Views from the Choir Loft

“Hidden” Hymns by Cardinal Newman

Jeff Ostrowski · October 16, 2019

ANY CONSIDER Fr. Guy Nicholls, Cong Orat, to be the greatest living authority on Cardinal Newman. In these interviews, he speaks about a range of fascinating subjects. For example, in the first video, he mentions “secret” hymns by Newman ¹ that can be found in the Birmingham Oratory as well as Cardinal Newman’s relationship with the music of Beethoven—who was still alive—and how Saint Newman adapted this for use in Church:

Fr. Guy Nicholls speaks about a great many things which will be of interest to our readers, such as the plight of Catholics in England at a time when the Anglicans did not allow Roman Catholics to attend college.

At the time of this posting:

Video 1 of 3 = 188 views
Video 2 of 3 = 78 views
Video 3 of 3 = 82 views

NOTES FROM THIS ARTICLE:

1 For the record, the “famous” hymns by Newman—the hymns known by everyone—can all be found in the Brébeuf hymnal. In the interview, Fr. Nicholls makes reference to hymns intended to be used at Birmingham, for which Cardinal Newman wrote the text and chose the melody.

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).

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