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Bach’s Well-Tempered Clavier (WTC) was not officially published until 1801. By that time, many hand-copied manuscripts had circulated through Europe. According to Charles Rosen: “Beethoven, at the age of 13, played the entire WTC in public.” His feat was published in the newspapers of that time. In my view, both books of the WTC—with a […]
Corpus Christi Watershed was sent this fascinating message vis-à-vis motets of Kevin Allen being sung in a Mass with 500+ altar servers present. If anyone has more information, we would love to hear more details about this event!
If you play nothing but the notes and chord highlighted by yellow in this passage from the “Haec Dies” Gradual, it’s quite ugly and dissonant. However, in the context of the stepwise descending bass-line, the LEMMENSINSTITUUT does not disappoint!
I’m attempting to record (on the pipe organ) any hymn contained in the Brébeuf Hymnal which doesn’t yet have its own rehearsal video with real voices. You can listen to my latest attempt: a hymn called DEVONSHIRE. For the second verse, I attempted to change the registration. Please let me know what you think. I […]
Not every hymn contained in the Brébeuf Hymnal has its own rehearsal video. In the meantime, I’m attempting to provide pipe organ recordings for the missing hymns. Today, I attempted to record COBLENZ, with a harmonization based on Sir Richard R. Terry. You can listen to my recording by clicking here. Whenever the record button […]
The University of Kansas has made available—as a free PDF document—this 2017 dissertation (113 pages) by Dr. Katherine Schmitz. The full title of the dissertation is: Chanting the Propers: A Comparative Study of Selected English Sources for the Catholic Mass. Dr. Schmitz is a Gregorian Chant scholar who has earned degrees from the University of […]
We are still searching for someone who can obtain for us a physical copy of either VOLUME 2 or VOLUME 8 of the accompaniments done by the LEMMENSINSTITUUT during the 1940s. Jeff’s personal copies were stolen.
One of the more colorful emails we’ve received: “Jeff, I often disagree with your articles, but let me give credit where credit is due. You are surely the only person I know who could somehow tie together John F Kennedy, Lyndon B Johnson, Senator Barry Goldwater, and sacred music!” [The article she references is called Must […]
In all seriousness, this article deals with some very dry topics. When I say “dry,” I mean technical (or even “boring”). Therefore, I wasn’t really expecting anyone to click on it. I was pleasantly surprised earlier this morning to see that it’s been one of our most highly downloaded articles over the last two weeks!
They say imitation is the highest form of flattery.
I’ve attempted to record the INTROIT for the Feast of Christ the King according to the official rhythm of the Catholic Church. You can view the YouTube recording of my attempt. Traditionally, our Savior’s “kingship” was celebrated as part of the Epiphany—but in 1925, Pope Pius XI created the “feast of Christ the King” to […]
My colleague, Richard J. Clark, has a little motto: The more time you spend on an article, the less people will care about it. I cannot claim to understand why certain articles gain more attention than others. For whatever reason, this recent article of mine has received an incredible amount of downloads. The full and […]
A reader sent us an email which was both thoughtful and articulate. Feeling it deserved a response, I published this article a few days ago. I included the full letter sent to us by the reader, but that’s not all. Indeed, the article became rather lengthy and touched upon a number of different themes. I […]
It’s very brief, but I think you would enjoy hearing Benno Moiseiwitsch (d. 1963) tell this really cool story about Sergei Rachmaninoff (d. 1943). Moiseiwitsch, whose playing was admired by Josef Hofmann, had studied with Theodor Leschetizky (d. 1915). I opened my recent article by speaking of a powerful quote Rachmaninoff gave to Robert Croan, […]
In case you missed it, many readers have enjoyed taking this little Quiz On Hymns. In the context of that article, I included a sensational quote about the Holy Mass by Monsignor Ronald Knox. Moreover, I talk about how Abraham Lincoln’s mother died, as well as a fabulous Eucharistic hymn by the Archbishop of Canterbury.
