Views from the Choir Loft

Novus Ordo Lectionary

A Literal Translation of the New Testament

Fr. David Friel · March 11, 2018 ·

David Bentley Hart’s experiment in recovering the conceptual vocabulary of a distant

Are the Readings at Mass Meant to Be Didactic or Doxological?

Fr. David Friel · July 17, 2016 ·

Reflections from the Fota IX International Liturgy Conference

All Nine Readings

Fr. David Friel · April 5, 2015 ·

Celebrating the Easter Vigil in Its Fullness

Improve Your Parish Liturgy … Instantly!

Jeff Ostrowski · March 17, 2015 ·

Have you noticed the change in atmosphere when people dress fancy, as opposed to tank tops with jeans?

Preparing Funeral Liturgies

Fr. David Friel · January 4, 2015 ·

Who Should Pick the Readings?

The Real Trouble With Missalettes

Jeff Ostrowski · July 14, 2014 ·

Did you catch that last quotation? “Unless proper readings are given.” What does that passage mean?

The “Children’s Liturgy of the Word”

Fr. David Friel · July 13, 2014 ·

Are We Past This Yet?

Problematic Sequence Translations In Our Current Lectionary

Jeff Ostrowski · June 2, 2014 ·

Are you bothered by the VANDALISM done to Lectionary Sequence translations?

PDF Download: Ordo Lectionum Missae & Ordo Cantus Missae

Jeff Ostrowski · May 5, 2014 ·

“…otherwise the entire Mass might be placed into the vernacular; whereupon the Council fathers burst into uproarious laughter.” — Cardinal Stickler speaking of Vatican II

Who Should Proclaim the Passion?

Fr. David Friel · April 13, 2014 ·

The “Circular Letter Concerning the Preparation and Celebration of the Easter Feasts”

Could Pope St. Pius X Sing?

“On 12 March 1908, the complete publication of the Roman Gradual was issued by the Vatican Press. On that very day, Dom Pothier solemnly presented the first copy to the Holy Father. A witness of the audience says that Pius X wished to be the first to see the new book; he opened it at random, at page 128 of the supplement pro aliquibus locis—it was the Introit of the new Feast of Our Lady of Lourdes. The Pope sang it with perfect taste to the last note.” (Catholic Choirmaster, February 1915)

—Jeff Ostrowski

Julius Bas Accompaniment

A very prolific harmonizer of Gregorian chant in the early 20th century was Mr. Julius Bas. He often uses a very strange technique, wherein he employs rests to eliminate the Alto, Tenor, and Bass voices. Consider what he did with “Lumen ad revelationem” here:

* JPEG • Lumen ad revelationem

It seems quite lazy, and I’ve never seen anyone else use such a technique, although Dr. Peter Wagner often switched to parallel octaves when he ran out of ideas… (Yuck!)

—Jeff Ostrowski

Hitting wrong notes

Fr. Valentine Young, OFM, used to say: “The organist can play 1,000 correct notes and one wrong note—and the only thing people will care about is the wrong note.” Last Sunday I hit some wrong notes, and felt bad. Then I remembered a story about Rudolf Serkin and started to chuckle. Charles Rosen (or was it Leon Fleisher?) told the story of Serkin playing a Beethoven Sonata in front of a large audience. The theme is all in octaves; but Serkin hit some wrong notes, and played parallel 7ths instead. This so unnerved him that every time the theme returned, he played the entire thing in parallel 7ths! We must remember that even the greatest hit wrong notes. Alfred Cortot, Vladimir Horowitz, Wilhelm Backhaus, Edwin Fischer, Sviatoslav Richter, Egon Petri—they all hit wrong notes, which we can hear on recordings. (Josef Hofmann was an exception, but he was super-human so he doesn’t count!)

—Jeff Ostrowski