Oh, look… I see you included the Latin titles of the propers! Thank you!

Am eagerly awaiting seeing the "Kyriale" section, and the rest of the front matter.

Jeffrey, I'm thinking I'm not the only one in this situation: My parish is considering various hymnals, and among the consideration is, of course, cost. At this point, do you have any idea what the pricing schedule will be?

I have not taken much of a look through this yet, but I did notice that on p. 140 (All Glory, Laud, and Honor), the R/ sign is missing from the ends of the verses. It really ought to be there. Also, the diaeresis on the e in "Bles - sëd" is also not correct. Since the second syllable has its own note, there is no danger of its being pronounced "Blest," and even if there were, the correct diacritic to indicate that the syllable should be sounded separately is not the diaeresis but the grave accent (i.e., "Bles - sèd").

Taking a further quick glance, I see you also don't have the R/ indicated on Lift High the Cross (p. 142) or Immaculate Mary (p. 157), and where you use it in Hail the Day (p. 150) and Hail, Holy Queen (p. 159) you just have "R." instead of the traditional crossed R. Couldn't you find a font that had it?

EDIT: Also, two thought about your "Notes on the Vatican II Hymnal" page:
1. You write:

Who wants to be singing the same hymn tune as Entrance Hymn during Lent, Eastertide, Ordinary Time, and Advent??!!! Nobody! This method is sheer laziness on the part of the editor, and we have avoided this method at all costs in our hymnal.

Well, no, the other reason for doing this is so that the congregation has a smaller number of hymntunes that it has to be familiar with in order to confidently sing things.

2. You also write:

The primary reason for this is because we now live in the age of Google. A person can learn everything he ever wanted to know about a hymn by typing into Google 3-4 words of any of the verses. There is absolutely no reason under the sun to include all this in a hymnal.

No. The reason is intellectual honesty and proper attribution. These are ends in themselves. It verges on dishonest to use the intellectual work of composers and translators without attribution. I'm not sure I could honestly recommend the use of a hymnal that did not at least put this information in the index.

One could also point out that there is "no reason under the sun" to put anything like "Possible use: Christmastide" at the top of Joy to the World, since anyone can just Google it and find out that it is usually sung around Christmas, which completely deflates your argument that these pointless notations absolutely must be present or else idiot music directors will have no clue how to select hymns.

MarkThompson,

which completely deflates your argument that these pointless notations absolutely must be present or else idiot music directors will have no clue how to select hymns.

I don't believe I ever said the word "idiot," nor would I, so please feel free to edit your comment accordingly. I appreciate it!

Just for the record, I am one of those "idiot music directors."

Jeff,

I'd like to second what Mark says about the directions at the top. I've mentioned it before, but this is didacticism and not nearly as helpful as a well-designed index would be. For me, the cognitive dissonance that Mark mentions dissuades me from purchasing the hymnal. Also, the pages which state that hymns "may" be used for communion, etc. end up looking like rubrics to the layman. The last things that the cause of sacred music needs are more unofficial statements that gain the status of "rubric."

***Please, please, please*** reconsider these headers and instructions and place the information in an index instead. Directors know how to use indices and multiple types of indices would be more suitable to your user-friendly purposes (e.g. by feast, by liturgical placement, scriptural reference, etc.) The very fact that your hymns have an ordering based on liturgical placement will suffice to help directors and congregation alike understand.

JD

If I'm not mistaken, in other hymnals the notation is smaller and less obtrusive, they don't generally label hymns as being for Ordinary Time, and they never label hymns by part of service (opening hymn option, recessional hymn option, etc.). It is one thing to list O Come, O Come, Emmanuel as being for "Advent," and rather another to list Praise to the Lord, the Almighty as being for Ordinary Time, and for the entrance hymn.

If you are really wedded to having these notations, I would suggest the following changes: (1) do not designate hymns as being for Ordinary Time, (2) do not designate hymns as being for the entrance or recessional, (3) "Communion hymn option" hymns could probably be listed in a section called "Eucharistic hymns" without forcing upon people your judgment that these are the ones for Communion, and (4) cut the size of the font you are using in half. Why must it be gigantic?

I agree with Mark about the way to modify the headings so that they are less assertive. While it is understandable to identify seasonal appropriateness, to overly dictate the likely or reasonable use of hymns could be problematic. We are trying very hard to get people to sing beautiful hymns in place of substandard ditties, so there should not be too much assertiveness -- even with the intention of being helpful -- that might create what someone (Mark?) called cognitive dissonance.

That is, your hymn selections are applauded, and your choice to have headers is acknowledged, but shouldn't the "recommended for" apparatus be downplayed somewhat?

Notes on Hymn 107:

(1) The use of capital letters at the onset of phrases is not consistent. "Though the eye of sinful man" has a capital T, while "only Thou art holy" does not get a capital O. Each is the start of a poetical line; neither is the start of the sentence, so the different treatment is puzzling.

(2) verse 1: As Mark observed for Hymn 140, the diaeresis is for marking a syllable break between two vowels, in words such as "naïve" and names such as "Chloë". (Source: Fowler's Modern English Usage). Therefore the diaeresis on "bless-ed" is not needed.

(3) verse 2: "All saints adore thee". The editions I can find give this as "All the saints adore thee". Is there a reason for omitting the "the"?

Some minor points:

On O Sanctissima, you might consider making the Latin verse #1, and the English verse #2. This would be consistent with some of the Latin hymns that follow.

For Pange Lingua (p. 166), would you consider setting the text to the "Tantum Ergo" tune? (Or will you already have this in the Holy Thursday section?)

When you make reference to Stuttgart on p. 125, would you consider giving a page reference for that, too?

The word "Ascensiontide" seems awkward to me.

Jeff,

Again, I quite agree with Mark on the matter of headings. In many hymnals, I've seen a single word description of the season on the lower exterior corner of the page and this can be helpful when flipping through the hymnal to delineate the hymns to the eye if choosing to use a non-indexical method of searching. The placement of the headers in the current edition is very prominent and contains more text than what is needed to accomplish this purpose. I think that your recommendations of liturgical placement can be useful to the busy music director, but I think they would be most helpful when included in an index.

Regarding my comments vis-a-vis "rubrics," I am quite interested in the hymnal precisely because of its inclusion of the antiphon texts. My comment meant to highlight my opinion that the rubrical sounding nature of the instructions contradicts the clarity with which the hymnal preferences the texts of the antiphons. Indeed, the concept of this hymnal will, I think, prove to be a force with which to be reckoned, and I hope for the highest quality possible in such a noble project.

One other point that I'm not aware has been discussed - is it possible to provide purchasers of the hymnal with a year (or several year) calendar for the feast in the three-year cycle to which the calendar date corresponds (sort of like the small ordos provided for the LOH)?

For example:
May 8, 2011 - 3rd Sunday of Easter, Year A
May 15, 2011 - 4th Sunday of Easter, Year A
etc.

Such a calendar could perhaps be tacked to the inside cover so that the user would know exactly which page to look at for the readings and antiphon texts and could be changed at the beginning of the new year. I know that in my parish we do not hand out the bulletin before Mass (lest people miss the homily for reading the church news) and thus do not have a discreet (i.e. non-verbal announcement) method for announcing that it is, for example, the 21st Sunday in Ordinary time, year A. Certainly I can make such a calendar myself, but I'm wondering if other parishes mightn't be in need of the same thing. Priests and congregants are used to throw-away missals that identify the day with a calendar date followed by the liturgical feast and might find always knowing the current feastday a bit bothersome (even if doing so would be good for the soul...)

JD

Notes on Hymn 108:
verse 2: "jubilation" needs a hyphen at the line break.
verse 3: To capitalize "sacred" here looks like an idiosyncrasy. (I think it's a habit of Jeff's.)
(What is the source for verse 3?)

Notes on Hymn 115:

verse 3: "white-robed" should be hyphenated, but isn't.
verse 5: "Thou has" should be "Thou hast".
verse 6: The verse number "6." should be aligned with the text.

Jeff,

As an addendum to what Mark and Jenny are saying, have you a copy of Worship III nearby? Two things about it that I found superior to any other Catholic hymnal: 1) the seasonal descriptors on each page are VERY discreet (actually on the side of the page closest to the binding!); 2) the indexes are complete! This would be the place for the advisories for communion hymns, etc. (aka a topical and liturgical index) I can't tell you (also) how crucial a scriptural index to the hymn tunes is, in addition to (of course) tunes, composers, metrical index, etc. The scriptural index is also very educational: one can instantly see the liturgical context in which something might be appropriate.

For example, take Wesley's "Christ the Lord is Ris'n Today". It is astounding how artfully he combines scriptural quotes to make up a coherent verse in the hymn (see citations here: http://www.hymnary.org/hymn/PsH/388). If one is going to have hymnody in a Mass, I think this is at least an important idea to think. Sometimes it's a stretch, but having "Lift High the Cross" as the entrance hymn for Holy Thursday is better than something random that has no relation at all to the introit.

A final idea: perhaps if the context headings are that important to you (and you'd like to retain them in the current mode) then you could make an "accompaniment editioN" or something like that targeted to the music directors. It could have all that information and yet allow a pew resource to look less cluttered. You could also put descants and other useful things in the accomp. edition.

Notes on Hymn 118:
The author's name is Hellriegel (note spelling).

verse 3: The comma after "sing" interrupts the phrase; you're better off dropping it.

The original text of the hymn, "O God, Our Help", was "Our God, Our Help in Ages Past". It was John Wesley who changed Isaac Watts' poetry. I would urge that the Vatican II hymnal restore the original text. A few daring hymn books have done so. That one word changes the entire slant of the text. The great hymnologist, Erik Routley, was a strong advocate for this correction.

I appreciate all this info.

In light of these helpful comments, it definitely seems appropriate to "shrink" the size of the headers.

God bless !

Regarding "Our God, Our Help in Ages Past": John Wesley altered the text for his Collection of Psalms and Hymns (1738), and made a few more revisions for his 1780 hymnal, A Collection of Hymns for the Use of the People Called Methodists.

The most noticeable change was to substitute “O” for the original “Our” in the opening line. Wesley felt that “Our” was a possessive adjective referring to the Calvinist doctrine of election. The Wesleyan all-inclusive perspective was satisfied by changing “Our” to the more ambiguous “O.”

While satisfying a theological problem for Wesley, the substitution of “O” for “Our” in the first line destroys the wonderful anaphora of the first stanza—repeating the same word at the beginning of each phrase (Erik Routley)

I don't know if this is intentional or not, but the header graphic before each Sunday with the letter of the cycle year changes starting the first Sunday in Ordinary Time. Everything prior to that is scrolled, but starting with oridnary time, the A, B, and Cs are a different font.

Notes on Hymn 122:

verse 2:
(1) The author's original version, used by many hymnals, has "Blooming meadow" and also "Chanting bird and flowing fountain". See page 232.

verse 4:
(2) The comma after "Ever singing" can be dropped, and it would be a good idea: there's no need for the singers to pause at that point.

Notes on Hymn 124:

From what source does this version of the text come? It's unfamiliar at several points, and one English verse is missing (between "Wisdom" and "thou Rod").

verse 3:
(1) The verb "orders" should agree with "thou": "who ord'rest all things"

Notes on Hymn 126:

verse 1:
(1) It's probably best to use a capital V in "virgin's Son".

Notes on Hymn 129:

verse 1:
(1) "faith-ful" needs a hyphen.

verses 5-6:
(2) I wonder about the accent marks in the Latin verses. While they are not part of the Latin text, they are added in liturgical books to indicate the correct placement of the word accent. I've never seen them used in hymnals.

verse 6:
(3) Add a comma after "genitum".

music for verses 4-6:
(4) On "Jesus, to Thee be glory giv'n": the notes on "thee" need a slur. The notes on "be" could use a dotted slur, similar to those used in Hymn 133.

Notes for Hymn 131:

verse 2:
(1) "bless-ed": no diaeresis.

verse 3:
(2) "rejoiced", "blessed": no diaeresis.

(3) Troublesome text: "And went to Bethlehem straightway" is a mouthful. Given that verse 3 also tries to rhyme "much in mind" with "storm and wind", it may be best to drop the verse.

I find the layout of the hymns to be so problematic that I feel participating further would be counter-productive. There are other matters of taste I'd quibble over here and there (like the unhelpful bar lines in the responsorial psalms); but, by and large, everything else in the hymnal is spot on. If future editions come out that have hymns in conventional notation, I'll be all over it like white on rice.

That's a pretty good indicator that time signatures aren't really necessary.

JMO

Will there be a Pew and Choir version with four part harmony of the hymns?

I am making suggestions for My parish choir to the Music Director, and he want to insure the Hymns are four part.

Thanks,

David Deavy