I found the Chant Tools app/website to be very helpful for learning the TLM because it has the propers in order (with psalm tone options if necessary) and you can select whichever Mass Ordinary setting you want. Sometimes this was easier than flipping pages in a book because there is SO MUCH MUSIC in the first 15 minutes of the liturgy.
Andrew's wonderful Psallite sapienter was extremely valuable when I was starting out with the TLM. It is highly recommended. As I have traveled more widely in the years since, I have come to see a more flexible view of how things are done, especially with regard to the use of the organ. But it is still the best place to start.
It says a couple of things about no organ at all in Advent and Lent (Gaudete and Laetare excepted, as is support of singing) - which I personally agree with, though I think custom can play a role - but also deprecates organ with congregational responses, which I would agree goes overboard, if that's where Charles is going with it. It's a great book though, I agree with the recommendations.
Chant_Supremacist, I don’t know that I’d say that the custom of using organ in Lent and Advent apart from for very specific accompanimental purposes should ever be followed - the appendices to Hayburn are littered with dubia on this and similar points with answers from the Congregation in very strong, negative terms.
That said, I do think custom can play a significant role where the law is silent or unclear, provided that the conditions for its establishment are legitimate. I think of the guidance in Marcel Dupre’s book on organ technique as a nice encapsulation of the customs in Paris at the time he wrote the book, for instance.
How prevalent are accompanied responses? I've inherited the custom in my position, and find that it does help with keeping the congregation's responses together (on time, in tempo). That said, I certainly see how introducing it in new places could be seen as overboard.
From what I've seen and restricting to TLMs, not prevalent (maybe sub 10%), but everywhere I've seen it done had fantastic music, robust congregational singing, and a beautiful all-around celebration of the mass. I'm not suggesting any cause and effect, it just doesn't ime correlate with bad liturgy or tasteless musicianship at all, quite the opposite. Anecdotal, mileage may vary.
Edit: I'm not suggesting new places should take it up, I just see it as entirely unproblematic.
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