Propers Vs. Hymns

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This might be a silly question, but could one sing the proper introit, communion, and offertory for mass and also sing hymns? It seems the propers are rather short, which could leave room for hymns still unless they are sung as an antiphon for a psalm. You’d basically have something like this:

(mass starts):

hymn
proper introit, either recited or sung
penetenial rite, gloria, readings, etc.
proper offertory
hymn
Eucharistic prayers, etc.
proper communion
hymn
final blessing
recessional hymn

Or is this sort of thing forbidden or really bad practice? It would seem to me to be a sort of compromise - you still sing the propers, but get congregational singing with the hymns. It would at least familiarize people with the propers again, as I doubt a lot of people even know there is specially composed texts for all the holy days.
 
Sure, nothing wrong with that. Well, it might be a little aesthetically jarring to move from a chanted (or polyphonic?!) Proper to a hymn, but liturgically I can’t see any problem. In fact, I’d say you’d be closer to the ideal for music at Mass than 99.9% of all parishes.
 
Rabbititus, the last church choir I sang in actually did this, except that we substituted choir anthems for the offertory and communion hymns. It does work, but on occation you may have to leave out a hymn if the proper is too long. Other wise the priest will be standing at the altar with his hands folded for too long a time. This can annoy both the priest and the congregation. The proper is more important than the hymn/anthem, and the flow of the Mass shouldn’t be disrupted. However, we rarely had to leave out one of our anthems because they were chosen with the lenght of the proper chant in mind.
 
Thanks for the answers, all. The question came to me after participating in the “worst hymn” thread. Several people talked about funeral music and so I got to thinking “what would I want played at my funeral?” (my own funeral isn’t really something I dwell on, but since others were talking about it…) I’ve always thought the requiem propers were beautiful, and I would really want them sung in either Latin or traditional English, but I would also want hymns too, so people could sing.

What are anthems, btw? How are they different from hymns? I’m rather dumb in regards to church music.
 
Rabbititus said:
This might be a silly question, but could one sing the proper introit, communion, and offertory for mass and also sing hymns? It seems the propers are rather short, which could leave room for hymns still unless they are sung as an antiphon for a psalm.
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Sure! Indeed, I once belonged to a parish that regularly celebrated a full Solemn Mass, and at the offertory there would be:


  1. *]A choral anthem – in effect, the choir’s “offering” while the people’s offerings were collected
    *]The offertory chant from the Graduale during the offertory procession/presentation of the oblations
    *]Finally, a congregational hymn while the clergy and ministers prepared the altar and did the censings

    It admittedly took a bit of time – but this was not the liturgy to attend of you were in a hurry! It usually took about an hour and a half, and the congregation loved it. :clapping:
 
Technically, the proper antiphons given in the Missal are to be used only for spoken (i.e. not sung) Masses.

The official sung Propers are found primarily in the Graduale Romanum. Since that’s a bit rough, especially for beginners, Rome has issued the Graduale Simplex. The antiphons are paired with Psalms, and do NOT match those of the Roman Missal.

The Graduales Romanum and/or Simplex are a must for any serious choir.
 
You’re certainly free to include both, and if there is time it would actually be, in a certain sense, wise to provide enough music to cover all the action (that is, after all, where the introit, offertory, and communion come from to begin with). You just have to remember that you’re not allowed to unnecessary delay the liturgical action. To avoid this, I would always lead with the proper (unless you know you definitely got time to spare) and then be ready to cut verses on a hymn.
 
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