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Views from the Choir Loft

PDF Download • “Creator Alme Siderum” with Organ Accompaniment

Jeff Ostrowski · December 23, 2020

S MOST OF OUR READERS KNOW, I have made an extensive study of the ancient Roman Catholic hymns which refer to “Christ as Creator.” A prominent example of this would be CONDITOR ALME SIDERUM, which was called “Creator Alme Siderum” after 1631AD. Why was the name changed? Well, it’s a long and fascinating story—involving Pope Urban VIII and the Jesuits—and I would encourage you to pick up a copy of the Brébeuf hymnal, currently being sold exclusively by Sophia Institute Press. Inside that book, the complete history of the “Urbanite Revision” is provided, along with beautiful full-color images.

Writing a review for the “Antiphon” liturgical journal, Dr. Aaron James had effusive praise for the way in which the editors of the Brébeuf Hymnal treated the Urbanite hymn reform. (That’s why I encourage you to obtain a copy.) But since Advent is almost over, I wanted to post a few score of CREATOR ALME SIDERUM you might want to download for next year:

*  PDF Download • ORGAN ACCOMPANIMENT
—2015 Organ accompaniment by Jeff Ostrowski.

*  PDF Download • (1st Singer Score)
—This version has an English translation by Father Edward Caswall (d. 1878).

*  PDF Download • (2nd Singer Score)
—This version has an English translation by Father Adrian Fortescue (d. 1923).

A lady named Eleanor Parker runs quite a fantastic blog called “A Clerk of Oxford.” Similar to the Brébeuf hymnal, she has provided color images of ancient (Roman Catholic) vernacular translations for CREATOR ALME SIDERUM—except that the Brébeuf translations are in English, whereas Eleanor’s translations are in Anglo-Saxon:

*  Eleanor Parker’s Blog • “Creator Alme Siderum”

The images she provides are truly spectacular:

Covid-19 has created insane difficulties, and our current choir situation is exasperating due to all the restrictions. We have small groups of singers, mainly people from the same family because the government counts people in the same family as “one unit.” I used an iPhone to record one of the groups singing CREATOR ALME SIDERUM, but the iPhone corrupted the choral sound resulting in a recording that doesn’t do justice to how beautiful they sounded in real life. In any event, we have several groups that sing at several Masses, and I often use higher or lower tessitura depending upon the voices. The Organ Accompaniment for the Edmund Campion Missal has come in quite handy:

*  Accompaniment • Kyriale in Three Keys (388 pages)
—Ordinary of the Mass: High Key, Middle Key, and Lower Key.

“Volume 1” is what you want. The accompaniments are by Achille P. Bragers (LOW KEY), Father Carlo Rossini (MIDDLE KEY), and the Nova Organi Harmonia (HIGH KEY).

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

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Filed Under: Articles Tagged With: Dr Aaron James Last Updated: December 23, 2020

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Jeff Ostrowski

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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20 January 2021 • REMINDER

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—Jeff Ostrowski
19 January 2021 • Confusion over feasts

For several months, we have discussed the complicated history of the various Christmas feasts: the Baptism of the Lord, the feast of the Holy Family, the Epiphany, and so forth. During a discussion, someone questioned my assertion that in some places Christmas had been part of the Epiphany. As time went on, of course, the Epiphany came to represent only three “manifestations” (Magi, Cana, Baptism), but this is not something rigid. For example, if you look at this “Capital E” from the feast of the Epiphany circa 1350AD, you can see it portrays not three mysteries but four—including PHAGIPHANIA when Our Lord fed the 5,000. In any event, anyone who wants proof the Epiphany used to include Christmas can read this passage from Dom Prosper Guéranger.

—Jeff Ostrowski
6 January 2021 • Anglicans on Plainsong

A book published by Anglicans in 1965 has this to say about Abbat Pothier’s Editio Vaticana, the musical edition reproduced by books such as the LIBER USUALIS (Solesmes Abbey): “No performing edition of the music of the Eucharistic Psalmody can afford to ignore the evidence of the current official edition of the Latin Graduale, which is no mere reproduction of a local or partial tradition, but a CENTO resulting from an extended study and comparison of a host of manuscripts gathered from many places. Thus the musical text of the Graduale possesses a measure of authority which cannot lightly be disregarded.” They are absolutely correct.

—Jeff Ostrowski

Random Quote

“The Catholic Church holds it better for the sun and moon to drop from heaven, for the earth to fail, and for all the many millions on it to die of starvation in extremest agony, as far as temporal affliction goes, than that one soul, I will not say, should be lost, but should commit one single venial sin, should tell one willful untruth, or should steal one poor farthing without excuse.”

— Saint John Henry Newman (1865)

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