How Many 'Alleluias' should a Gospel Acclamation Embody?
  • francis
    Posts: 10,668
    Hi All:

    I see Gospel Acclamations with varied numbers of 'Alleluias'. Should it embody two, three or more Alleluias? What is tradition? How did it develop? Is this flexible?

    (calling Dr. Mahrt... I suspect you would be knowledgeable about this one)
  • M. Jackson Osborn
    Posts: 8,368
    Answer: ONE before and ONE after the Verse.

    There are some nice options when wishing to abide by the historic number of Alleluyas (ONE) for celebrations other than the Easter Vigil, which alone is and should be graced with three. They include -
    >The Anglican Use Gradual.
    >One of the Alleluyas found in the back of Graduale Romanum for use with Introits, singing the Verse to the appropriate psalm tone.
    >A carefully chosen and not too difficult specimen from the various propers, singing the verse to the appropriate psalm tone.
    Using this last option, if one were determined he could repeat one of the Alleluyas from the proper for several months and the congregation would know it. One could be chosen for each liturgical season.

    The above is assuming that weekly usage of the proper Propers from Graduale Romanum or the Plainchant Gradual of Palmer-Burgess is not practicable.

    Other than that tiresome and over-used triple alleluya from the hymn O filii et filliae it would seem that the plethora of multiple alleluyas is the result of publishers' marketing of ditties made out of sacred texts, it being rather difficult to make a really successful & catchy ditty out of one alleluya; or out of one Great Amen or one anything. When honest liturgy is not enough Hollywoodization takes over.
  • Mark P.
    Posts: 248
    I thought that the new Graduale Romanum wants you to sing the Alleluia completely twice before the verse and once afterwards.
  • Steve CollinsSteve Collins
    Posts: 1,021
    Traditionally, the Alleluia is 'intoned' just up to the quarter-bar, then the schola/congregation repeats the Alleluia in its entirety. Then it is repeated after the verse has been chanted, no matter what style of chanting is used for the verse.
  • Mark P.
    Posts: 248
    @Steve Collins. I know that's the traditional practice. I believe that the 1974 edition of the GR wants the whole thing sung through twice before the verse--once as an intonation to be taken up by cantors and the repeat to be sung by the entire schola. I found an English-language version of the introduction/rubrics to the GR in Robert Hayburn's "Papal Legislation on Sacred Music."
  • Steve CollinsSteve Collins
    Posts: 1,021
    Maybe so. But I really don't like that idea. There are a number of supposedly simple changes in minutiae like this that just fly in the face of logical tradition. The long melisma is called a "jubilus" (a joyful work song without text) and is a meditation on the text "ia (ya)" - the Lord's name (Alleluia = praise the Lord). It therefore makes much more sense for a group to be meditating during the singing than for the cantor (soloist) to be meditation publicly on his/her own.

    Liturgists have been using the argument that form needs to follow function for years now. Mostly they use it to shed forms that they don't see or understand (or have not been taught) the accompanying function. The jubilus has a function that defines the form, and that form stops the intonation at the quarter-bar. Period.
  • miacoyne
    Posts: 1,805
    So, if you are doing just common triple 'Alleuia' that many parishes use for OF, does it always have to be done twice, by cantor then congregation before the verse, even if it's something the congregation know very well?

    GIRM 62 says,
    "it is sung by all while standing and is led by the choir or a cantor, being repeated if this is appropriate.

    I'd like to know because during weekdays I have the schola sing only once , then verse, then everyone sings "alleuia."
  • Steve CollinsSteve Collins
    Posts: 1,021
    I really think the implication is that the congregation sings it before and after, whether it is intoned by voice or by organ introduction. Again, the 'liturgists' speak with forked tongue - decrying repetition and duplication, and yet we're stuck with a modern tradition of multiple Alleluias at every Mass and having to stand during them. This blurs the entire concept of standing, IMO. Yes, we stand to here the Word of God 'proclaimed' by the ordained minister - priest or deacon. That starts with the versicle and response 'acclamation' led by that same minister. The Alleluia is NOT the Gospel. There is not reason, via logic or etiquette for us to stand to sing it or listen to it. Except, of course, that we are to follow the new rules of the game. Now this has gone on long enough the the new form follows a new function NOT based on tradition at all!
  • Mark M.Mark M.
    Posts: 632
    I'd recommend reading a related thread, from almost two years ago. Also, you might want to inspect a brief paper written about what has essentially become the "Alleluia Simplex," so to speak.
  • francis
    Posts: 10,668
    tnx all
  • incantuincantu
    Posts: 989
    The Alleluia of the Roman Gradual is to the Gospel Acclamation as the Gradual is to the Responsorial Psalm, and their respective practices differ accordingly. It does not make sense to apply to rubric for one to the performance of the other.
  • BachLover2BachLover2
    Posts: 330
    incantu speaks the truth...besides, the greater alleluia in the extraordinary form has only a total of two alleluias...it is not the same as the lesser alleluia...
  • Steve CollinsSteve Collins
    Posts: 1,021
    The EF Mass does have 3 Alleluias, even when the priest only says them: 2 before and 1 after the verse. The tradition should remain in the OF Mass, at least when the Alleluia is used rather than the Gospel Acclamation.
  • miacoyne
    Posts: 1,805
    Maybe I'm confused, but if we sing Gospel acclamation with simple triple alleluia, alleluia is sung three times already, so if we repeat them again, it's 6 times. If the triple alleluia is used in Easter vigil, how is it done? Is the entire triple alleluia is repeated before the verse? (although it seems that triple alleluia is used at the communion.)
  • noel jones, aagonoel jones, aago
    Posts: 6,605
    Help! Steve I understand what you have written, but what do you mean at the OF "when the Alleluia is used instead of the Gospel Acclamation". Do you mean when an Alleluia from the GR is substituted for the Gospel Acclamation (alle - verse - alle?)
  • Charles in CenCA
    Posts: 2,416
    Unless we're talking about the unfortunate Hurd/Canedo "Mass of Glory" concoction GA, this thread seems a tad pedantic. I'm likely wrong again.
  • noel jones, aagonoel jones, aago
    Posts: 6,605
    Mia - based upon Steve's explanation, your schola on weekdays could sing the Alle without the IA and then have everyone sing it from the beginning including the melismatic IA, verse and then all again. This makes sense to me...as long as you are singing 1 Alleluia.
  • BachLover2BachLover2
    Posts: 330
    steve...kindly differentiate between greater alleluia and lesser alleluia...thanks
  • Steve CollinsSteve Collins
    Posts: 1,021
    Calling what we sing before the deacon/priest arrives at the pulpit/ambo the "Gospel Acclamation" is one of the few things modern liturgists have done that is at least honest, if nothing else good! For all these years the verses have been from the Graduale only during Eastertide. The rest of the time they are not. As some one already pointed out, Alleluia verses in the Graduale are typically from the Psalms. Yet our current Gospel Acclamations are mostly from the Gospels, often from the verses we are just about to hear. Talk about built in redundancy and repetition! Maybe that's why they thought we needed to stand during their singing - they are verses from the Gospel. But we used to only stand during the actual proclamation of the Gospel because it is the Word of God, the words of Christ spoken "in persona Christi".

    O used to blithely do what I was instructed to by priests and liturgists, until I woke up some time - probably while I was at Our Lady of Walsingham. Between my years there and these last years involved with the EF I have learned a lot. You cannot fathom the depths of questionable modern traditions without immersing yourself in the EF Mass.
  • miacoyne
    Posts: 1,805
    One of my homeschooling group is planning to have children's schola sing every week. The children is not ready to sing melismatic alleluia, so we sing the simple triple alleluia from PBC (Pages 84-85) with Psalm tone verse for Gospel acclamation, and I just wanted to make sure singing it without repeat before the verse is not something outside the Church's instruction and the tradition we inherited. Thank you.
  • Steve CollinsSteve Collins
    Posts: 1,021
    I think that it would be just fine, if the Alleluias before the verse were to be sung by all. This seems a simple adjustment to be made for a small group at a special Mass where they are all equally active in the singing.
  • francis
    Posts: 10,668
    OK... this has been an interesting discussion, but I was unable to glean a simple answer to my original question. Is there a tradition for two, three or even four alleluias in the composition of such from beginning to end.

    Here is what we usually do:

    intonation
    choir or cantor sings 'alleluia, alleluia, alleluia' (this is the number of alleluia's I am discussing)
    the congregation sings 'alleluia, alleluia, alleluia'
    choir or cantor sings verse
    congregation sings 'alleluia, alleluia, alleluia'

    OK ... so we sing it nine times total. So if the composition has four Alleluia's in it, we wind up singing it 12 times. Is this clearer?
  • Steve CollinsSteve Collins
    Posts: 1,021
    In that light, I don't think it makes any difference. The Celtic Alleluia uses 4 iterations for a total of 12. I think the repeat of "praise the Lord" so many times in a musical setting antiphon is OK, if it's found in an authorized Catholic book. (LOL!) The concept is to intone the antiphon, the congregation present repeat it, and then again at the end. There has always been wiggle room in musical settings of the texts of the Mass, even with an occasional work repeated in the Gloria or other parts of the Ordinary. There is a respect for the music as it stands to enhance the ceremony, even if the text is slightly altered. It also might seem that the question of singing fewer Alleluias might be to shorten the Mass - like we really have better things to do that sing all this stuff. If it's good music, fits your celebration, and has not been disallowed, I would sing it as the composer intended it.
  • SkirpRSkirpR
    Posts: 854
    This is such a pointless excercise. In the OF Mass, it does not matter. You could sing "Alleluia" 137 times in the Gospel Acclamation if that is how it is set to music. I recognize there are rubrics for the EF Mass, and there, there is the tradition of only having a threefold Alleluia at the Easter Vigil. But, in the OF Easter Vigil, there are three verses of Psalm 118 called for -- each with an additional Alleluia refrain assumed to come in between -- therefore making its own kind of threefold nature no matter how many "alleluias" are in the actual refrain.

    So as to present a unified front with this regard, if you normally use a Gregorian Alleluia at your OF Mass, use the threefold Gregorian Alleluia at your OF Easter Vigil for heightened solemnity. If you usually use some other Alleluia at your OF Mass, then use it at your OF Easter Vigil with the three verses from Psalm 118 instead of just one verse.

    As the Holy Father said, they are two different expressions of the same Rite. No need to get hung up on such minor details as these. I also dismay when the form of music written in the Renaissance (obviously for the Tridentine Mass) is butchered by modern choir directors to make them "fit" the current rubrics of the EF Mass.
  • francis
    Posts: 10,668
    ah, thank you SkirpR... that is what I was after.

    Be assured, I am not 'hung up' on anything this side of heaven. But as a composer of RCSM, I am concerned what tradition and the rubrics are for our liturgy. You can never be too careful to know your stuff, because, most of the time, the 'authorities' are either ignorant, or don't care, or worse, are out to "sing the new church into being."
  • SkirpRSkirpR
    Posts: 854
    I agree, Francis, and as a composer you were right to ask. Somehow these kinds of questions end up being sidetracked into how the OF Gospel Acclamation is different from the EF Alleluia, and what a terrible shame that is - without even answering your question!
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