choir

[water]

Hello,

Which non/denomination church has choir in which its members sing really loud and moving side by side with clapping sometime.

I once when to this Catholic church, all of a sudden we had choir like described above - few months later, there was a huge decline in people going to the church. Later, the choir was gone.

Thanks!

 

[Della]

Pentecostal churches have choirs like these. And the movie Sister Act inspired many a parish choir to try to imitate it. But, it usually doesn’t work well for the Mass because the Mass isn’t about us and our emotions, but about worshiping God in word and sacrament.

Our parish tried such a choir for a while, but it was soon gone. It was funny to see our white, German heritage people trying to sound like a black Pentecostal choir. They couldn’t pull it off and the congregation was completely lost as to what they were supposed to be signing.

 

[asquared]

my dad belonged to a Catholic Church in Detroit for a few years which included a large number of the former congregation of a black protestant congregation, who had converted along with their pastor. They brought their gospel choir with them and the music at that parish was great, in that style of singing. This parish was downtown close to his work, and also where he attended cursillo, so there was a strong charismatic element as well, and the congregation was 2/3 black, 1/3 Hispanic and other whites. Music had to be experienced to be believed, the Easter Vigil we attended there was sublime. I can still hear the deacon with the Paul Robeson voice singing the Exaltet.

 

[CarolAnnSFO]

At the church in the town my parents used to live in, they had a choir like this visiting one Sunday, and doing the singing. It really woke the people up. By the way, it was a choir from a Catholic church, with a predominantly African-American congregation.

 

[Hellisreal]

This is a good find. Thank you for this thread!

My child loves Gregorian Chant and sways side to side, and is participating in the Mass more than I thought was possible before seeing that.

 

[water]

my dad belonged to a Catholic Church in Detroit for a few years which included a large number of the former congregation of a black protestant congregation, who had converted along with their pastor. They brought their gospel choir with them and the music at that parish was great, in that style of singing. This parish was downtown close to his work, and also where he attended cursillo, so there was a strong charismatic element as well, and the congregation was 2/3 black, 1/3 Hispanic and other whites. Music had to be experienced to be believed, the Easter Vigil we attended there was sublime. I can still hear the deacon with the Paul Robeson voice singing the Exaltet.

First of all, it is great to see a large number of people from another congregation converted to Catholic.

For this case, I could understand that it suits the people pretty well. For me personally, when the choir was at the Church I went to, it really gave me a very hard time to concentrate on the Mass itself.

The Gregorian Chant is beautiful and very relaxing and I love it; however, I can’t understand anything.

 

[water]

Pentecostal churches have choirs like these. And the movie Sister Act inspired many a parish choir to try to imitate it. But, it usually doesn’t work well for the Mass because the Mass isn’t about us and our emotions, but about worshiping God in word and sacrament.

Our parish tried such a choir for a while, but it was soon gone. It was funny to see our white, German heritage people trying to sound like a black Pentecostal choir. They couldn’t pull it off and the congregation was completely lost as to what they were supposed to be signing.

Thanks Della for the info.
I too watched the movie Sister Act - I really liked the movie.

 

[6YRSHOME]

In our diocese, we are pretty traditional. I have not heard anything like you describe. My parish priest is very conservative, ( He used to be a Benadictan Monk) so we are still fairly traditional. (And we are the most contemporary choir aside from the youth choir.)
As a musician, I know how hard it is to balance good Liturgy with good music. I think that music has to be in harmony with the mass, not distracting or irreverent. But it cans still be beautiful.We are always happy to learn songs that were written in this decade.
We are always wanting to do more contemporary and spiritually uplifting music at mass, but we seem to go in baby steps.

 

[Sarabande]

I am a classically-trained musician and when I did sing in church choir, it was mostly with choirs that performed Gregorian chant, polyphony, motets, etc. I also would cantor and still do cantor for the low masses at my cathedral which performs more traditional hymns.

That said, I have been to a couple masses at a church near my college which was mostly an all African-American congregation. They performed music the way the OP described. It wasn’t for me, so I never went back after a couple times, but I really appreciated the fact that they were doing things from their culture to help them with their prayer. I recently came back to that church to sing for a wedding and met the pastor. He told me that many of the people in the congregation also converted from other Protestant faiths and brought their cultural music with them. They also used a hymnal that has more Gospel music and some traditional African melodies for Catholic texts. I forget the name of the hymnal.

 

[water]

He told me that many of the people in the congregation also converted from other Protestant faiths and brought their cultural music with them. They also used a hymnal that has more Gospel music and some traditional African melodies for Catholic texts. I forget the name of the hymnal.

Thanks!