Accompaniment for the ICEL Chant

The chants in the revised Roman Missal will be printed in missalettes and newly revised hymnals. In the meantime, accompaniment for the Missal is available at www.icelweb.org/musicfolder/openmusic.php.

Recently, Father Richard Hilgartner, executive director of the USCCB Secretariat for Divine Worship, clarified what “chant” means in the English translation of the General Instruction of the Roman Missal. In response to a recent question by Catholic News Service, he explained that “chant” is used in a “generic way, a translation of [the Latin] ‘cantus,’ ‘that which is sung.’ . . . [The General Instruction on the Roman Missal] is really talking about what texts are sung, not the musical form.”

He offered this explanation because some sites in the “blogosphere” are maintaining that “chant” means that only Gregorian chant is to be used, and only the processional antiphons provided in the Roman Missal (with appropriate psalms) are to be sung for the entrance, presentation of gifts, and Communion processions.

Hymnody is still among the options for processional music, so long as they are “suited to the sacred action, the day, or the time of year, [and] approved by the Conference of Bishops or the Diocesan Bishop” (General Instruction, 48). He added the word "song" was removed from the new General Instruction of the Roman Missal because "it sounds secular, even when it's preceded by 'liturgical.'"

And what, if anything, preceded chant? "Likely, it was hymnody because it was memorable," Father Hilgartner said. "St. Paul does that whole great hymn to Christ -- 'though he was in the form of God.' Is that early hymnody? Is that used liturgically? We don't really know. As one of my liturgy professors used to say, we've lost the videotape."

The brief report is available on the Catholic News Service web page available with this link.

EARLY USE OF SOME REVISED MASS TEXTS

MUSIC ONLY

PRIESTS and LITURGICAL MUSICIANS may practice for November 27th on their home desk computer.  Click on this site:  NPM

The National Pastoral Musicians (NPM) have provided recordings of music from The Roman Missal.  You will see a PDF file of the revised texts and can click on a recording of the chanted version of the text you view.

The musical settings of liturgical texts in The Roman Missal were prepared by the International Committee on English in the Liturgy (ICEL).  The only exceptions for the United States copy of the Roman Missal are the Christmas Proclamation and the setting of the Our Father by Robert Snow, which will appear in the U.S. edition of the Missal as the primary version along with the ICEL settings. 

ICEL has prepared an introduction to the music of the Roman Missal that explains the principles that were used in preparing these settings. Their copies of the musical settings (which you also see at npm.org) are located on their site:  ICELWEB.

GRADUAL INTRODUCTION OF MUSICAL SETTINGS

The USCCB has authorized the gradual introduction of some musical settings (Mass settings) of the Order of Mass.  Starting September 1, the bishops have said that, the Glory to God, Holy Holy, the memorial acclamations, the Amen, and Lamb of God may be introduced.  Although this authorization means that these sung texts may be used during the Mass, when the spoken text is used, permission is NOT granted to speak the same revised texts. In other words, if the Glory to God, Holy, and the Memorial Acclamation are recited, the current translation must be used.

The National Catholic Partnership on Disability (NCPD) will begin shipping CDs with the Roman Missal in large print for the visually challenged in September.  Here's the link:   NCPD Roman Missal.