Views from the Choir Loft

PDF Download • “Sing the Angelus” (Plainchant)

Jeff Ostrowski · January 26, 2017

YNN DEAHL is an Environmental Engineer with whom I was blessed to sing Gregorian chant about sixteen years ago. He gave me a plainsong setting of the ANGELUS (attributed to Dom Charpentier, OSB) which I habitually taught to my high school students—and they loved it.

Print this booklet to begin your choir rehearsals:

* * PDF Booklet • THE ANGELUS (Dom Charpentier, OSB)

Choose a different choir member each week to say the concluding prayer:

Time sure flies! In February of 2010, I posted this setting to the CMAA forum. Since that time, it’s been adopted by a surprising number of people across the globe.

But did Dom Charpentier, OSB, truly compose it?

The melodic pattern is quite common in the Gregorian repertoire and would have been known even in the “decadent ages” of Gregorian chant (circa 1700). However, I recently came across this ancient manuscript:

4743 Charpentier ANGELUS source

This implies that Dom Charpentier created his rendition based on an ancient model.

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

About Jeff Ostrowski

Jeff Ostrowski holds his B.M. in Music Theory from the University of Kansas (2004). He resides with his wife and children in Los Angeles.—(Read full biography).

16 September 2021 • Fulton J. Sheen

Here is a photograph of Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen celebrating Mass in Jerusalem. That image was included in the “Fulton J. Sheen Sunday Missal” (1961), which was edited by Father Caramen and has an IMPRIMATUR by William Cardinal Godfrey, who served as Archbishop of Westminster from 1956 until his death in 1963. The Fulton Sheen Missal can be freely downloaded as a PDF file, thanks to Corpus Christi Watershed.

—Jeff Ostrowski

15 September 2021 • Offertory Problem

I submit to you that nothing is gained by these slight variations in the repeats for the Epipany Offertory. The edition is by Carl Ott, a musicologist. Almost nothing is about Carl Ott—as far as I can tell, nobody even knows when Carl Ott was born or when Carl Ott died.

—Jeff Ostrowski

A Truly Insane Liturgical Practice

In 2013, I began speaking of an insane liturgical practice which was allowed by Pope Pius XII—but nobody realizes this. If you tried to do this at the Traditional Latin Mass, you would most likely be run out of town on a rail. However, for the record, the FULTON SHEEN MISSAL (edited by Father Caraman) specifically mentions this type of participation … and you can see for yourself.

—Jeff Ostrowski