Inappropriate Music at Mass?

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jbuck919

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Usually, they just don’t get it right, but when they do…

Collegio di Sant’ Anselmo in Rome, 1975, Jubilee year, on pilgrimage. A perfect Good Friday service, entirely in Latin, absolutely beautiful chanting of the traditional Gregorian service by the mostly young Benedictine monks. Then they sang “Herzlich tut mich Verlangen,” a Lutheran chorale known in English as “O Sacred Head Surrounded,” in various languages on various verses. Why? WHY?

Any examples of where something was spoiled by compromise, as opposed to compromise from the get-go? I do not mean invalidation or rendering something illicit. I mean obvious aesthetic/pastoral compromise.
 
you are still obsessing about something that happened in 1975? that is the worst example if inappropriate liturgical music you can come up with? you don’t get out much, do you.
 
puzzleannie

Good catch on the date. I guess I was distracted with the song which as far as I know is a traditional Catholic hymn.

At least it is according to this site.
Hymn
 
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jbuck919:
Usually, they just don’t get it right, but when they do…

Collegio di Sant’ Anselmo in Rome, 1975, Jubilee year, on pilgrimage. A perfect Good Friday service, entirely in Latin, absolutely beautiful chanting of the traditional Gregorian service by the mostly young Benedictine monks. Then they sang “Herzlich tut mich Verlangen,” a Lutheran chorale known in English as “O Sacred Head Surrounded,” in various languages on various verses. Why? WHY?

Any examples of where something was spoiled by compromise, as opposed to compromise from the get-go? I do not mean invalidation or rendering something illicit. I mean obvious aesthetic/pastoral compromise.
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Are you sure you’ve transalated it correctly?

What id you find objectionable about the lyrics
 
I think people are missing my point. I also think that most American Catholics have been so conditioned by low standards that they perk up anytime even a single musical moment at any Mass is anything less than dreadful. Our “cousins” the Anglicans would never put up with what we have had to put up with for many, many years. If you are a trained organist and overall professional musician as I am, it is a particular continuing source of pain.

The chorale is known in German as Herzlich tut mich verlangen (My heart is ever yearning) from the opening words of its first verse. Another verse begins O Haupt voll Blut und Wunden, from which we get the common English title O Sacred Head. It may seem traditional Catholic because it was in the old St. Gregory’s Hymnal and was in fact one of (only about a dozen) hymns anybody ever sang in Catholic churches prior to Vatican II, when musical standards in the US were no higher than they are today. However, it is a Lutheran chorale, and has no place in an otherwise splendid and entirely Gregorian service.
 
I still don’t get your point. What’s objectionable about the lyrics? As long as it doesn’t contradict doctrine, what’s wrong in singing it? It doesn’t have a banal tune (or banal words for that matter).
 
Do you realise that every “approved proper song” that you sing today, was most likely an improper and non accepted song at some point in history. If you are not singing the same Jewish songs that Christ sang, every song you sing now was new and I am sure not fully accepted for many years

If the song gives Christ the glory, get over it,
 
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jbuck919:
I think people are missing my point. I also think that most American Catholics have been so conditioned by low standards that they perk up anytime even a single musical moment at any Mass is anything less than dreadful. Our “cousins” the Anglicans would never put up with what we have had to put up with for many, many years. If you are a trained organist and overall professional musician as I am, it is a particular continuing source of pain.

The chorale is known in German as Herzlich tut mich verlangen (My heart is ever yearning) from the opening words of its first verse. Another verse begins O Haupt voll Blut und Wunden, from which we get the common English title O Sacred Head. It may seem traditional Catholic because it was in the old St. Gregory’s Hymnal and was in fact one of (only about a dozen) hymns anybody ever sang in Catholic churches prior to Vatican II, when musical standards in the US were no higher than they are today. However, it is a Lutheran chorale, and has no place in an otherwise splendid and entirely Gregorian service.
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The Anglicans have some rather pressing issues of their own.

To those who are unfamiliar with the hymn, “O Sacred Head Surrounded” comes to us from J.S. Bach. It appeared in his “St. Matthew Passion” several times (unless I am mistaken, each time it is heard it is in a lower key). The music was “repurposed” and reharmonized from an earlier source (“Mein gmut est mir verwirret” by Hans Leo Hassler. I do not have the translation in front of me, but it is secular in nature). The English text is a translation of a German translation a text by St. Bernard of Clairvoux. Bach was a devout Lutheran, but this particular hymn really isn’t anti-Catholic in nature (especially given the source of the text). Most of Bach to be honest I find no objection to.

A HUGE portion of hymns that I know of are not by Catholics (my absolute favorite hymn in fact is “I bind unto myself this day” which was translated from “St. Patrick’s Lorica” by the wife of an Anglican minister and is set to music by a different Anglican. This hymn ALSO appears in the St. Gregory hymnal albeit in a highly truncated version). The music is fantastic and the text is not anti-Catholic, nor does the hymn have an anti-Catholic history (as something like “A Mighty Fortress…” does have…I was somewhat jarred when I heard that at Mass a few weeks ago).

If you are upset about the use of the Bach Chorale, why not challenge yourself to create a new setting of it. You’re a trained musician, use your gifts. Find the original text and create something new (trust me…its worth it. I complain about the music in church a LOT, but I realized that I can do something about it, so can you). Consider it your gift to the church.
 
Hi PM1853

In my diocese every song book has Martin Luther’s “Mighty Fortress”, I have heard it sung about twice at mass. First time I heard it was at a Mass that a prayer group to which I belong has before an evening of lecture on a topic. I never though of questioning why is a hymn from Martin Luther in the song book, but now I am curious why do we have it. Does it date before he went off on his own way? I hope that this does not take the thread off track.

God bless,
 
Off Track:
Maximus, I have heard the terms “Battle Hymn of the Protestant Reformation” and “Greatest Hymn by the Greatest Man of the Greatest Era” used to describe “A mighty fortress.” The version you most likely hear nowadays is the harmonized version by Bach.

Again off track:
Cecil F. Alexander, the translator of “St. patrick’s Lorica” was the wife of an Anglican Bishop and primate of Ireland, not just a minister. My apologies.

Somewhat on track:
Despite the…uhmm…turbulent history of “A mighty fortress,” in and of itself, the text and music do not really pose any problems with Catholicism. The history of this hymn however is rather hard to ignore, hence my surprise to hear it. “O sacred…” likewise poses no issues and has no general association with anti-Catholicism that I am aware of. It is simply a good hymn by a Catholic set to music by a non-catholic. A similar thing was done to the Canticle of the Sun. I can’t for the life of me find hte music, but I believe its by a protestant (possibly Wesley?).
 
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