Views from the Choir Loft

Live Recording from Macau Cathedral

Andrew Leung · June 8, 2017

T IS USUALLY NOT common for church choirs to get good live recordings during liturgies due to various reasons; but here is an exception! Two weeks ago, we had a concert followed by a choral Mass at the Cathedral of the Nativity of Our Lady (Macau, China), and thanks to the Diocesan Social Communication Centre, we managed to get a pretty good and professional video of the whole program.

We were blessed to have the Tallis Vocalis visiting us from Hong Kong. They performed a 30-minutes program for us before the liturgy and they sang Josquin’s Missa Pange Lingua for the Mass under the direction of Dr. Edward Wickham. The full video can be found on YouTube.

The original program was to sing pieces written by Josquin des Prez and other pieces composed based on his works. However, we added a piece by Thomas Tallis to the program because its text was part of the Gospel of the Sixth Sunday of Easter (OF). And since we are still in the “Octave of Pentecost”, this would be the perfect time to share this. So, here is the recording of the famous If Ye Love Me sung by the joint choirs of the Tallis Vocalis and the Cathedral Schola of Macau. Enjoy!

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

About Andrew Leung

Andrew Leung currently serves the music director of Vox Antiqua, conductor of the Cecilian Singers, and music director at Our Lady of China Church.—(Read full biography).

Surprising Popularity!

One of our most popular downloads has proven to be the organ accompaniment to “The Monastery Hymnal” (131 pages). This book was compiled, arranged, and edited by Achille P. Bragers, who studied at the Lemmensinstituut (Belgium) about thirty years before that school produced the NOH. Bragers might be considered an example of Belgium “Stile Antico” whereas Flor Peeters and Jules Van Nuffel represented Belgium “Prima Pratica.” You can download the hymnal by Bragers at this link.

—Jeff Ostrowski

15 February 2021 • To Capitalize…?

In the Introit for the 6th Sunday after Pentecost, there is a question regarding whether to capitalize the word “christi.” The Vulgata does not, because Psalm 27 is not specifically referring to Our Lord, but rather to God’s “anointed one.” However, Missals tend to capitalize it, such as the official 1962 Missal and also a book from 1777 called Missel de Paris. Something tells me Monsignor Knox would not capitalize it.

—Jeff Ostrowski

15 February 2021 • “Sung vs. Spoken”

We have spoken quite a bit about “sung vs. spoken” antiphons. We have also noted that the texts of the Graduale Romanum sometimes don’t match the Missal texts (in the Extraordinary Form) because the Mass Propers are older than Saint Jerome’s Vulgate, and sometimes came from the ITALA versions of Sacred Scripture. On occasion, the Missal itself doesn’t match the Vulgate—cf. the Introit “Esto Mihi.” The Vulgate has: “Esto mihi in Deum protectórem et in domum refúgii…” but the Missal and Graduale Romanum use “Esto mihi in Deum protectórem et in locum refúgii…” The 1970s “spoken propers” use the traditional version, as you can see.

—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)