Teach the folk-Mass Catholic boy all about Anglican chant
  • DougS
    Posts: 793
    I agree about O Sacrum Convivium, but it's the exception that proves the rule. Also, I don't think you can attribute his lack of liturgical production to the cultural ethos. As I said, he was a very strong proponent of chant and humbled himself to it. Anyway, that's neither here nor there; there is a good amount of literature about this.
  • G
    Posts: 1,397
    "the Mahrt paradigm"

    Sounds like the title of an episode of "The Big Bang"....

    (Save the Liturgy, Save the World)
  • noel jones, aagonoel jones, aago
    Posts: 6,605
    Here's the choice:

    COME AS YOU ARE
    People can come to Mass dressed in shorts and t-shirts with advertising on them and sing songs that sound like the songs they hear on the radio.

    COME AS YOU WOULD LIKE TO BE
    People can come to Mass dressed in the best, most dignified, clothes that they save for very special occasions and they sing and hear music that is also saved for this very special sacred occasion.


    [At the Colloquium there was a grand decorum about the music that we do and the music we should not have to do. There was no discussion about why we should not sing music, just as people did not dress for Mass as if we were going to the beach. We know the music people listen to at the beach and how they dress. We can rise above that music and dress...]
    Thanked by 1bdh
  • Richard MixRichard Mix
    Posts: 2,768
    I would not consider the vast majority of Messiaen's music suitable for the liturgy. He didn't even perform most of his published music at his own parish. To my knowledge, he believed chant should have pride of place and wrote mostly throwaway service music (or improvisations and what have you).


    Oh Doug, are you just trying to get my goat? What else would any great improviser play but unpublished music? If you're making a different point altogether about the liturgy's suitability for throwaway music, you ought to listen to OM's recorded improvisations first: some are even on Youtube. There is no 'service music' by OM as such, disposable or otherwise.
  • M. Jackson Osborn
    Posts: 8,368
    I don't know why OM's music would not be appropriate as voluntaries before or after mass; or even (wisely chosen) as offertories and communions at non-choir masses. I was taught, however, that he had been asked not to play his music at his church. This is an illustration of nothing more than the ill-learned narrowness of leaden authority - not of actual appropriateness. We often like to think of our European cousins as being somehow culturally or intellectually superior to us: they often aren't.
  • IanWIanW
    Posts: 756
    Nonetheless, Doug, his exception to the rule is part of the evidence for the range of styles that can fit with the ethos of the Roman Rite and its musical traditions - the point I actually made, rather than the Aunt Sally you chose to target.
  • G
    Posts: 1,397
    Here's the choice:

    COME AS YOU ARE
    ...
    COME AS YOU WOULD LIKE TO BE
    How brilliantly succinct!

    (Save the Liturgy, Save the World)
  • vincentuher
    Posts: 134
    There is a book published by the Canterbury Press Norwich that is a new edition of what was "The New St. Paul Psalter". The new title is simply "An Anglican Psalter" edited by John Scott. I believe this is the version used at St. Thomas in New York City. The current edition has a fairly good historical preface and the tunes are very much drawn from the best of the standard repertoire. Look at the Hymnal 1940 of the Episcopalians as some of those Anglican chants may be known by your new congregation if the 1982 ones are unfamiliar.

    If you can find it, there is an old book published by H.W. Gray in 1927 called "The Choral Service" -- while much of it is plainchant at the very end one finds included Tallis' four part settings of various parts of Morning Prayer and Holy Communion. They are little gems.

    There are also the oldest Anglican Chants -- four part harmonisation of Gregorian tones -- but I think the only one used with any regularity is the Anglican Chant based on Tonus Peregrinus. But at the moment I cannot think of a particular title to look for those.

    As someone whose childhood and youth was filled with Anglican Chant, let me share the one rule we had to learn: sing Anglican Chant the way the choir director tells you to ... and no grousing... or something like that.

    I do like the Anglican Chant recordings of the Gloriae Dei Cantores for a USA recording series, and there is also Wilcocks complete set out there. Best wishes on your new post!
  • Adam WoodAdam Wood
    Posts: 6,451
    Sir David Wilcocks?
    I met him when I was in college.

    Anyway- Thanks for the info, and for getting this thread back on track.

    Anymore Anglican music tidbits out there?
  • vincentuher
    Posts: 134
    The Scottish Chant Gloria (found in the Hymnal 1940) is a warhorse of a sort. The positive side is that most U.S. Episcopalians know it, the down side ... they want it sung every Sunday. But if you are trying to build a Sunday Mass template with Anglican Chant, the Scottish Gloria could be very useful. (There is possibly a version in the 1982 Hymnal ... but I am a liturgical dinosaur so I prefer the way Canon Douglas pointed it.)

    Bishop Matthew Parker's tune book and Merbecke's The Book of Common Prayer Noted are of historical interest and some tunes in the wee book may prove useful to you. On the Merbecke you will find one realisation by Canon Douglas in the Hymnal 1940, and there is another in the Hymnal 1982 by Dr. Bruce Ford ... if I recall correctly.

    The red Canadian hymn book printed jointly with the United Church had a section of some useful Anglican Chants. This would be the book printed before "Voices United" or "Common Praise"(Canada). Copies show up on Ebay from time to time.

    Also, Healy Willan provided settings for the introits etc then in use by what is now the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod, and they can be employed successfully when using the 1928 or 1962 Book of Common Prayer. I am not sure of what use they would be in a Rite II Episcopalian Mass using the Revised Common Lectionary. But one never knows. I think they remain useful compositions for all of us to consider.

    Church of the Incarnation in the Episcopal Diocese of Dallas used to sing Anglican Chant very well. Perhaps checking with their musical stuff would provide some helpful information.
  • vincentuher
    Posts: 134
    One final thought: the Hymnal 1982 provides simplified Anglican chant tones for the psalter that I do not find uniformly useful. A few are good for the recital of the psalms with one or two of the simplified settings being very useful and a couple ... let's just say some of them tend to be ignored.

    (Just a final thought to say my prayers are with Ken Knott, a man with a good heart and a vast knowledge of this literature. May God be merciful to Ken, and bless him. Amen.)
  • IanWIanW
    Posts: 756
    Adam,

    An enjoyable option is to write Anglican chant yourself. If you were to follow the advice given here to immerse youself in its sound world with the support of chant books this would be no more difficult then any 4-voice pastiche exercise, and technically easier than many.
  • Adam WoodAdam Wood
    Posts: 6,451
    Got an email from a priest-in-residence (not leadership) asking if I had any experience with folk music, and wondering if we could do a folk Mass....

    My rebuttal:
    1. No.
    2. I've already added some contemporary music to the mix.
    3. No.
    4. The choir had a hell of a time with syncopation in an easy Dan Schutte song. You want us to do what?
    5. No, no , no.
    6. We have no guitar players. I've asked the congregation on multiple occasion if we had any instrumentalists. Result: two clarinet players and a teenage saxophoner. Oi.
    7. Still, No.
    8. Young people think folk music is old fashioned. Even if we decide contemporary music is the way to go, folk music is far from contemporary.
    9. umm...... no.
    10. Yeah- I like it too. But it isn't about me. Or you.
    11. Oh, hell no!

    I was a little more pastoral than that, of course. The priest-in-charge (pastor? rector?) was CC'ed on everything. His response: "I agree with you, Adam. Keep up the good work."
  • Charles in CenCA
    Posts: 2,416
    Adam, I always enjoy your posts. Style!
    You might want to brush up your reading of WHEN SHEEP ATTACK tho'.
  • Adam WoodAdam Wood
    Posts: 6,451
    Thanks! You should go to the Latin Novus Ordo thread and play up my clever acronyms for types of folk masses. I worked hard on that, and it got so little attention.

    To your "Sheep attacking" point...
    As far as I can tell, everyone likes what I'm doing. (That can change in a second, I know- but for now...)
    My preference for a wide mix of music across styles and periods, while somewhat dubious in a Catholic setting, works very well in an Episcopalian parish. The funny thing about that, though, is I am as likely to be accused of being a High Church Triumphalist and boring fuddy-duddy traddie as I am of being labelled a hippie praise-bander.
    Considering that the bulk of the "new" (for them) music I've brought in (not that much, anyway) has come from the Contemp. Catholic or the Protestant Praise & Worship genre, I found it odd that I got a "let's do folk music" email before I got a "what happened to our traditional music" email. (Although I think doing Gregorian chant seriously tarnishes my Contemporary Street Cred)

    Anywho....
    It's a fun job. I just have to keep reminding myself that they're damned heretics. :)
  • noel jones, aagonoel jones, aago
    Posts: 6,605
    Adam,

    The problem is not everyone. The problem is one, two or three who gather together to squelch the good work of creative people.

    You are in the classic situation of When Sheep Attack. Immediately get When Sheep Attack and make an appointment to meet with your pastor within 7 days, giving you enough time to get it (amazon ships fast), read it and be able to explain it to him as you hand him the book, scheduling an appointment then a few days later to meet again with him and then sign the agreements that the book recommends...between the two of you, and at that point he will probably require the rest of the staff...and maybe the vestry to also sign the agreements.

    If you choose to ignore this advice, you and the pastor may find yourselves sitting on the street corner outside the church in which you find yourselves both no longer welcome and no longer employed. Having done nothing wrong....rather you were doing everything right.

    In the process you both may find your careers stifled as well when you seek future employment due to what happens in the second phase of the Sheep Attack that is already underway in the parish.

    A Classic Example - MARK MY WORDS!
  • Adam WoodAdam Wood
    Posts: 6,451
    You're right, of course- it only takes a few agitators (isn't that how we got the Reformation?)
    I'll read the book and stay on guard.
  • noel jones, aagonoel jones, aago
    Posts: 6,605
    You cannot guard against this, you must take action now, because they are already acting against you.

    I will guarantee that there are people at the parish who reading what you and I are writing right now.
  • eft94530eft94530
    Posts: 1,577
    odd that I got a "let's do folk music" email

    Not odd at all.
    See Galatians 6:8
  • Adam WoodAdam Wood
    Posts: 6,451
    For the curious... a few days after that email exchange, I was at dinner with the Senior Warden, who said that the Vestry had discussed my email (I forward everything). They thought it was awesome, and that everything I'm doing is "perfect."

    And then...

    Got this email from the Pastor (Rector?)
    are great with your direction and development of the choir, the congregation and the music, itself. I really believe you and Nikkie were sent by God. Thanks for making Sunday a joyful experience...I look forward to hearing more each Sunday....and I am putting in for an increase for you and also need to know from you what your financial needs for music, etc would be for 2011. Thanks for being there!
    Fr. Vernon


    Other than he spelled my wife's name wrong (it's Nikky), that was great!
    And a budget! Woo hoo! I can buy Kevin Allen motets!! (Really, that will be my first purchase).
  • Fradgan
    Posts: 1
    This has been a wonderful and informative series of posts, but I am still left with a frustrating lack of information.

    I am a fan of Anglican Chant. Our local Compline Choir wants to provide the chant during the ordination of an Episcopal priest, but are unable to locate any resources that would guide anyone attempting to do so? Any leads?
  • dboothe
    Posts: 31
    There are many Anglican chant psalters around. Be sure you know what translation of the Psalms you should use. Most Episcopalians use the 1979 Book of Common Prayer, which is modern English. C of E and other provinces use the Coverdale translation (Tudor English) It makes a big difference in the pointing. Here are a few psalters:

    The Anglican Chant Psalter, Alec Wyton, ed., Church Publishing; ISBN: 978-0898691351 (79 BCP, has a good introduction with basic instruction)

    The Psalms of David, George Guest, ed., Paraclete Press; ISBN: 978-1612610702 (Coverdale)

    John Speller's Online Psalter (79 BCP)

    The Cathedral Psalter (Coverdale)

    Hope this helps.

    dB
    Thanked by 2Adam Wood Roborgelmeister
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