Views from the Choir Loft

Popular Posts From 2015

Cynthia Ostrowski · December 29, 2015

Below are some popular articles from 2015. Unfortunately, the list is not exhaustive, because Facebook makes such lists difficult to assemble. If you didn’t read them, you might want to check them out. Here they are in no particular order:

RICHARD CLARK:

Carpeting Is the Enemy of Congregational Singing

Five Things Directors and Choirs Must Remember This Week

ANDREW MOTYKA:

“Proper Of The Mass” (Ignatius Press)

FR. DAVID FRIEL:

Pastoral Difficulties with Recently Ordained Priests

The Future of the Pipe Organ

Bishop Conley & Advent “Ad Orientem”

DR. LUCAS TAPPAN:

One Sure Way To Destroy Your Child’s Musical Potential

Where Have All The Organists Gone?

JEFF OSTROWSKI:

Cardinal Sarah’s Powerful Letter Available In English!

Six Things To Know About USCCB Hymn Approval

PDF Download • Extremely Rare Hymnal (1952)

Top Six Liturgical Quotes By Robert Cardinal Sarah

Short, Fresh, & Beautiful • SATB “Ave Maris Stella”

CHRISTOPHER MUELLER:

A Striking Approach To Performing Gregorian Chant

ANDREW LEUNG:

Papal Master of Ceremonies on receiving Communion

Understanding the Sacred

DR. ALFRED CALABRESE:

An Antidote For Clericalism: Sung Vespers

VERONICA BRANDT:

Easy Organ Hymns for Catholics

How to do Marian Hymns

GUEST AUTHOR:

“No Approval Needed for Substitute Songs” says USCCB

“Saving” Gregorian Chant In The Ordinary Form

Opinions by blog authors do not necessarily represent the views of Corpus Christi Watershed.

About Cynthia Ostrowski

Cynthia Ostrowski holds a bachelor's degree (2005) in Geographic Information Science and a minor in Computer Science from Texas A&M University Corpus Christi.—(Read full biography).

23 May 2022 • FEEDBACK

From a reader: “I wasn’t looking for it. But, I stumbled across your hand-dandy arrangement of Pachelbel’s Canon. Jeff, this is the greatest thing since sliced bread! I had to play a wedding on Saturday. The bride requested the Canon. There were 11 bridesmaids! The organ loft is a football field away from the communion rail. It’s so difficult to play and keep checking the mirror. Your arrangement is absolutely genius. One can skip and choose which variations to use. The chord names are handy so that when my eyes are off the music, I always know where I am at. A thousand times thank you for sharing this arrangement!”

—Jeff Ostrowski

19 May 2022 • “Trochee Trouble”

I’m still trying to decide how to visually present the “pure” Editio Vaticana scores, using what is (technically) the official rhythm of the Church. You can download my latest attempt, for this coming Sunday. Notice the “trochee trouble” as well as the old issue of neumes before the quilisma.

—Jeff Ostrowski

16 May 2022 • Harmonized Chant?

This year’s upcoming Sacred Music Symposium will demonstrate several ways to sing the CREDO at Mass. This is because—for many parishes—to sing a full-length polyphonic CREDO by Victoria or Palestrina is out of the question. Therefore, we show options that are halfway between plainsong and polyphony. You can hear my choir rehearsing a section that sounds like harmonized plainsong.

—Jeff Ostrowski

“Liberalism in religion is the doctrine that there is no positive truth in religion, but that one creed is as good as another… It teaches that all are to be tolerated, for all are matters of opinion. Revealed religion is not a truth, but a sentiment and a taste; not an objective fact, not miraculous; and it is the right of each individual to make it say just what strikes his fancy. […] Men may go to Protestant Churches and to Catholic, may get good from both and belong to neither.”

— Bl. John Henry Cardinal Newman (May of 1879)