NTIL HIS PARISH church was built, FATHER ADRIAN FORTESCUE—England’s “PPP” (Peerless Polyglottic Polymath)—offered Mass in a wooden shed. Father Fortescue died in 1923, the same year as Abbat Pothier. While I’m not aware of Pothier offering Mass in a shed, I suspect he offered Mass in houses because from 1880-1895 the monks of Solesmes Abbey were expelled from their monastery by the French anti-clerical laws. That meant they had to fulfill their monastic vocations “dispersed in houses within the village” (as Dr. Katharine Ellis of Cambridge put it). Roman Catholics believe that no matter where Mass is offered, the SECOND PERSON OF THE BLESSED TRINITY becomes present. I believe this is one reason Monsignor Skeris said: “If we’ve got the Faith, we can’t be anything by optimists.”
(1) Father Adrian Fortescue • Fortescue’s talents defy enumeration, so I won’t list them here. Suffice it to say he was a brilliant musician and organist. As parish priest, Fortescue spent hours writing harmonizations for his organist and creating “simplified” versions of the Proprium Missae. (He felt the full melodies printed in the LIBER USUALIS were beyond the capabilities of a parish choir.) Inside the gorgeous EDMUND CAMPION MISSAL (3rd edition) you’ll find an English translation for the Easter Sunday Sequence—Victimæ Paschali Laudes—alongside the Latin version. Its provenance was a hymnal Father Fortescue published before WWI. Notice how each syllable corresponds perfectly to the Latin, although Father Fortescue never mentioned that. There’s no way this was an accident.
* PDF Download • ORGAN ACCOMPANIMENT (w/ Latin original)
* Singer’s PDF • “Gregorian Notation” (5 lines)
(2) SATB “Tenor as Melody” • The following version (in English) is based upon a melody called “Winchester Old” (#415 in the hymn portal). The chords in the third stanza can sound a bit schmaltzy on an electric organ. Therefore, please make sure your organ, choir, and acoustic are suitable for this piece. It’s available as #40309 at LALEMANT POLYPHONIC—or you can download it below. Notice how the tune switches to the Tenor in the second stanza, which is pretty fun!
* PDF Download • “Tenor as Melody”
EQUAL VOICES : YouTube
SOPRANO : YouTube
ALTO : YouTube
TENOR : YouTube
BASS : YouTube
(3) Keine Schönheit • The following version can be sung with or without organ accompaniment. In my view, it sounds better a cappella (if one’s choir has sufficient singers and skill). The melody—called “Keine Schönheit hat die welt”—is relatively simple, but it’s gorgeous. Rehearsal videos for each individual voice part are available at #835 in the hymn portal, but make sure your singers understand the lyrics are different. That is to say, the music is the same—but the lyrics are different.
* PDF Download • “Keine Schönheit hat die welt” (Víctimae Pascháli)
(4) “Old Hundredth + Polyphony” • This version takes an English translation of the Víctimæ Pascháli Laudes and sets it to the well-known Old Hundredth melody. Then, it launches into an SATB a cappella section which is hauntingly beautiful. Make sure to explain to your choir that the rehearsal video lyrics are different. In other words, the music is the same—but the lyrics are different. The metrical translation was created by Father Frederick Charles Husenbeth, Vicar-General of the Roman Catholic diocese of Northampton.
* PDF Download • “Old Hundredth + Polyphonic Extension”
Notice the rehearsal videos have different lyrics.
EQUAL VOICES : YouTube
SOPRANO : YouTube
ALTO : YouTube
TENOR : YouTube
BASS : YouTube
(5) SATB “All Saints” (English) • The following English translation was created by an FSSP priest. The familiar musical setting (“ALL SAINTS”) is used in the Brébeuf Hymnal for numbers 228, 282, 388, 672, 789, and 820. Rehearsal videos for each individual voice part are available at #282 in the hymn portal, but make sure your singers understand the lyrics are different. That is to say, the music is the same—but the lyrics are different. This version would also sound very nice with females singers (only) in unison, accompanied by the pipe organ.
* PDF Download • METRICAL VERSION (“All Saints”)
—English Translation by an FSSP priest.
(6) Paschal Lamb w/ Descant • I composed a “soaring soprano descant” for the hymn tune known as PASCHAL LAMB. You will most likely recognize that melody once you hear it. The soprano descant enters during the 4th verse. You can listen to what the descant sounds like—with Richard J. Clark on the organ and Dr. Calabrese on the podium—but just remember that video uses different lyrics.
* PDF Download • PASCHAL LAMB + Descant
—Rehearsal videos for each individual voice with different lyrics.
EFORE WE PROCEED, we must remember that the Church’s official version of Gregorian Chant (EDITIO VATICANA) doesn’t specify the length of each trochee. It leaves trochee interpretations up to each choirmaster. That is to say, one is free to have no elongation (FRENCH), a heavy elongation (GERMAN), or something in between (GOGNIAT). You can see the EDITIO VATICANA doesn’t specify:
* PDF Download • EDITIO VATICANA (Singer)
—“Víctimæ Pascháli Láudes” (Sequence) • Dominica Resurrectionis.
Some editors attempted to “split the baby.” One example would be Dom Lucien David, OSB:
“Germanic Trochee” Harmonizations:
* PDF Download • 2 VERSIONS (Latin + English)
—English Translation approved for liturgical use in the United States by the USCCB.
—Page 3 and Page 4 contain singer’s versions.
* PDF Download • Max Springer (1910s)
—Max Springer (d. 1954) was organist at the Saint Emmaus Monastery (Prague).
* PDF Download • Dr. Peter Wagner (1910s)
—Wagner founded the “Gregorian Academy” in Fribourg, Switzerland.
* PDF Download • Nova Organi Harmonia (1944)
—Monsignor Jules Van Nuffel was choirmaster at the Cathedral of Saint Rumbold (Belgium).
* PDF Download • Monsignor Nekes (1910)
—This is an awful accompaniment, yet Msgr. Franz Nekes was quite popular in Germany.
* PDF Download • FATHER WEINMANN (Singer’s Score, 1909)
—Dr. Karl Weinmann (1873-1929) produced a wonderful book.
* PDF Download • Father Franz Xaver Mathias (1936)
—Father Mathias founded the SAINT LEO INSTITUTE FOR SACRED MUSIC in 1913.
39357 “Victimae” with Dr. Alfred Calabrese conducting according to Abbat Pothier. Organ accompaniment was by Richard J. Clark.
“French Trochee” Harmonizations:
Writing in 1949, Justine Bayard Ward said that without Dom Mocquereau’s rhythmic signs, it is “impossible” to have an “artistic interpretation” of Gregorian Chant. The organist at Solesmes Abbey, Dom Jean Hébert Desrocquettes (d. 1972), in 1954 published a work promoting the idea that “the rhythmic ictus itself is a fact in the melodies as written in the manuscripts” [PLAINSONG FOR MUSICIANS, p. 9]. However, Dom Desrocquettes admitted that Dom Mocquereau’s groupings “do not always coincide” with “the grouping in the notation (torculus, podatus. climacus, etc.).” On page 18 of Solesmes; Its Work For Liturgy And Chant, Dom Aldhelm Dean declares:
“Modern rhythmic signs, in our Solesmes choir-books, are no new invention, an innovation calculated to deprive us of our liberty; they are merely a modern way of reproducing the rhythmic signs found in the best manuscripts, and we have no more right to neglect them, if we wish to sing the melodies as they were intended to be sung, than we have to change the notes themselves.”
Consider the way Dom Mocquereau marks the Víctimæ Pascháli Laudes:
In French, the accent falls on the last syllable. Notice how the rhythmic markings of Dom Mocquereau produce that same effect. In other words, Dom Mocquereau marks the rhythm as if the words were:
re-cón-ci-lí-a-vít pec-cá-to-rés.
According to Dr. Katharine Ellis of Cambridge, when his “opposite-accent” theory began (circa 1897): “Dom Mocquereau would elicit howls of protest on grounds that via his theory of stressed and unstressed syllables his method introduced the horror of syncopation into plainchant singing.”
The bottom line is: If you adopt Dom Mocquereau’s rhythm, make sure your accompaniment matches.
* PDF Download • Giulio Bas (1874-1929)
—Giulio Bas was the editor of the “Rassegna Gregoriana” (Rome).* PDF Download • Desrocquettes (1887-1972)
—Dom Jean Hébert Desroquettes was organist of Solesmes Abbey.* PDF Download • Achille P. Bragers (1887-1955)
—Bragers taught at the Pope Pius X School of Liturgical Music (Manhattanville College, New York).* PDF Download • Achille P. Bragers (TRANSPOSED)
—This has been transposed very high.* PDF Download • (first) Henri Potiron (1882-1972)
—Potiron was Choirmaster of the Basilica of the Sacred Heart (Paris).* PDF Download • (second) Henri Potiron (1882-1972)
—Another version by Henri Potiron.* PDF Download • Father Andrew Green (1865-1950)
—Father Green headed the music department at St. Benedict’s College (Atchison, KS).* PDF Download • Dom Gregory A. Murray (1905-1992)
—Dom Murray was a Downside Abbey monk who eventually came to hate Mocquereau’s method.* PDF Download • Dr. Eugene Lapierre (1957)
—Lapierre (University of Montreal) granted Roger Wagner his doctorate “in absentia” (from California).
* PDF Download • Father Percy Jones (1952)
—Dr. Percy Jones lived until 1992 • He produced the Pius X Hymnal (Australia).
* PDF Download • Director of the Gregorian Institute (Paris)
—Auguste Le Guennant (d. 1972) served as organist at the Basilica of Saint-Nicolas in Nantes.
—Director of the Gregorian Institute of Paris. (He replaced Dom Gajard there.).
* PDF Download • Dr. Ted Marier (1970s)
—The famous hymnal created by Dr. Theodore Marier has been reviewed by Daniel Craig.
* PDF Download • Nicola A. Montani (1920)
—Nicola A. Montani produced the Saint Gregory Hymnal (1920).
* PDF Download • “Victimæ Paschali Laudes” (Singer)
—Paul Arbogast; Eugene Lindusky; Columba Kelly, OSB; Mr. Murray Bradshaw; Dr. John B. Egan.
* PDF Download • Father Carlo Rossini (1932)
—Father Carlo Rossini produced the Parochial Hymnal (1936).
* PDF Download • Jeff Ostrowski (2020)
—Following the rhythm of Dom Mocquereau.
