Pope Francis Calls for Reform in Liturgical Music

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Peeps said:
Obviously people would have to read neumes.
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There’s no reason why the melodies couldn’t be set to modern musical notation, in fact many chant books, including some versions of the pre-Conciliar Liber Usualis, did just that.

I’m the opposite, I prefer neumes. They’re actually pretty easy and quick to get the hang of. I find modern notation harder because the 5-bar staff is harder on my ageing eyes. The 4-bar staff is more spread out and it’s easier to see the half-tones.

Both versions however are possible.
 
The congregation sings the chant, which has been transcribed into the more familiar notation. We also regularly chant the “Gloria” and the “Creed.”
 
Cirdan_XII said:
Amazing Grace is pentatonic. Pentatonic is a musical scale with a reduced number of notes. Most early music and pre Renaissance popular / folk music was pentatonic.
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And can be played on all black keys, as many other supposedly negro spirituals or a connection there of. I read that most negro spirituals are pentatonic.
 
blackforest said:
I suspect that the Pope is deliberately evading specifics. There would be a lot of outrage if he came out and said, “For heaven’s sake, stop singing Eagle’s Wings, already!!”
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Putting words in his mouth is too easy. That may be his favorite, for all we know.

But yes, I would say we are in line with what he says. We do not fall into the problem of nostalgia or some archaeological vision of what music should be.
 
Mtatum1958 said:
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Wesrock:
D is a key that’s easy for guitar and piano to play together in unison without the use of a capo. Also since the majority of parishioners are women it’s easier for them to sing in
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That’s interesting. Is there a key men find easier to sing (curious, but music illiterate )?
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It is not the key, but the range. I try to stick from C to C, going a little lower first, in choosing keys. I do no go above a D ever for the sake of men and most women.
 
That was an example, nothing more, based on my own personal, subjective disdain for the song. 😊

I do think that it’s a cop-out to avoid discussing proper criteria for liturgical music just by declaring, “But . . . but, it’s soooooooo subjective!”

There have historically been attempts at defining solid church music. John Wesley made a good stab at it.
 
Any decent mezzo can hit a D and that is usually the highest pitch in many church pieces.
 
Years ago, back when we first became Catholic and I became aware of the conflict over the “new” hymns vs. the “traditional” hymns, I did a simple comparison study.

I chose about 12 “modern” hymns in the Gather Hymnal, hymns that the parishes in our city do fairly often. Examples would be “Here I Am , Lord,” “Gather Us In,” “One Bread, One Body,” “City of God,” .etc.

And I chose 12 “traditional” hymns in the Gather hymnal, hymns that the parishes in our city do fairly often. Examples would be “Hail Holy Queen,”, “Holy God, We Praise Thy Name,” “Joyful Joyful We Adore Thee,” “Love Divine All Loves Excelling” (Hyfrydol melody), “The Servant Song,”. etc.

I compared these hymns to see which ones had the greater percentage of high notes, which I defined as anything over C one octave above middle C. So that means that the “D” that is in the Mezzo (and baritone range in the lower registers) would be included in my comparison study.

The winners (the ones with the MOST high notes)…
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the TRADITIONAL hymns! 🎆

At first I was surprised, but as I thought about it, I realized that in the “olden days,” (back when I was child, and my parents, and their parents, too!), people were taught how to sing either at their school if they were able to attend, or by their families (singing around the piano or out on the front porch or around the woodstove was a common family activity), or in church by the choir master. They were also taught to sing in harmony.

So those traditional hymns would have been a piece of cake for the generations gone by. 🎂

Today, people sing along with the radio, often an octave lower than the singer is using, and musical training in schools or anywhere is very spotty. So no wonder modern hymn writers keep it LOW. 🐸

Surprised?

I don’t think it’s the high notes that make the modern hymns difficult. I think it is the lack of a strong melody in many of the songs. I get the impression that some of the modern hymn writers sit at the piano or guitar and just “noodle around” letting their creativity run free, and when they hear a pretty phrase, they run with it and turn it into a hymn.

A lot of the older hymn melodies, BTW, were not originally hymn melodies, but secular melodies adapted to hymns. So I personally think that secular-ness of modern vs. traditional hymns is about equal, when all is said and done. :roll_eyes:
 
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Spot on! As for the hymnal, we use a printed Worship Aid (albeit we are a congregation of about 200, with only one Sunday Mass at an Abbey}. Anytime we use new/unfamiliar music (or sometimes as a refresher) the music director takes a few minutes before Mass to teach the piece, giving a little background/translation when necessary.
 
Those are the Sanctus and the Agnus Dei I remember from when I was kid. At daily Mass, particularly during Lent and Advent, I remember these responses were chanted by a 13 year old who was part of our parish choir. We never experienced a dialog Mass in our parish where we would have all been expected to chant these responses.
 
My hubby, a non-Catholic who learned 4-part hymn singing as a child in his church choir, and to whom singing harmony comes as naturally as breathing, thought neumes were fairly easy to understand when he watched a the video of the simple tone Salve Regina I usually use for praying Compline. Granted he has not investigated the depth of neumes.

I remember when he started singing in our parish choir. He came to pick me up at church after Mass on the last Sunday of Advent. I was busy cleaning and the choir was rehearsing. As he was waiting, unable to resist, he started harmonizing. Our choir sings in unison and this was very different for them. He was immediately asked to join them.

I was still cleaning when the choir finished practicing and suddenly I heard “O Holy Night”. I thought they’d put on a CD and came out to ask what it was. To my surprise I saw the choir was gone and only my husband, the organist, and the organist’s daughter, who was visiting her parents for Christmas, were left. Hubby and the daughter were the ones singing the hymn in harmony. They were revelling in being able to do their thing. That’s when I first realized that my husband could really sing. Needless to say they were both part of the choir at Midnight Mass and hubby stayed on for a couple of years.
 
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It’s more the region than the denomination that matters here. My mother was born in the Catholic diaspora region around Göttingen/Germany after V 2 and they used to sing a whole bunch of medieval and early modern time Catholic hymns. Where I live now, it’s mostly modern (past 150 years) church music.
But I get the emotions people show regarding this topic. One thing I deeply love of the orthodox liturgy is the fact that some chants like the phos ilarion or the Agni Parthene are even older than the medieval stuff I was used to in my childhood. I think I would fall in despair if they changed it.
 
I think a false dichotomy in this discussion would be modern-versus-traditional. Both have potential to reach a high bar for liturgical standards.
 
Amen. Perhaps also, the people assisting at Mass can sing along with the hymns. When the cantor says, “Please join in singing…” it doesn’t mean stand there like a statue.
 
Just a thought - if we went back to Gregorian Chant: I.E. something that takes time to learn, practice, etc. then those in Church will have to spend more time than 45 minutes a week at your typical Novus Ordo gathering, then people have to spend time, learn, and ultimately spend more time at Church in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament to learn it - and that’s how you get graces.
 
basketballguy said:
When the cantor says, “Please join in singing…” it doesn’t mean stand there like a statue.
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That is certainly true, but teaching people to sing is a task as it is breaking long standing Catholic tradition.

When Latin Mass was the only Mass, the most popular Latin Mass was the Low Mass. Outside of a funeral, I don’t think I ever saw a high mass as a kid. Any who, assisting at Low Mass meant staying quiet, whether standing, sitting or kneeling.

Sure, most of the people who were at Low Mass have since passed on, and it has been 50 years for the rest of us. But the tradition of quiet is a tough one to break. We aren’t black baptists or pentecostals, you know.
 
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