Incantu,

Consider the unofficial English translations of the chant propers in Solesmes’s “Gregorian Missal”. For that matter, many of the antiphons in the current Sacramentary are indeed translations of the Graduale antiphons, and as I recall, they generally are well-done translations.

Also, I believe Fr. Weber’s work may have come at least partly from the Missal antiphons rather than from those in the Graduale.

Additional resources you might consider under “option 1.1” are collections like James Biery’s communion antiphon sets for Advent and Lent, published by Morningstar. (Be aware that he mixes and matches antiphons from the Graduale and Missal.) WLP has a handful of them, too, for the same seasons, by Charles Thatcher.

Psallite froom The Liturgical Press would go, I believe, under option 3. Also under option 3 would go other Graduale antiphons/psalms from the same season; the rubrics in the Ordo cantus Missæ do allow, as Ruff has pointed out, for the use of, say, any Lenten introit at any Lenten Mass. I personally don’t think this was such a great idea, and they would have done better to designate a handful of seasonal propers from the Graduale Romanum--similar to how they did designate 7 or so communions for use “ad libitum”.

Thank you for your suggestions, Felipe, but for the purposes of this project, I am looking for chant resources only (ruling out the Biery antiphons as well as Psallite). I wonder if anyone is familiar with the English Gradual v. 2 published by RSCM. I know the Anglican Use Gradual "draws heavily" from this work, but I'm not sure in what way. The latter volume has mostly psalm-tone settings but also contains a handful of full melismatic chants. I don't know if the melismatic versions were taken from the English Gradual or the Plainsong Gradual or if they were newly edited.

With some trepidation, I pose the following question:

Quoth Dr. Ford:

Psallite's communion texts are from the Graduale Romanum wherever the Graduale text reflects the deepest theology of the communion song of the ancient Sunday gradual: the gospel communion (because communion is the fruit of the proclaimed word, especially the gospel, the communion song ideally "quotes" the proclaimed word, especially the gospel).

Where I see this concept breaking down is:

• Aren’t the psalmic communions actually older?
• Most of the Advent and Christmas communions are from the Old Testament, yet ISTM they stand on an equal footing with the idea of quoting the day’s gospel.

Snappy!

Speaking of Broadway, should the psalm at mass (the second link above) really remind me of this song?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-r2xXtSsPV0

ACK!

Yes, I agree. I sort of like the piece! It is so much better than the link above it. It has conviction and groove and authencity.

For Mass? No way.

Jeffrey, thank you for your candor and for praising Psallite's method of antiphon and psalm.

I'd like to hear further from you about your objections to some of the textual material in the online samples.

I will also agree with you about some of the musical styles, which don't appeal to me either.

Perhaps you were working quickly and only found samples that were very much not to your taste.

May I offer you and our members other samples? (Please remember that the five members of the Collegeville Composers Group are the singers and only Father Cyprian Consiglio, OSB Cam, is a professional singer.)

"Seek the Lord," a setting of Psalm 105:1-5 and a version of the Laetetur Cor Quaerentium Dominum. Notice how the translation, "seek/long for/search," delivers the yearning the three uses of quaerere of the original Laetetur cor quaerentium Dominum: quaerite Dominum, et confirmamini: quaerite faciem eius semper. It also provides the semper. This can be used as the entrance song for the 4th Sunday in Years A and B, the 26th Sunday in Year C, the 30th Sunday in Years A, B, and C, and the 2nd Sunday in Lent A, B, and C

"Lord, cleanse my heart," a setting of Psalm 51, used as a responsorial after the seventh reading at the Easter Vigil and for the 5th Sunday in Lent B, and useful for many other occasions as well.

"Love bears all things," a setting of 1 Cor 13:7 (with verses from John 15:16-17; 1 Corinthians 13:4-5a, 13, 8a; 14:1a), a communion song for Table for the 4th Sunday in Year C, as well as for Christian Initiation, Baptism, Confirmation, Marriage, and Pastoral Care of the Sick

"For you my soul is thirsting," a setting of Psalm 63, used as a responsorial for the 22nd and 32nd Sundays of Year A and the 12th Sunday of Year C, and useful for many other occasions as well.
Blessings,
Paul

incantu says

I have looked at and listened to the Psallite samples that are provided on the site. I simply don't see the connection between the texts, which seem to have been written as "lyrics" more than prose, and those of the Gradual.

Dear incantu,

I believe I was careful to explain that the texts of the songs for the week/day, the entrance chants of the Psallite Project, are largely from the Graduale Romanum.

Beginning with the First Sunday of Advent I will be publishing on The Liturgical Press website a detailed Sunday-by-Sunday, song-by-song commentary referencing, among other things, the sources for the texts and the tunes in Psallite.

Blessings,
Paul

Fr. Ford, I'm pleased at your response of course, which is so magnanimous, a model of how to deal with strong criticism. I'm listening to the first link and I like it very much. I suspected that there is diversity of music here and hence my caveat. That said, It is still not something I'm drawn to simply because I detect too much popular song in here among the rhythms and chords. These days, even hints of this style carries so much baggage of the past when so many have been traumatized by the introduction of far more extreme examples in liturgy. A clean break from this approach seems called for given the current context when so many are aching for links to a more extended aesthetic order along the lines of what plainsong provides.

Paul,

Thanks for posting these samples. They give a more complete picture than the ones I was able to find last time I visited the Psallite site. My previous comment about "singing accompanied music without accompaniment" was prompted by the fact that, to my ear, the antiphons sounded as if the accompaniment of a song had simply been removed. Imagine "Here I Am, Lord" without piano or guitar. The vocal line would fall flat during the two measure interludes where the only musical interest lies in chords changing above a bass pedal. The vocal lines of some of the Psallite antiphons not only seemed to have an implied harmony, but they seemed rather to be derived from a chordal harmony, as if they had been composed on a guitar, or at the piano. Without harmonic support they just don't seem to "work."

In your first example, though, "Seek the Lord," the modal quality gives a feeling of independance to the vocal line, which comes to a satisfying cadence. My only criticism with this one is that the verse seems to consist of an antecendent phrase (made up of two shorter phrases with spontaneous choral interjections) without a consequent phrase. It sounds incomplete.

The sample given for year A is "Now is the hour," based on the French carol "Berger secoue ton sommeil profond." The tune has been awkwardly truncated, so that the secondary dominant in the third measure is not brought to a satifying close by the two measure phrase that follows it. Even if one doesn't know the original melody, this adaptation still sounds incomplete.

Although I wouldn't use them personally, I do think the selections you posted would be a step forward for many parishes, and an easy pill to swallow at that. If the collection is successful, I hope it will encourage other composers to provide similar resources. If there is a market for music inspired by the propers, perhaps publishers will start promoting collections of psalms and antiphons instead os hymns and songs. However, if the goal of Psallite is to provide an English alternative to the Roman Gradual (as By Flowing Waters successfully does for the Simple Gradual), I think it misses the mark.