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Views from the Choir Loft

Update (25 April) • “Forthcoming Spanish Hymnal”

Jeff Ostrowski · April 25, 2024

HE FOREMOST scholar of the early 20th century was FATHER ADRIAN FORTESCUE—England’s “PPP” (Peerless Polyglottic Polymath). Fortescue died in 1923, the same year as Abbat Joseph Pothier, the greatest Gregorianist since Guido d’Arezzo. When it comes to the subject of vernacular hymnody, it’s said that Abbat Pothier was shocked and dismayed when shown the doggerel found in some American hymnals. For his part, Father Fortescue wrote on 25 March 1916: “In nothing are English Catholics so poor as in vernacular hymns. The real badness of most of our popular hymns, endeared, unfortunately, to the people by association, surpasses anything that could otherwise be imagined. When our people have the courage to break resolutely with a bad tradition, there are unworked mines of religious poetry in the old hymns that we can use in translations. If we do, there will be an end of the present odd anomaly, that, whereas our liturgical hymns are the finest in the world, our popular ones are easily the worst.” And Father Francis Brunner 1 wrote something similar in 1953: “Catholics in America have been the heirs of a sentimental and subjective hymn tradition that, for some reason or other, has taken a deep and fast hold on the fancy of the average person. And no one has yet had the courage to do anything about the problem that is thus created.”

New Spanish Hymnal (1 of 3) • When the Brébeuf Catholic Hymnal appeared, the problem of good hymns in English was solved—once and for all. One of the main authors for the Church Music Association of America Blog declared (6/10/2022) that the Brébeuf Hymnal “has no parallel and not even any close competitor.” But what about good hymns in Spanish?

New Spanish Hymnal (2 of 3) • We believe that Latino Catholics have been treated—broadly speaking—with contempt by the Catholic Church. They have been given “garbage” music with shoddy lyrics and uninspired, tedious, syncopated melodies. Indeed, many Spanish songs used in Catholic churches mindlessly repeat the same words over and over again.

New Spanish Hymnal (3 of 3) • Recently, we revealed details vis-à-vis a new Spanish hymnal. I won’t repeat everything that has already been said. As of this moment, the collection has not been given a title. Nor has any “date of publication” been announced—but exciting progress is being made each day. Indeed, this Spanish hymnody project has been decades in the making!

Consider this example, recorded yesterday morning:

Here’s the direct URL link.

English Translation for that Hymn:

1. Eternal king of the blessed,
creator of all things and the Father’s
co-equal Son from all eternity,
when the world was at its beginning

2. You created Adam and gave him
the image of Your own likeness,
joining a soul of noble destiny
with slime of the earth.

3. But when an envious, deceitful enemy
had covered mankind with the filth of sin,
You clothed Yourself in man’s flesh
and, a creator once again, gave man back
the beauty he had lost.

4. Once You were born of a virgin.
Now from from the tomb,
You command us, buried in sin,
to rise with You from the dead.

5. As our eternal shepherd
You wash Your flock in the
waters of baptism, where souls
are cleansed and sins are buried.

6. And as our redeemer, fastened to the
cross that we ought to have suffered,
You gave Your blood to the last drop
as the price of our salvation.

7. That You, O Jesus, may be
the unending paschal joy of their minds,
from the dreadful death of misdeeds
free those reborn to life.

8. To God the Father be glory,
and to the Son who from the dead
arose, and to the Paraclete,
unto everlasting ages.

Archbishop Bagshawe • One of the translators featured in the Brébeuf Catholic Hymnal was an Oratorian priest who became a bishop: viz. Edward Bagshawe (d. 1915). Verse six is particularly beautiful, and here’s how it was rendered by Bagshawe:

Thou—though to us the Cross was due—
Wast nailed upon its sacred wood,
And for salvation’s price didst give,
Unsparingly Thy Precious Blood.

1 Rev. Francis A. Brunner, C.SS.R. was Professor of Theology at Saint Joseph’s College in Kirkwood, Missouri. This priest-musician is remembered primarily for his English translation of Father Josef A. Jungmann’s enormously lengthy Missarum Sollemnia. Ten years ago, CORPUS CHRISTI WATERSHED scanned that book and made it available as a free PDF file.

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

Filed Under: Articles Tagged With: Archbishop Bagshawe Roman Catholic Bishop of Nottingham, Carmen Gregorianum, Josef A Jungmann Missarum Sollemnia, Missarum Sollemnia, Rev Fr Adrian Fortescue Liturgy, Spanish Hymnal for Catholics Last Updated: April 17, 2025

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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 Michigan. —(Read full biography).

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Corpus Christi Watershed

President’s Corner

    PDF Download • “Polyphonic Extension” (Kevin Allen) for Gloria III
    EVIN ALLEN was commissioned by Sacred Music Symposium 2025 to compose a polyphonic ‘middle section’ for the GLORIA from Mass III (“Kyrie Deus sempiterne”). This year, I am traveling from Singapore to serve as a member of the faculty. I will be conducting Palestrina’s ‘Ave Maria’ as well as teaching plainsong to the men. A few days ago, I was asked to record rehearsal videos for this beautiful polyphonic extension:
    *  PDF Download • Gloria III ‘Middle Section’ (Kevin Allen)
    Free rehearsal videos for each individual voice await you at #24366. Instructions • This polyphonic composition fits ‘inside’ GLORIA III. That is to say, the congregation joins in the beginning and end, while the choir adds polyphony to the middle. To see exactly how this works, take a look at the congregational insert:
    *  PDF Download • Congregational Booklet (Gloria III)
    My colleague, Jeff Ostrowski, composed an organ accompaniment for this same GLORIA a few months ago. Obviously, the organist should drop out when the polyphony is being sung.
    —Corrinne May
    “Booklet of Eucharistic Hymns” (16 pages)
    I was asked to create a booklet for my parish to use during our CORPUS CHRISTI PROCESSION on 22 June 2025. Would you be willing to look over the DRAFT BOOKLET (16 pages) I came up with? I tried to include a variety of hymns: some have a refrain; some are in major, others in minor; some are metered, others are plainsong; some are in Spanish, some are in Latin, but most are in English. Normally, we’d use the Brébeuf Hymnal—but we can’t risk having our congregation carry those heavy books all over the city to various churches.
    —Jeff Ostrowski
    “Yahweh” in church songs?
    My pastor asked me to write a weekly column for our parish bulletin. The one scheduled to run on 22 June 2025 is called “Three Words in a Psalm” and speaks of translating the TETRAGRAMMATON. You can read the article at this column repository. All of them are quite brief because I was asked to keep within a certain word limit.
    —Jeff Ostrowski

Quick Thoughts

    Antiphons Don’t Match?
    A reader wants to know why the Entrance and Communion antiphons in certain publications deviate from what’s prescribed by the GRADUALE ROMANUM published after Vatican II. Click here to read our answer. The short answer is: the Adalbert Propers were never intended to be sung. They were intended for private Masses only (or Masses without music). The “Graduale Parvum,” published by the John Henry Newman Institute of Liturgical Music in 2023, mostly uses the Adalbert Propers—but sometimes uses the GRADUALE text: e.g. Solemnity of Saints Peter and Paul (29 June).
    —Corpus Christi Watershed
    When to Sit, Stand and Kneel like it’s 1962
    There are lots of different guides to postures for Mass, but I couldn’t find one which matched our local Latin Mass, so I made this one: sit-stand-kneel-crop
    —Veronica Brandt
    The Funeral Rites of the Graduale Romanum
    Lately I have been paging through the 1974 Graduale Romanum (see p. 678 ff.) and have been fascinated by the funeral rites found therein, especially the simply-beautiful Psalmody that is appointed for all the different occasions before and after the funeral Mass: at the vigil/wake, at the house of the deceased, processing to the church, at the church, processing to the cemetery, and at the cemetery. Would that this “stational Psalmody” of the Novus Ordo funeral rites saw wider usage! If you or anyone you know have ever used it, please do let me know.
    —Daniel Tucker

Random Quote

“I have devoted myself too much, I think, to Bach, to Mozart and to Liszt. I wish now that I could emancipate myself from them. Schumann is no use to me any more, Beethoven only with an effort and strict selection. Chopin has attracted and repelled me all my life; and I have heard his music too often—prostituted, profaned, vulgarized … I do not know what to choose for a new repertory!”

— Ferruccio Busoni (to a colleague in 1922, when he was 56 years old)

Recent Posts

  • PDF Download • “Polyphonic Extension” (Kevin Allen) for Gloria III
  • “Booklet of Eucharistic Hymns” (16 pages)
  • PDF Download • “Text by Saint Francis of Assisi” (choral setting w/ organ: Soprano & Alto)
  • “Yahweh” in church songs?
  • “Music List” • Pentecost Sunday

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