets are quite nice. I would redo how I worked everything together in hindsight as we did not have a funeral for five years; we only needed the absolution at the catafalque, and I made it so that the Libera Me had to be inserted twice, without it being terribly clear where to go on the day of the exequial Mass. Apple Preview (and paid Adobe Acrobat for sure) make it trivial to move pages around and insert from other files.
  • Palestrina
    Posts: 562
    My basic idea is that such a booklet should replace a Gradual and a Missal for singers, such that they have everything they need in a single book, complete with a translation. Day of Burial, All Souls etc should be covered. Think Mass and Vespers but on a small scale… Many singers who can handle a simple sung Mass may not be as confident with a Requiem.
  • MatthewRoth
    Posts: 3,494
    Yeah you have to do that in part yourself. There are are too many permutations, and you have to check with the priest beforehand.

    Because the funeral readings never change, but the prayers can and do; the anniversary is another set, there is the daily Mass for the dead, there are three Masses of All Souls (the readings of which get reused on other occasions).
  • dannyboi0513
    Posts: 45
    Yes, I have a booklet with all the chants and absolution.
  • SponsaChristi
    Posts: 722
    The circumstances in which the burial immediately follows Mass are so rare as to be virtually non-existent now, yet I rarely hear the ‘Ego sum’ and Benedictus following the ‘In Paradisum’

    It depends what is meant by “immediate burial”. Do they mean literally from walking to graveyard behind the church straight from the funeral? Do they simply mean that burial happens on the same day, although delayed either by a drive to the cemetery, with perhaps a reception beforehand?Are they referring to winter back when burials were delayed and coffins were stored in corpse houses or Mort Houses and burial happened later in spring when the ground thaws and graves can be dug with a shovel rather than today’s modern backhoe technology that can dig a grave when it’s in the dead of winter? I suppose this could also include people who are transported elsewhere to be buried, but the funeral happens in one place, or it’s delayed to allow time for cremation.
  • MatthewRoth
    Posts: 3,494
    I think that obviously driving to the cemetery means that the In Paradisum should be sung at the church and the Ego Sum resumed at the cemetery.

    I do think that the reception should follow that. Even the very NO parish where my family funerals have been understood this.

    Funerals can happen in two places actually, so you repeat the exequial Mass exactly. You just do the stuff for the graveside at the church door of the first, at the burial for the second.

    They don’t specify because, as I said, the burial could legitimately be delayed even when you’re putting the body in a tomb. Monarchs and other figures come to mind.
    Thanked by 2Liam tomjaw
  • Palestrina
    Posts: 562
    SponsaChristi, my reading of ‘In Paradisum’ is from church building to grave.

    The range of the alternatives you present is the invariably supported by the ‘Ego sum’ etc.

    Seemingly the ‘In Paradisum’ is the processional chant to the grave,
  • MatthewRoth
    Posts: 3,494
    it's from the front of the church to the exit (I have no problem extending it with ps 129 with tone 7a if your funeral home team is slow due to the catafalque candles being in the way, but we need one repetition ordinarily); the procession to the grave is with the Benedictus and the psalms of the office of the dead as needed (the Ego Sum is then sung at the graveside again, although in reality nowadays in North America we would pause, then sing the Ego Sum + Benedictus at the grave), but this can be done as a station. It's in all of the manuals.

    Fortescue-O'Connell-Reid 2003, p. 453 (assuming that one is walking…):
    If the coffin is taken at once to the place of burial, the procession is now formed…As the coffin is carried to the cemetery, the choir sings the antiphon in Paradisum deducant te angeli followed by Ego sum (in full)* and Benedictus. If the distance is great, the psalm De profundis and other psalms of the Office of the dead are said. At the entrance to the cemetery, the antiphon Ego sum is repeated in full.


    *They specify this because pre-1960, the funeral antiphons were semidoubled, whereas the office of the dead for the day of the funeral were doubled, and so the sources don't necessarily match the new rubrics.

    P. 454 corrects what I said above
    You just do the stuff for the graveside at the church door of the first, at the burial for the second.


    F-O-R says that the antiphons and all that follows (through Anima ejus… Amen., then the prayers said on the way back to the sacristy) are sung (or said, although really sung is preferred and historically required in most cases) in the church. It is not necessary to repeat this, but it can be done (why wouldn't you?), and the whole service may be repeated another day or in another church (typically both, I think) if burial is delayed.

    Also, as in modern practice (although you could do this at the funeral home I suppose,albeit without the expected procession from the church to the place where the body is laid out) the station with Si iniquitates and ps 129 are to be done at the church door (we do it in the vestibule). The next antiphon and the Miserere may be omitted and the Subvenite begun at once (I've done both, it's nice to take up that time with music instead of allowing people to futz around).

    Stercky, vol. 2, p. 139ff: Most of this still applies to the 1962.

    He confirms that the Exsultabunt and Miserere may be omitted when the body is only received at the church (for him, on what amounts to the street or sidewalk or even the square/parvis or whatever we call it). The psalms are interrupted even the Miserere by skipping to Requiem aeternam and repeating the antiphon when the procession arrives, then the Subvenite begins.

    One says the Office of the dead (1962 allows for evening funerals with Vespers, but before, morning funerals only were allowed, so Matins + Lauds, or at least the invitatory and the first nocturn, with or without Lauds), but this may be omitted, although the Subvenite and the Absolution may never be omitted (there are days where a funeral must take place but the Requiem Mass isn't allowed, and so you proceed immediately to the Absolution, with no connection to the Mass of the day, like on a major feast).

    p. 148, he confirms that if there is no procession, or if the clergy do not accompany it, everything is said or sung in the church and then on the way back to the sacristy. He says that if the body rests in the church, the In paradisum is omitted (nowadays I think that it is always carried out to the hearse). The whole of the ceremonies may be done in the transept if the body is carried out of the church but it cannot be done easily in even the short procession to the door and to the outside (usually not a problem).

    He also confirms that if the prayers are said once, they need not be but may be repeated.
    Thanked by 2Liam tomjaw