Advent Selections...

Advent and Christmas are two of my favorite Liturgical Seasons. There are many reasons that this is so...nostalgia of my childhood (which was filled with wonderful memories at Christmas), the beautiful decorations, etc. Also quite important to me is the overarching feeling of hope the entire world feels. For some it is merely a hope for an end to war and hope for a perfect peace that, as utopian as it may be, almost seems possible during the month of December.

With that said, what keeps me eternally excited about Advent and Christmas again coming around in the ever-circling seasons is the music. There is so much beautiful Advent and Christmas music that sometimes I find myself trying to "overdo it" in programming. My suggestion, then, is to focus on one more difficult piece during Advent to allow more work on what will undoubtedly be a more involved Christmas Mass. Allow me to share my programming for Advent:

1st Sunday of Advent: "Sleepers Wake" (Wachet Auf) by Felix Mendelssohn. CPDL also has it available in the original German. This is a chorale from Mendelssohn's "St. Paul Oratorio". It is effective, short, and simple. For those who direct non-Catholic choirs that don't require simplicity of instruments during Advent, there are also parts for three trumpets. Catholic choirs can easily make use of the trumpet solo stop on the organ.

2nd Sunday of Advent: "This is the Record of John" by Orlando Gibbons. This is a traditional "verse anthem" that is great to introduce your choir to polyphony. It is accompanied by the organ and the soloist (generally alto, but there's also an edition pitched a minor third lower that has the solo for a tenor) carries half the weight of the piece, which cuts back on rehearsal time. The second Sunday of Advent is traditionally "Baptist Sunday", recounting the story of St. John the Baptist, so this piece is an excellent yearly regular.

3rd Sunday of Advent: "Veni Emanuel" arranged by modern German Composer Christoph Dalitz. This piece is simple, but a great way to work on proper plainsong singing with your choir. It's a tune they know, so more time can be spent on technique. This is as early as I will program this text (which, in English, is "O Come, O Come Emanuel"). The verses from this ancient hymn are the traditional "O" antiphons, which are antiphons attached to the Magnificat for Vespers from December 17th thru December 23rd. While even the 3rd Sunday of Advent sometimes falls before Dec. 17th, it is generally close. However, far too often the moment the Advent Purple comes out, "O Come O Come Emanuel" starts being sung. It simply doesn't fit in the first half of Advent.

On a side note, the third Sunday of Advent is traditionally called "Gaudete Sunday". This from the text of the Introit for the day: "Gaudete Ierusalem!" "Rejoice Jerusalem!". This piece is then particularly proper as the refrain continuously repeats "Gaude! Gaude!". The tone of the Advent season takes a decisive shift today. The texts become more intense about our need for a savior. We move from thinking about Christ's coming in the past to thinking about his future coming. Advent, after all, isn't merely a time to prepare for Christmas, but a time to prepare for Christ's coming for the final time, both at the end of time, as well as our own personal end. To mark this shift, we take a moment from our penitential tone to "rejoice"! While the rest of the season refrains from any instrumental solo music, today the organ may be played without restraint.

4th Sunday of Advent: "Ave Maria" by Jacob Arcadelt. The fourth Sunday of Advent tends to be Marian in character, generally including the gospel reading about either the Annunciation or Mary proclaiming her Magnificat. This setting of the Ave Maria is actually based on a madrigal written by Archadelt and arranged by French composer Pierre-Louis Dietsch. It is simple and homophonic, giving you plenty of times to focus on the Christmas Holiday, which is merely days away.

In the next post, we'll take a look at the much anticipated Christmas Season...

Musically speaking...

For those of my colleagues who have yet to discover the Choral Public Domain Library (henceforth in this blog referred to as CPDL), I suggest you become intimately familiar with it quickly.

For too long, one of the biggest obstacles to (or excuses for not) building a quality music program in a church is the cost of purchasing the music. http://www.cpdl.org has thousands upon thousands of wonderful scores that have entered the public domain, and I will cite it very regularly in the "Musically speaking" posts. All of these scores are free to print and copy.

In these latter days of Ordinary Time, as we begin to ponder the inevitable final days of Earth's existence, there are many choral pieces to choose from.

One text that is rarely used anymore, but that is quite appropriate to this time of year is Estote fortes in bello. The translation is below:

Be valiant in war
and fight the ancient serpent
and you shall enter the everlasting kingdom.
Alleluia.

The text is strongly militant, which could well be why it is rarely used and nearly never set to music any longer, but the texts of the orations and readings describe the Church in a struggle against evil and the eventual victory.

There are two fairly well known settings of the text, neither of which is painfully difficult. One by Victoria and one by Italian composer Luca Marenzio, who was far more renowned for his madrigals than his sacred music.

For those choirs with limited resources, consider Palestrina's Jesu Rex Admirabilis, a lovely simple motet for SAB Choir.

For many parishes, November is "Stewardship month". Now, I am not at all a fan of making the entire Mass focus on stewardship. Frankly, a nicely-worded homily does just fine. However, for those parishes that simply must have music that talks about stewardship, there's no reason to not have quality music. Consider Christopher Tye's Give Almes of Thy Goods. The piece is simple, lovely, and easily fits into the "stewardship" category.

If you are ever looking for a piece for a particular topic, event, or scriptural reference, please always feel free to email me at adam@starofthesea.net and I'll address it on a future post as well as directly.

Liturgy imitates life...

As we come to the end of the liturgical year, have you noticed that the tone of the readings and the orations of the Mass have started to shift? Check out this coming Sunday's first reading from Malachi:

Lo, the day is coming, blazing like an oven,
when all the proud and all evildoers will be stubble,
and the day that is coming will set them on fire,
leaving them neither root nor branch,
says the LORD of hosts.

Intense, eh? The Church liturgical year mirrors the life of the Church from beginning to end. In the beginning of Advent, we reflect on our need for a savior. In the latter days of Advent, particularly from December 17th to December 23rd, the readings and prayers become more and more intense, as we declare our need, nearly demanding a savior, until we finally enter the peaceful joy of Christmas.

The days of Lent and Easter lead us into a deep reflection into the ministry of Christ, particularly in the establishing of the Paschal Mystery. The physical seasons reflect the mystery of death and resurrection as we proceed from the darkness of winter to the new life of spring. The sixth century poet Venantius Fortunatus wrote a beautiful piece of poetry which was translated into English and set to music by Ralph Vaughn Williams called Salve Festa Dies or Hail Thee, Festival Day. In it he captures this reality very well when he writes:

"Lo, the fair beauty of earth

from the death of the winter arising.

Every good gift of the year

now with its master returns!"

You can see how well the ancient poet connected the divine with the terrestrial, seeing in the terrestrial a prefigurement of a divine reality. In the days of Advent, Christmas, Lent, and Easter, we see our sacred past; the revelation of Christ as Messiah and the initiation of the salvific act.

The summer can be easy to just think of as a disjointed bunch of readings that can be difficult to connect together, but nothing could be further from the truth. In the liturgical days of summer/early fall, we see represented where we find ourselves in this period of time. We see the readings and prayers focused on the Eucharist, proclaiming the Kingdom of God to the far reaches of the world.

Now we reach late fall; November to be precise. The readings and orations become more apocalyptic. As we come to the yearly end of our liturgical life, as well as the seasonal end of the earth in its vegetation and harvest, we reflect on the end of the world and the second coming of Christ; the final end. We reflect on the reality that too many of us prefer not to consider: that we are going to die. It is no wonder that the Church focuses so much attention to the faithful departed during this month.

While the readings and orations seem, on the surface, to discuss the final judgement at the destruction of the world, there is a very good chance that the final judgement that we all first experience will be our own particular judgement.

In the end, we reach the celebration of Christ the King of the Universe; the joyful reality that, despite all of our struggles as the Church Militant (the Church on Earth) and our pain as the Church Suffering (the souls in Purgatory), if we persevere, we will ultimately reach the goal of being the Church Triumphant, rejoicing with the saints, in the presence of the Heavenly Liturgy and its Divine Celebrant.

Yet another blog...

The Catholic blogosphere is a crowded field...so why another blog? Well, several reasons...

Even among Catholic musicians fighting the good fight (particularly younger ones), we often miss the important connection between the three topics that lie in the name of this weblog. Also connected to these are the other sacred arts (architecture, painting, writing of icons, etc). What make the sacred arts the sacred arts is that they are not simply beautiful in and of themselves. Rather, they point to the ultimate beauty, which is that reflected in the Most Holy Trinity. Although we can never fully comprehend the beauty of the Trinity, God himself provides the arts to us as a way for us, in our feeble way, to take a glimpse into the beauty that is to come.

A wonderful opportunity will be afforded us in the chance to delve into the biblical and theological aspects of the reformed Roman Liturgy. This blog will take a look at many of the re-translated orations and other prayers of the new translation of the Missale Romanum, as well as the poetry found in the Liturgia Horarum and other liturgical texts.

For my fellow choirmasters, I'll provide some repertoire suggestions...many of which are freely downloadable online.

That's what this blog will be...

But, also important is what it will not be...

We won't delve into frustrations with the prevailing state of sacred music, poetry, and liturgy. Why not? Well, two reasons. First, this blog is meant to be a chance to review in an intellectual and scholarly fashion, the beauty and the arts in the Roman Rite; to celebrate and revel what it can and should be...not to bemoan what it is not. Second, my experience has been that the best way to get rid of something is simply to ignore it.

So how can you help? Two ways in particular. First, I encourage you to comment on these pages, feeling free to agree or (charitably) disagree, suggesting additional or conflicting ideas. Second, and perhaps even more important, assist me in increasing readership by posting links to posts of interest on your social media pages, sharing them with friends, or citing this blog on your own blogs.

Enough blather...let us begin...