HE VERY BEST lies always contain a grain of truth. For instance, radically progressive liturgists in the 1960s published a pamphlet called The Place of Music in Eucharistic Celebrations (1967). Infamous among church musicians for years, it was finally replaced in 2007 by Sing To The Lord. In spite of the clear words of SACROSANCTUM CONCILIUM, that bizarre 1967 pamphlet stated: “The musical settings of the past are usually not helpful models for composing truly liturgical pieces today.” And there is a grain of truth in that. Having spent decades providing music for Mass in both forms—EXTRAORDINARY and ORDINARY—I know a wise musician will approach each differently.1 Adding polyphony to the Novus Ordo can require a bit of creativity. That’s why I’ve been intrigued by Jeff Ostrowski’s advocacy of “choral extensions.”
Discovering Rare Music • Readers know my family traveled all across Europe during the summer. (Scroll to the bottom to see a photograph of my family meeting Pope Francis.) Traveling by car across France, we visited countless villages and towns: Versailles, the abbey of Solesmes, Fontenelle Abbey, and so forth. We sometimes came across mini-libraries inside or nearby the various churches. One in particular (not far from Ars-sur-Formans) contained some fascinating musical scores. Hiding amongst unpublished manuscripts by Énemond Moreau was a ‘choral enhancement’ for the Lord’s Prayer I knew Jeff would love.
Choral Enhancement • Jeff helped me convert it to a practical music score. Yesterday morning, I helped him create rehearsal videos for it. (I sang ALTO.) The best part about this piece is how the congregation sings along with the choir:
EQUAL VOICES : YouTube
SOPRANO : YouTube
ALTO : YouTube
TENOR : YouTube
BASS : YouTube
The Most Famous Chant • The English setting of the OUR FATHER isn’t ancient. The one who created it, Professor ROBERT J. SNOW (1926–1998), studied with Willi Apel at Indiana University. According to Larry Wolz:
Snow’s early professional career included service as a church choir director and music adviser to the American Council of Catholic Bishops during the controversial post–Vatican II years of the late 1960s. He also served as an editor for the World Library of Sacred Music publishers in Cincinnati from 1958 to 1974. Snow held academic appointments at the University of Notre Dame, the University of Illinois, Duquesne University, and the University of Pittsburgh before being appointed to the faculty at the University of Texas at Austin, where he taught from 1976 until his retirement in 1996.
Why would a Belgian composer set a piece written in English to music? I can only speculate. Everyone who lives in Belgium knows multiple languages: Flemish, French, German, and (increasingly) English. Without question, the OUR FATHER by Robert J. Snow is the most widely known “English plainsong” piece in the world.
The image below was taken a few months ago, when we met Pope Francis in Rome. I’m in a black dress, holding the camera:
A few images from our visit to the Abbey of Saint-Pierre de Solesmes:
1 By the way, I’m not saying this situation was intended; I’m just describing reality. Incidentally, that 1967 document (happily, now obsolete) is so progressive at times it’s almost grotesque. Consider this sentence, found towards the end of the document: “Songs like the psalms may create rather than solve problems.” Imagine saying something like that about the psalter! While I’m not a liturgical expert, I do know the PSALTER was the only hymnbook of the early church.
