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“What earlier generations held as sacred, remains sacred and great for us too…” Pope Benedict XVI (7 July 2007)

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Views from the Choir Loft

“Dies Irae” • Why Does It Appear In So Many Movies?

Jeff Ostrowski · September 16, 2019

URING the Sacred Music Symposium each year, we spend hours explaining to the participants how Gregorian chant is the basis for Western music. We have an entire series on this, including expensive slides. Even the “B-Flat” and the “Natural” symbols come from Cantus Gregorianus. Readers of Views from the Choir Loft know we avoid posting YouTube videos, since everyone in the world can already search YouTube without our help.

However, the YouTube video below (about the Dies Irae) is worth watching. It was created by “VOX”—an organization I know absolutely nothing about:

PLEASE OVERLOOK anything considered inappropriate in the video.

Watershed is not the creator of this video.


See also the 2014 article by Veronica Brandt.

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

Filed Under: Articles Last Updated: January 1, 2020

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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).

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Quick Thoughts

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
14 May 2022 • “Pure” Vatican Edition

As readers know, my choir has been singing from the “pure” Editio Vaticana. That is to say, the official rhythm which—technically—is the only rhythm allowed by the Church. I haven’t figured out how I want the scores to look, so in the meantime we’ve been using temporary scores that look like this. Stay tuned!

—Jeff Ostrowski
14 May 2022 • Gorgeous Book

If there is a more beautiful book than Abbat Pothier’s 1888 Processionale Monasticum, I don’t know what it might be. This gorgeous tome was today added to the Saint John Lalande Online Library. I wish I owned a physical copy.

—Jeff Ostrowski

Random Quote

“Urban VIII appointed four Jesuits to reform the hymns, so that they should no longer offend Renaissance ears. These four, in that faithful obedience to the Holy See which is the glory of their Society, with a patient care that one cannot help admiring, set to work to destroy every hymn in the office.”

— Fr. Adrian Fortescue (1916)

Recent Posts

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  • 16 May 2022 • Harmonized Chant?
  • Prayer of Abandonment,  Saint Charles de Foucauld

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