Letter on liturgy and music

This charitable and wonderful letter was written by the Bishop of Marquette and recommended to me by the Bishop of Lincoln.

Here's just a few excerpts, but click HERE to read the entire article.

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He begins by thanking those who have served the Church with their musical gifts over the years:

"Indeed, many have made it their life’s work to provide music for the
Sacred Liturgy. The Church, including both clergy and laity, is grateful beyond
words for their dedication and service. It must also be said that the principles
and practical applications which follow will come as a real change in focus and
direction for many of these same dedicated musicians...Although much of
what follows may contravene the formation that many have experienced over
recent years, this is in no way to be interpreted as a criticism of those dedicated
Church musicians who have offered their service with a generous heart and with
good will."

Then, he quotes Vatican II documents and other Church documents to lay out the vision for Sacred Music.

"We must come to see that, since sacred music is integral to the
Mass, the role of sacred music is to help us sing and pray the texts of the Mass
itself, not just ornament it. "


"Church teaching emphasizes that the music proper to the Sacred Liturgy
possesses three qualities: sanctity, beauty, and universality. Only music which
possesses all three of these qualities is worthy of the Mass.

Sacred music should consequently possess, in the highest degree, the
qualities proper to the liturgy, and in particular sanctity and goodness of
form, which will spontaneously produce the final quality of universality." (Pius X, Tra le sollecitudini I:2)

"One often gets the impression that, as long as the written text of the music or
song speaks about God, then it qualifies as “sacred music.” Given what has
been articulated here, this is clearly not the case. As an example, the Gloria of
the Mass set to a Polka beat or in the style of rock music is not sacred music.
Why not? Because such styles of music, as delightful as they might be for the
dance hall or a concert, do not possess all three of the intrinsic qualities of
sanctity, artistic goodness (beauty) and universality proper to sacred music."

--
That's just the beginning of this detailed, 20-page document!

 

Publication

Today, I opened my mailbox to find the latest issue of "Sacred Music." Months ago, I had sent in my abstract, and the editor said that he was interested in the entire thesis for publication. After sending my thesis, however, I did not hear any confirmation, so I was uncertain if my thesis had actually made it into the journal.

...But there in the index, third from the top, was "A Blessing in Disguise" with my name next to it.

It is a thrill to see my hard work in print and know that it is being read.

Perhaps there'll be more to come now that I know I can do it!

Thesis completion

Also, a news bulletin:

I have completed my senior thesis. My thesis title is: "A Blessing in Disguise: Stepping Back to Make Informed Decisions in the Performance of Gregorian Chant." It is a look at chant in the past 100 years or so.

Here is the abstract:
By studying the history and current practices of Gregorian chant, modern church musicians like myself can reach an informed decision regarding the choices facing them as Schola directors in the use of Gregorian chant. I begin by focusing on the movement of the monks of Solesmes at the turn of the 20th century because Solesmes spread a unified and more accessible practice of chant to Church musicians and Scholas. The Motu Proprio of Pope Pius X gave the Solesmes’ method a boost that spread the practice of Solesmes style chant around the world and gave commands for the cultivation of further editions of chant. Examples of the widespread use and development of chant according to Solesmes’ method are the work of Justine Ward and Mary Berry. Practice of chant fell drastically after the Second Vatican Council changed the order of the Catholic Mass, and Mary Berry’s own practice was shaken by the changes, but she used the time as an opportunity to do further research into Medieval chant practices. Selecting a few examples of scholars and practicing church musicians in the debates regarding interpretation of chant I find aids for the church musician like myself interested in selecting a suitable method of practicing chant.

Lenten Music

This year, while appreciating my files of music selections from years past when it comes to picking out hymns every Sunday, I have also begun using English Propers at Communion. The choir or myself sing the Propers from the Sacred Music Project. They're beautiful little melodies written in chant notation and a great way to begin introducing Propers to the congregation. We sing it and then sing a Communion hymn. It's especially beautiful for the choir to learn the way in which music is a part of the Mass as we sing something that goes perfectly with the readings and Gospel of the day--just as the Church intends.

Interesting article from V.II. In certain parts of the world, especially mission lands, there are peoples who have their own musical traditions, and these play a great part in their religious and social life. For this reason due importance is to be attached to their music, and a suitable place is to be given to it, not only in forming their attitude toward religion, but also in adapting worship to their native genius....

Of course, don't forget this part too: The Church acknowledges Gregorian chant as specially suited to the Roman liturgy: therefore, other things being equal, it should be given pride of place in liturgical services.

And that the Council called for more editions of Chant to be put forth!

http://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_const_19631204_sacrosanctum-concilium_en.html#_ftnref42

On these grounds Gregorian Chant has always been regarded as the supreme model for sacred music, so that it is fully legitimate to lay down the following rule: the more closely a composition for church approaches in its movement, inspiration and savor the Gregorian form, the more sacred and liturgical it becomes; and the more out of harmony it is with that supreme model, the less worthy it is of the temple.

Pope Pius X, in his 1903 Motu Proprio.

a Marian Celebration

The opportunity to direct the singing for a Marian Mass offered by the Bishop of Lincoln in honor of Our Lady of Fatima. We sang Salve Regina and Ave Maria as Communion meditation--the same as are and have been sung for years at the sites of Lourdes and Fatima and throughout the Church.

a short research project

Chant of the Church:
Text and Melody


Gregorian chant, the music of the Roman Catholic liturgy has had a history of ups and downs from its earliest origins. Chant’s very existence came about because of widespread differences in liturgical music and a desire to unify the Roman liturgy. Chant became distinct to each locale once more and was again unified, this time by the Council of Trent. The downhill took place again, and the restoration was begun by Dom Gueranger at the Abbey of Solesmes. If one were to draw a diagram of the history of chant in the Church, it would appear not dissimilar to the lines drawn by the monks of Solesmes to indicate the arsic and thetic gestures of chironomy. The history is not disconnected, but is rather a continuously undulating line of practice. Unfortunately, therefore, each time in history that chant must be, as it were, rediscovered, the scholars and musicians face the challenge of reinterpreting and selecting the old manuscripts and the importance of text versus melody.

Briefly, the first upsurge of chant, resulting in its promulgation by Pope Leo III and spread by Charlemagne throughout the Holy Roman Empire, began with the beginning of Western Monasticism. Most important in preserving manuscripts was the Benedictine monastery of St. Gall, Switzerland.[1] In the years from 1545-1563, the Council of Trent was held. By this time, chant was once again widely different in each diocese across Europe and in the aftermath of the Council, the Counter-Reformation, “intelligibility of the text was important.” A new gradual, known as the Medici edition because of the press from which it came, was published in 1614-1615 with the chants to be used by the church—although they were never officially binding. [2]

Unfortunately, the Medici edition “is shocking for its mutilation of the traditional melodies.

Melismas were mercilessly shortened, and the remaining melismas were transferred to accented syllables. This was due to Renaissance and nascent Baroque understandings of the subordination of melody to text. It was no longer understood that the ancient melodies, with long melismas and ingenious placement of melismas on weak syllables, were to be sung lightly and quickly, and with a rhythmic interpretation which brought out the text.”[3]

This left, as David Hiley points out, an opening for “further rewriting of the ancient melodies…for anyone with the will and ability to follow it.”[4] Once again, chant disintegrated to individual differences across the Church and was all but lost in the Age of Enlightenment and the era of the French Revolution.

The revival of chant would be begun this time by one Dom Prosper Gueranger who, having concerned himself with the restoration of the Faith, monasticism, and the Abbey of Solesmes looked also to restore the soul of the Church, the liturgy.[5] He hoped to renew the unity of the French Church to Rome, and he would end up beginning a movement that would lead to Rome unifying chant for the Church once more. As Katherine Bergeron points out in her book, Decadent Enchantments, sometimes restoration may mean “to create a form of life that ‘may never have existed.’” Dom Gueranger did more than bring back a way of life that once existed at Solesmes, rather, he built up beyond it in the spirit of the Church and Benedictine monasticism.

Dom Gueranger “arrived at the recognition that the archeological investigation of chant manuscripts by itself was not sufficient to bring about a manner of singing which is convincing [or] appropriate for the liturgy. For him Gregorian chant was in the first place prayer, the sung prayer of the liturgy.”[6] For this first step in restoration, therefore, the focus was primarily for the text. This focus on a text-oriented manner of singing became the practice of Solesmes passed on from Dom Gueranger to Dom Joseph Pothier and Dom Andre Mocquereau in the latter half of the nineteenth century. However, Dom Mocquereau was to develop a great interest in the “most comprehensive documentation and intensive investigation” of historical manuscripts rather than limiting himself to the text as the highest principle of interpretation.[7]

As Dom Pothier followed the path of fidelity first and foremost to the text, he also “attempted to sketch Gregorian history through the very notational signs—the neumes—in whose collective features he believed that history resided.”[8] Dom Pothier spent a great deal of time focused on beautifully reproducing and seeking to publish books of chant with clear, antique neumes and ornamentations. By making their work more beautiful, the monks of Solesmes hoped to overcome other publishers of liturgical music; but the more beautiful the books, the more beautiful must be the singing.[9] As Solesmes continued to develop its singing and production of chant, Dom Mocquereau developed his ideas regarding this music of the liturgy.

Dom Mocquereau moved beyond the development of a single beautiful printed edition and studied manuscripts, all that he could find. To his study, Dom Mocquereau brought the technology of photography. By means of photography, he “exposed Gregorian tradition not as a single, idealized creation but as a staggering diversity of representations.” Dom Mocquereau’s work presented a threat to the work of Dom Pothier. The threat was in the very number and availability of the photographs; “by its willful proliferation of images, the Paleographie musical functioned…as a kind of silent critique.” Dom Pothier feared not only that his colleague’s work would cause of revision of his, but also that because the sources were “no longer the private property of monk-scholars” and other scholars were armed with “the source” and could study Dom Pothier’s work against even more sources than he perhaps had consulted.[10]

Although one might not be led to expect it by Dom Mocquereau’s serious study of manuscripts, he also was responsible for mesure libre, “a modern invention and a purely abstract system of rhythm…in clear contradiction to the data of the very Gregorian paleography which he worked so hard to establish and disseminate.”[11] Despite that, Dom Mocquereau was responsible for bringing the study of chant from solely a question of liturgy to a field of science outside of the sacred realm. Within the Church, the restoration had a victory in the Motu Proprio of 1903 when Pope Pius X reinforced the teaching that chant was the “principle music for worship.”[12] The following year, the Holy Father followed up on the Motu Proprio by declaring preference for the interpretations and work of Solesmes above other chant books.

But this victory was not the end of the saga of Solesmes. Dom Gueranger and his successors had brought about a restoration of Gregorian chant, not just in their Abbey but also in the Church and not just in the Church but also in the world of scholarly study. Although chant would fall again from public use throughout the churches and have to begin to rise again (1960 fall and current revival), the work of the monks of Solesmes accomplished the vital task of keeping chant, manuscripts, practice, and study of it alive. As scholars continue to contend on proper interpretation and compilations of melody and rhythm, they will always have Solesmes to look to for gratitude even if not in certain agreement. And chant lives on—there is more yet to discover in our study of it.




Bibliography

Bergeron, Katherine. Decadent Enchantments: The Revival of Gregorian Chant. Berkeley, California: University of California Press, 1998.

Fr. Anthony Ruff, O.S.B. "Beyond Medici: The Struggle for Progress in Chant." Edited by William Mahrt. Sacred Music (Church Music Association of America) 135, no. 2 (Summer 2008).

Goschl, Johannes Berchmans. "One Hundred Years of the Graduale Romanum." Edited by William Mahrt. Sacred Music (Church Music Association of America) 135, no. 2 (Summer 2008).

Hiley, David. Western Plainchant: A Handbook. New York City, New York: Oxford University Press, 1993.

Wright, Craig, and Bryan Simms. Music in Western Civilization. Belmont, California: Thomson Schirmer, 2006.





[1] Craig Wright and Bryan Simms, Music in Western Civilization (Belmont, California: Thomson Schirmer, 2006), pages 17-33.

[2] David Hiley, Western Plainchant: A Handbook (New York City, New York: Oxford University Press, 1993), page 615.

[3] Fr. Anthony Ruff, O.S.B., "Beyond Medici: The Struggle for Progress in Chant," ed. William Mahrt, Sacred Music (Church Music Association of America) 135, no. 2 (Summer 2008), pages 26-27.

[4] Hiley, page 616.

[5] Katherine Bergeron, Decadent Enchantments: The Revival of Gregorian Chant (Berkeley, California: University of California Press, 1998), page 10.

[6] Johannes Berchmans Goschl, "One Hundred Years of the Graduale Romanum," ed. William Mahrt, Sacred Music (Church Music Association of America) 135, no. 2 (Summer 2008), p. 11.

[7] Ibid. page 12.

[8] Bergeron, page 35.

[9] Ibid. pages 35-58.

[10] Ibid. pages 87-89.

[11] Goschl, page 13

[12] Bergeron, page 129.