Music List for Ascension - Guess where

Here is a (superb) music list for Ascension Thursday (a clue).

Where do you think it might be? Westminster Cathedral? Spanish Place? Farm St? London Oratory? Church of the English Martyrs, Cambridge? St Mary's Cathedral, Sydney?  Impossible - they all celebrate Ascension on Sunday (surely the policy of moving important feasts and solemnities to the nearest/following Sunday will one day come to an end?)

Whatever the venue, to sing Credo I you would have needed a book with a Kyriale inside (e.g. Graduale Romanum, Singing the Mass).  To sing the Propers, the choir would have needed the Graduale.  You would have heard them sing the exquisitely beautiful introit Viri Galilaei.

The other parts of the Ordinary were in Greek/Latin - from the delightful Rheinberger Cantus Missae.

It simply must have been in a Catholic church - any Catholic church, since this is the music that has pride of place in the Roman tradition, that constitutes a treasure of inestimable value.

If you had been present in Cambridge on Thursday 9 May 2013, it would have been all but your bounden duty (after having punted on the Backs) to attend this sung service, and you would have heard Catholic music given the pride of place that it so deserves.

You would have heard the Church's own music for Ascension, sung on Ascension (how novel).

You would have been at ... King's College.

Kudos to Stephen Cleobury and the staff of the college and chapel.

Great Bach Videos

The Osteroratorium, Philippe Herreweghe, Scholl as countertenor:

And for Ascension on Thursday (Sunday), the opening movement of the Himmelfahrtsoratorium, Tolzer Knabenchor - such splendid singing:

Funeral Service at St Paul's for Baroness Thatcher - Order of Service

(updated)

Today is the funeral in London of The Baroness Thatcher.  The music at St. Paul's Cathedral is provided by the Cathedral Choir directed by Andrew Carwood (formerly of the London Oratory, Brompton Road).

Download the Order of Service here.

The service is being streamed here.

The choir sang How lovely is thy dwelling place from Ein Deutsches Requiem by Brahms.

And here is the original in German (Wie lieblich sind deine Wohnungen):

The In paradisum is from Faure's Requiem.

REQUIEM aeternam dona ei, Domine, et lux perpetua luceat ei.

Sir Colin Davis - Requiescat in pace

News today that Sir Colin Davis has died at the age of eighty five (see here and here).  I fell in love with Mozart's Mass in C minor after listening to his recording on a CD I borrowed from my local library (a copy of which I now own). He was conducting the London Symphony Orchestra and Chorus.

My fondness for this recording extends beyond the performance to the venue - none other than Westminster Cathedral!  It was the first time I has cause to investigate this intriguing, red brick building, and my appreciation for the Cathedral has continued ever since.  (Classical music enthusiasts might be interested to know that Westminster Cathedral was also the venue for the world premiere recording of the Berlioz Messe Solennelle under the baton of Sir John Eliot Gardiner).  

The Mass in C minor:

The booklet states that the recording was made in February 1971 in Westminster Cathedral "by kind permission of Cardinal Heenan"

Actually, I had cause to reflect on Sir Colin's musical legacy as recently as last weekend.  The superb Choir of St Mary's Cathedral, Sydney, performed Handel's Messiah on Saturday night at Holy Name Church in the Sydney suburb of Wahroonga.  In preparation, I listened to a number of Messiah recordings that I have accumulated over the years.  First among them (in the chronology of recording dates) was Sir Colin's legendary 1966 recording with the LSO and Chorus (recorded in the famous Watford Town Hall - by all accounts a fabulous recording venue but in a less than salubrious locale).  The recording (along with that of the Antipodean Mackerras in 1967 with the English Chamber Orchestra) was trail blazing because it dispensed with the gargantuan vocal and instrumental forces that had characterised Handel performances up until that time.  Although Sir Colin (and in a sense Sir Charles) was skeptical about what he regarded as the period instrument "craze", in a sense he precipitated its impact.  

Here is the 1966 Messiah recording on Philips, in full:

Of course, by modern ears, even this recording will sound "dated", but it is still riveting listening.  

I will post shortly on the performance given by the St Mary's Cathedral Choir, who were accompanied by members of the Australian Chamber Orchestra and Sydney Symphony Orchestra - suffice it to say (in the interim) that it was a truly splendid performance.  I will also add a few comments about other recordings I have collected over the years (post dating the Davis one).  

Easter Vigil and Easter Sunday Masses from St Peter's Rome

View them here.

Easter Vigil (booklet here)

Easter Sunday (booklet here)

The Gloria from Mass I was sung superbly - listen to the men sing Jesu Christe at or about 26'50''.

Musical settings of the Credo

In the contemporary liturgical age, musical settings of the Credo are scarce.  The Roman Missal, Third Typical Edition has gone a considerable way to changing the liturgical ethos that spurned the sung Credo by adapting the melodies of Credos I and III to the English text of the Creed.  Chanted Credos should (in Latin in the first instance), and might one day again, be commonplace.

What, however, about the great repertory of polyphonic, orchestral and other choral settings of the Credo, amassed throughout the ages?  The current General Instruction seems to prevent such settings being used liturgically, as it mandates the Credo being sung by the whole congregation together, or alternatim (but not by the choir alone, in contrast to the Gloria).  

A musical setting of the Credo might actually bring alive that faith which the congregation is professing.  In Easter Time, does the Paschal Mystery resonate more when the Creed is merely recited, or when a setting like the following is sung?  I think particularly of the words Crucifixus etiam pro nobis, sub Pontio Pilato; passus et sepultus est.  Et resurrexit tertia die, secundum Scripturas.  

Are we depriving ourselves of a possible source of spiritual nourishment by preventing that which previous generations held dear (and which, in the final analysis, can only serve to support and illuminate the themes conveyed by the text)?

Our Lord's Passion at St Peter's

The full video of the Celebration of Our Lord's Passion at St Peter's Basilica, Rome, on 29 March 2013 is now available:

The choir is sounding great - listen to the men sing the Gradual (at 21'20''), followed the Passion, which was beautifully chanted.