Sacred, Beautiful & Universal

During my enforced lay-off from any service [so far] this Holy Week due to this infernal cold, I managed to watch a DVD that I'd received from the US a while ago, and never got around to looking at, until now.

It's interviews and edited highlights of the the nineteenth annual Sacred Music Colloquium, sponsored by the Church Music Association of America.

Whilst not everyone's cup of tea I suppose, it turned out to be one of the most fascinating and inspiring 56 minutes I've spent in front of the TV for ages. All I'll add here is if you're in the UK and you have ANY interest in Music & Liturgy [in either form of the Roman Rite] then you need to go here and buy one! Mine cost $30 which worked out at £20.42 including postage.

I think it's money well spent.

Go on, buy one.

Now.

And then we'll discuss the possibilities of such an event happening over here in the UK.

Holy Week & Easter

It's an, as yet, unfulfilled ambition of mine to sing Tenebrae in Holy Week. I just never seem to get the time off work to join others in singing this most wonderful solemn music, when it's been done in other parts of the country. The chances of it happening in Yorkshire are virtually nil at the moment. A few years ago, the then Schola Greg of Northumbria managed it at Fr Michael Brown's parish in Forest Hall, and if you're in or around Edinburgh do make the effort to go to the Metropolitan Cathedral where the St Andrew's & Edinburgh Schola will be singing.

Apart from Tenebrae, another ambition is to sing the Passion. Again this hasn't happened yet due to lack of time and people. Whilst it would be wonderful to have a polyphonic setting performed [liturgically of course], I'd quite happily settle for chant!

As for the Triduum, I'm at a loose end this year as there's not a lot happening musically in the York area. Last Year I took part in the first EF Triduum to be held in Yorkshire for several years, perhaps even since the 1960's. Sadly this isn't happening this weekend, but I know from my own experience in organising services, the difficulties that can be encountered purely from an admin point of view. It's bad enough to organise the Ordinary Form, so just imagine how much more difficult the EF is, especially when you have a full time job to do as well! It's well worth it though, and I hope that sometime in the future, we'll be able to do it again.

So, that leaves me a 'free agent' so to speak, and as the Orthodox/Byzantine Catholic Easter is the same as the West this year, I have plenty of options. The music programme at Leeds Cathedral is excellent, but I'm reluctant to go there because the older I get, the more claustrophobic I seem to become, and I'm pretty sure the place will be packed, which for me would be a very uncomfortable experience despite the music. I do intend to go back there occasionally to see how my choral successors are faring...

I shall certainly be at the Greek Orthodox Church in Leeds though for one or two services. If I can get there on Friday evening I'll be taking part in the SERVICE of EPITAPHIOS (Burial of The Lord & Harrowing of Hell). This is an amazing service in which the Epitaphion [tomb] is taken out in procession around the local streets surrounding the church, during which hymns are sung in Greek and English. I don't know if this happens in other Orthodox/Greek-Catholic churches, but if you're near a Greek Orthodox church, do see if they have this service. The one in Leeds commences at 6.30pm with the procession starting about an hour later.

I shall certainly be at the Greek Church on Sunday for VESPERS OF LOVE [Gospel in Many Languages], as I've been asked to read the Gospel in Latin (& possibly German too if nobody else there will do it!) This is always followed by what can only be described as the 'mother of all barbecues' and has to be seen [& tasted] to be believed!

What I'll probably miss out on though is the Resurrection Liturgy which starts at 10.30pm and goes on for 4 hours. Another awesome experience, especially when 'Christos Anesti' is sung, but I don't want to be out that late as I'm not in the best of health right now, and need to be in tip-top condition, or as close to it as possible, for the following weekend as I'm singing for a Solemn Nuptial Mass [OF] in Glasgow, followed immediately by the EF Training Conference at Ushaw!
(See here for details of the services that are readily accessible to the public. ALL Services will be open to anyone, but I can't imagine too many visitors in the chapel at 8.00am for Lauds, or 9.30pm for Compline!)

I'm told the services at Ampleforth are worth going to, so may just go there for the Vigil, though I note that it's also likely to be beyond midnight when it finishes - but probably not 2.30am!

Wherever you are, may I wish you a Blessed final few days of Holy Week, and a very Happy Easter. I'll try not to over-indulge on the Lamb on Sunday afternoon, perhaps just 5 courses should suffice! ;-)

More About Hymns

I've had some response from my last note about hymns. It's always nice to receive feedback, proof it seems that I have more readers than I thought! Let me just quote from one which came via Facebook.

"while I do think the 19th century Hymns by Faber, Wiseman etc gave us a rich devotional heritage it is far more Liturgical to sing Mass"

My response to this may come as a surprise considering what I wrote previously as I'm not as 'anti-hymn' as I appear to be. Believe it or not, but I actually like hymns too, and generally from the same era as Matt who posted the above comment. A recording I made in the early 1990's with a group of singers called the 'St Anne's Singers of Leeds' of wonderful hymns purloined from the Leeds Catholic Hymnal, the St Andrew Hymnal, [where can I get full music editions of these?], and the Parish Hymn Book is partly responsible for sowing the seeds which later bore fruit in the Rudgate Singers.

I'm going to quote something else now, from the forward to the great Parish Hymn Book which, in my opinion, was the last of the great Catholic hymnals before the publication of the Catholic Hymn Book some 30+ years later.

"We may never again see those crowded congregations at evening service - rosary, sermon and Benediction - but we shall still have crowded churches. There is nevertheless regret among the clergy and all who loved congregational singing that the day of popular devotions seems to be gone...

... Mass has become the popular devotion...

...The new Parish Hymn Book is welcome because it will halt the decline of congregational singing. Soon we shall have vernacular versions of the Mass in new musical settings but we shall not have completely satisfactory words and music for the Mass until after a long period of experiment. Meanwhile the English tradition of hymn-singing will be preserved by singing at Mass and at the new type of Service."

These words were written by Cardinal Heenan back in May 1966. How times have changed! It seems to me though that the use of hymns (good, bad, ancient, modern) has now taken over so much that in most parishes up and down the country, the '4 hymn sandwich' has become the staple musical diet within the Latin Rite Catholic Liturgy. I'll leave you to dwell upon the level of congregational singing & musical settings for the Mass, should you actually have the latter in your Parish! The Eastern Liturgy, for those of you lucky enough to experience it, is a different ball game entirely. By mentioning the classic hymn sandwich, I think I've come more or less back to my original point made in the previous posting. More thoughts would be welcome!

Hymns

Those of you who know me are probably aware that I'm not the greatest fan of hymns in the Extraordinary Form Mass, preferring, where possible, that the Mass should be sung, rather than have singing at Mass. I've heard of similar arguments for the same to apply for the OF too, mostly falling on deaf ears locally. How many parishes do you know of that still rely on the '4 hymn sandwich'? Fortunately I'm not regularly called on to provide music for OF liturgies [yet, the last one I did, being Whit Sunday nearly 2 years ago], I'm busy enough as it is, with the EF in the North of England, not just York!

Nevertheless, I can't help noticing that when the York EF Masses have been sung, there has been an increase in attendance. Coincidence? These are of course hymnless, bearing in mind that the Mass is sung - either chant or polyphony and always concluding with the seasonal Marian Antiphon, a habit I first picked up when singing with the Leeds Schola Gregoriana some 20+ years ago. The Low Masses though, have a dreadful attendance record generally, and I can't help but think that there's a musical [or lack of] connection here.

Of course, the Mass being at 6:30pm on a Sunday evening, isn't helpful, because some people don't like coming out on dark evenings. There is also the shameful polemicised prejudice in Greater York [especially amongst some of the clergy] against *anything* connected to the EF or even the official language of the Church! (This despite all the initiatives coming out of Rome under this Pontificate...)

I've also heard arguments for/against music [any kind, not necessarily just hymnody] from those who attend the EF on occasion. It's interesting [to me at least!] to note that those who prefer quiet Low Masses are much older than those, considerably younger than me (!) who would like some music - even suitable hymns during Low Mass, which brings me back on topic!

Since October, when the EF Masses resumed in York, there have only been 2 Sung Masses so far. All the others have been Low Masses without any music except occasionally the appropriate Marian Antiphon sung at the end. Following last weekends highly successful Missa Cantata, which almost doubled the congregation, I've decided to introduce some music for the Low Masses during Lent. Not that controversial [I hope!] at first, as I'm starting with the Lent Prose, which amazingly is in the hymn book the parish uses, a vernacular hymn at Communion, and concluding with the seasonal Marian Antiphon, Ave Regina Caelorum.

I know I'm going to get some criticism from some quarters, because it's impossible to please everybody.

Wish me luck!

Singers needed.

Can I ask a favour? I know this blog doesn't attract the thousands of visitors that other great bloggers receive [see bloglist on the right!], but it does get a fair few regular visitors, and I'm now going to prevail upon you, or more particularly, your networking skills. :-)

For the second year running, there is to be a clergy training course in the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite [Traditional Latin Mass] at Ushaw College, in Durham. This year, it's from 12th-16th April & I've been given the unenviable task of organising the music & getting the singers together - most of which is done.

So far, I've planned for 3 Solemn High Masses, 2 other Sung Masses, Lauds [x4], Solemn Vespers once, ordinary sung Vespers twice and other services including Compline. Where I'm asking for a bit of help is regarding the Mass scheduled for 11.00am on the Thursday [15th April]. This will be a Solemn Memorial Requiem with the music planned being Victoria à 6. (The same music Rudgate sang in Scunthorpe in November last year.

We can't afford to hire a choir because the LMS [Conference organisers] have only budgeted for one choir who will be singing for the final High Mass the following day, & I certainly can't afford to hire singers - I drive a 10 year old rusting VW Polo for heaven's sake! [and that only because my even older , limited edition, beloved Skoda Felicia Bohemia was written off in an RTC in Leeds by an uninsured driver, just after I'd sung for the Easter Vigil.] But I digress.

This leaves me running around trying to find people who want to come & sing this wonderful music. What *can* be offered, provided I know in good time is accommodation @ Ushaw [bearing in mind the start time] & all meals. Some Rudgates have already valiantly taken a day off work and are coming to sing. Other singers will already be at Ushaw, as we're part of the Schola in residence. That leaves me looking for at least 3 Sopranos, 1 or 2 Altos and 1 Tenor. We already have 4 basses signed up!

If you know of anyone who might be interested & potentially available, bearing in mind that it's a work day for most people, I'd be delighted to hear from you via the Comments box!

London Calling.

I used to hate London, but am now beginning to rather like the place - in small doses. For a city which I've usually visited only once in blue moon, to have been there 3 times in the last 7 months to me, speaks for itself.

This time it was for the launch of the Gregorian Chant Network at the end of January. Various accounts have appeared in the blogosphere already, so I won't repeat what's been written there. I will add, that I thought it quite appropriate that other organisations besides the LMS [who hosted the event] were represented, who do not, as a rule, have the same opinion on the EF held by most of us present.

Gregorian Chant is still the official music of the Roman Rite (in BOTH FORMS) and I'm personally quite fed up of people with their heads buried so deep in the sand who think it should be exclusively associated with the EF. (These generally tend to be people who either love or hate the Extraordinary Form with equal fervour!) Despite my preference for the EF, I'm more than happy to get involved with OF liturgies, either directly, as a singer, or indirectly by offering advice or by going to listen and supporting other singers. This applies to other choral music too. How are we going to encourage the use of Gregorian Chant & other good quality sacred music in parishes if we think it's our exclusive preserve?

I was particularly keen to hear that several cathedrals are using the Chant more often, although there is still a distinct bias towards South/Central England. I can only think of Leeds in N/NE England that is taking Chant seriously alongside other good Liturgical music, though I'm quite happy to stand corrected if that's not the case. That said, it's still good to hear, and I'm very much in favour of the proposed idea to have Regional Chant workshops in our cathedrals [led by the Cathedral Directors?] where details of local choirs/scholas such as ourselves can be provided should people who attend wish to take their interest further and start singing on a regular basis.

Putting Gregorian Chant aside, I'm also, as some of you know, very fond of the Eastern Rites. After leaving the Oratory, roydosan, [my host for the weekend] & I went up the road to the Russian Orthodox Cathedral for the Vigil Service of the Sunday of the Prodigal Son - all 2½ hours of it(!) accompanied by some excellent, virtually non-stop singing in both Church Slavonic & English by only a handful of chanters. Much praise is due, & if I knew who was in charge of the music there I'd write to them to let them know!

The Byzantine theme continued on Sunday with a visit to the Ukrainian Catholic Cathedral. This was an experience not to be missed. Although there were only 3 chanters, they had only to intone various parts of the Liturgy and we were suddenly engulfed by the sound of the entire congregation joining in - in harmony! Considering there were about 300-400 people present, you can imagine what that must have sounded like... For those of you who want to see/hear genuine participation without it being forced on you in the misguided mindset of 'Community', go along to your nearest Ukrainian Catholic or Orthodox church and prepare to be overwhelmed! The Poles, to be fair, are pretty good too, but the Roman Rite - in either form - doesn't really allow for the same experience because of the way it's structured. Other Byzantine Rites could potentially do the same of course, but in my experience, Greek, Russian & Romanian congregations just remain silent and let the chanters or choir get on with singing the Liturgy along with the clergy.

I would have liked to have stayed longer, but had a train to catch in order to sing Vespers of Septuagesima Sunday back in York, which in the end didn't happen due to the train breaking down - twice! Still, a pretty good weekend, and I'm looking forward to the next one. :-)

Wassail!

I'm off out to dinner this evening. To be precise, a three course meal with music provided by the excellent Ebor Singers. To quote directly from the invitation...

"if you wish to celebrate the end of Christmas in style, join us for our Wassail Dinner 2010, on Saturday 16 January at the Merchant Taylors Hall, for a 3-course meal, music, readings, and our own Mummers Play - if you think you've seen the choir perform, think again!"

I've been to these before, and it's always been a splendid evening's entertainment with a good meal provided too!

For those of you unfamiliar with Wassailing traditions in this country, any Google search should soon put that right. Here's an excerpt from a site I came across.

Wassailing

Wassailing has been associated with Christmas and New Year as far back as the 1400s. It was a way of passing on good wishes among family and friends.

What is Wassail?

Wassail is an ale-based drink seasoned with spices and honey. It was served from huge bowls, often made of silver or pewter. The Wassail bowl would be passed around with the greeting, 'Wassail'.

There are three main ways of wassailing.

The filling of a common bowl or cup often referred to as a 'Loving Cup' and passing it around a room to be shared.

Taking a bowl of Wassail around houses

A celebration of the apple harvest and the blessing of the fruit or trees.

Where does the name Wassail come from?

Wassail gets its name from the Old English term "waes hael" meaning "be well" It was a Saxon custom that, at the start of each year, the lord of the manor would shout 'waes hael'. The assembled crowd would reply 'drinc hael' meaning 'drink and be healthy'.

As time went on, the tradition was carried on by people going from door to door, bearing good wishes and a wassail bowl of hot, spiced ale. In return people in the houses gave them drink, money and Christmas fare (special foods eaten during Christmas time e.g. mince pies) and they believed they would receive good luck for the year to come.

What was in the Wassail?

The contents of the bowl varied in different parts of the country, but a popular one was known as 'lambs wool'. It consisted of hot ale, roasted crab apples, sugar, spices, eggs, and cream served with little pieces of toast. It was the toast floating on the top that made it look like lamb's wool.

A Wassailing Carol

One of the most popular Wassailing Carols went like this:

Here we come a-wassailing

Among the leaves so green,

Here we come a-wassailing,

So fair to be seen:

Love and joy come to you,

And to you your wassail too,

And God bless you and send you,

A happy New Year,

And God send you,

A happy new year.

There's more, all from this site which you can explore at your own leisure, but I think this gives you a rough idea of what the evening will be about! Should be great fun, but I can't be too late back because I'm going over to Gtr Manchester tomorrow to celebrate Theophany (incidentally the traditional date of celebrating "Wassail" in the Old English Calendar!) with my Ukrainian friends now that the weather's improved.

Until next time...

Waes hael!

Frustrated again....

I am not happy. Having booked 3 days leave ages ago in order to celebrate Christmas according to the Julian Calendar with my Ukrainian friends - what happens? We get the worst winter for nearly 30 years! Needless to say, venturing across to the other side of the Pennines on 7th January was a non-starter, hence my disappointment yet again, having previously missed out on the only Solemn High Mass of Christmas [Midnight] in the EF to be celebrated in Yorkshire (& quite possibly the entire North of England.) I shall make up for missing out on the Ukrainian celebrations by going to the Ukrainian Cathedral in London at the end of the month. It will be the Sunday of the Prodigal Son by then, so not quite the same as Christmas, but as it will also be my first Byzantine Catholic Liturgy since June, I'm not going to lose any sleep over it! ;-)

I'm in London principally to attend this, believed to be the first meeting of its kind. Looking at the map that Joseph has so kindly created (& put a lot of work into), it's quite clear that there's a distinct lack of organised singers who provide music for the EF in North/North-East England. There are other groups around, I can think of one on South Tyneside, the Leeds Schola Gregoriana - the first chant only group that I joined over 20 years ago & the fledgling Schola founded by the indefatigable Fr Bill Charlton based at North Ormesby whose name escapes me at the moment. The harsh reality is though, that the only opportunity for people to hear a Chant Mass in either form with the full Propers taken from the Graduale Romanum or Liber Usualis is from groups like ourselves who travel miles to sing by invitation & therefore put a lot of hard work & money into ensuring that the services are given the due musical solemnity that they deserve.

Still on Chant matters, I had intended to resume the chanting og Compline & Vespers last week also, but due to the weather, postponed that to this week instead. At least it gave me an opportunity to change the times, bringing them more into line with what I'd originally intended. So, Compline will now be at 9pm on Fridays, and Sunday Vespers will be at 5pm. (Term-time only unless my arm's twisted by people desperate to take part....) Whether anyone actually turns up remains to be seen. As I've mentioned here before, York is a very secular city when it come to chant (& polyphony too) in it's proper context. The concert venues thrive with superb performances by the many talented choirs in the area. We also have the National Centre for Early Music here, as well as an excellent music department in the University, but the only full churches you're likely to see will be at Carol Services, or for sheer snob-value, the Minster at major Festivals. (The regular Minster congregation are completely exempt from this criticism!)

OK. Mini-rant over. Let's hope the meeting at the end of January bears the seeds of a gradual recovery to get quality music, not just chant, back into churches where it belongs.

Happy New Year!

A day late maybe, but as this is the first entry, still justified methinks. In the month plus since I last managed to write anything here, I've recovered most of the work, photos, music and other files which were almost disastrously lost after what I now call the great crash.

Unfortunately all my work for the LMS Ushaw Conference bit the proverbial dust, so I've had to recreate all the planned services, which for added insurance purposes, I've now uploaded to my webspace! This is provisional at the moment, as some things may change, but the work is done so any minor alterations will be relatively easy. 'Tis a great relief to be at this stage now because last year I beat the publishing deadline for the booklet by only two days....

I have a large chunk of spare time now which I can devote to other things before I get around to preparing full music folders for the resident singers. We hope to have two full scale polyphonic Masses this year, and even polyphony [motets] during the chant Masses too. It promises to be magnificent!

So, I now plan to spend a bit more time reading [I have a pile of books, which at this rate will take me a decade to get through!], writing here more often & indulging in taking more photographs - not necessarily of church events, but I've just noticed that my set from St Alphonsus' North Ormesby have been published on their new website. Do go and take a look. Fr Bill Charlton is a wonderful priest who deserves all the support we can possibly give him.

I had hoped to be there for Midnight Mass, but unfortunately fog descended in the Vale of York, so it was to my intense frustration, but common sense prevailed - a 100 mile round trip at night in freezing fog is not to be recommended!

The Rudgates were busy just before Christmas though at our now Annual Carol Service. We did have a group photo taken beforehand, but I've yet to receive this from the photographer, so you''ll just have to make do with my mobile snapshot just before the service started of the East End.

It was, another huge success, and has given us the nice headache of "how do we follow that?" Well, I've already got some wonderful pieces for Next Year....

The full choir now has some respite between now and April, when we hope to persuade as many as possible to come and sing Victoria's glorious Requiem for 6 voices in the equally glorious St Cuthbert's chapel at Ushaw. It's a working day fo most people, and as the Mass is scheduled for 11.00am it means, taking a day's holiday. I'm pushing it like mad at the moment in the hope that we can get the required quorum. If the worst comes to the worst, we've always got the chant Requiem, but the Victoria would be just stunning in that location.

However, that said, we are trying to get a full choral Mass in York for the Chair of Peter on 22nd Feb. Depending on the church, & the availability of people it may or may not happen as it's a Monday evening & we'd be relying on quite a few people - not least our choral Director travelling many miles to York & back home again before work the following day. Watch this space..

Chant-wise Compline resumes on 8th January followed by Sunday Vespers on the 10th. Before then, I'm switching calendars to celebrate with the Ukrainians on the 7th, so if you use the Julian Calendar instead of the Gregorian, Happy Christmas for Thursday!

Back to normal? We'll see!

I've just spent the best part of the last month gradually restoring my data, music and photo files which went AWOL when my External Hard Drive crashed. [That's in excess of 40,000 files!] Unfortunately, some have been lost, including a chant responsory arranged by yours truly - the first time I'd ever arranged a piece of music for public performance, and now you'll never know how good it was. ;-) Also lost is all the work I'd done so far for Ushaw next year. :-( Very frustrating, but as most of this years files actually survived, I've got the foundations, as it were, to rebuild what I'd done, making the necessary changes to reflect the different dates in April next year, as the conference is a week earlier. It helps that the first day is going to be exactly the same!

Depending on numbers in the choir, we may even introduce some polyphony in the first 3 days. We certainly hope to have a polyphonic Requiem on the Thursday if enough Rudgates can be persuaded to take a days leave to sing the Victoria Requiem a 6 which went down so well in Scunthorpe.

The final Mass will definitely be polyphony, as we'll be booking a choir from the local area to sing. (We'll still have the Proper to to...) Palestrina's Missa Aeterna Christi Munera is the favourite at this stage. It's all looking very good planning wise. I just need to recreate the lost Orders of Service and add Thursday & Friday. Simple to write about, but I know there'll be much slaving away over a hot computer before it's finished. It took over 60 hours to do last time - and then I noticed the mistakes I'd failed to spot in the preparation... With the benefit of experience, there shouldn't be any this time! Famous last words. ;-) I'm tempted to say that't I'll buy drinks for the first person to spot one, but that might be a tad too risky. Can't wait for next April though. It'll be wonderful!

Ushaw apart, life is as hectic as ever. I've been involved with my sister's choir, taking photographs of their last concert for the choir website - yet to be launched, and have temporarily joined another choir to help them out with their major Christmas Concert, as they're short of Basses.

As if that wasn't enough, there are plans for the first sung Extraordinary Form Mass in York for a year. It will be our priests first sung Mass, so we hope it will be a success. We also have our Annual Carol Service to look forward to on 21st December.

Planning all this keeps me out of mischief I suppose!

Victoria's Requiem a 6

One of my favourite pieces ever is Victoria's Requiem for 6 voices. We were

privileged to sing this last Saturday at Holy Souls' Church, Scunthorpe.

Apart from the repeat of 'Quam Olim' in the Offertory - which very few people seem

to have been prepared for, despite the rehearsal, it went very well. It's a shame that

more people weren't there though. We now hope to repeat this for Remembrance

Sunday next year. I'm also hoping that it will be sung, either by us, or some other

group during the next LMS Priestly Training Conference at Ushaw, next April. It will

sound glorious in St Cutbert's Chapel! Here's an excerpt purloined from Youtube.

If you don't know the piece, then I recommend you check Amazon, or your favourite

supplier and get yourself a recording!

Our next fully choral service will be our Annual Carol Service @ Bishophill, always

well attended. We're looking forward to it even more this year, as it will be followed

by out first organised Christmas Party!

Music Matters.

No sooner am I back from holiday and back at work in 'the day job' then I manage to get involved in musical events of one form or another! I've already written about the EF Missa Cantata in Howden for which I'm providing the music along with one or two other 'volunteers' [I didn't even cross their palms with silver, although it may cost me a pint or two later!]

More importantly, someone's coming to York, and it's not Pope Benedict - at least not yet anyway. I am of course, referring to the visit of the

Relics of St Thérèse of Lisieux

to York Minster

Many things have been said about this, some quite controversially, as the Minster is one of two non-Catholic venues, the other being the chapel of Wormwood Scrubs Prison. There are various services and events being planned in the Minster itself, but there will be at least one musical event taking place elsewhere, as all the good time slots have been taken already. :-(

I [and a few others I hope!] will be singing 2nd Vespers for the Feast of

St Thérèse of Lisieux

at the church of St Mary, Bishophill Jnr - our regular venue for Chant Vespers & Compline.

The idea came about because a few of us want to to *something* connected to St Thérèse on her Feast Day whilst the relics are in York. We didn't think that the Ecumenical Service of thanksgiving for the Malines Conversations of 1921 to 1927 was really appropriate...

Thanks, to Fr Elias, the previous Carmelite Chaplain to the University of York, we're going to commemorate the visit with, we hope, a service that's a little bit, well, more appropriate! He very kindly copied and sent me chants from the Carmelite Office for her Feast Day, which I'm supplanting with Gregorian Chant and chant from the Use of York for the final Marian Antiphon. If you're in the York area that evening, please do come along. Our service is at 7.30pm, a little late for Vespers I know, but I've got to account for people who are at work and travelling some distance to be with us.

The following day, there is a Mass in the Zouche Chapel to which all are welcome, but I wanted to do something specifically on her Feast Day whilst the relics are in York, hence Vespers.

[I know that in the EF Calendar the Feast isn't until 3rd October, but I'm not getting into that argument here!]

Le 'Mini-Tour'

It's been almost a week now since I returned from holiday. I turned the invitation to sing for Brother Lawrence Lew's Solemn Profession into an even greater opportunity for me to get a few days away and even spend some time in France and quick visit to London before heading back to York.

I won't bore you with details, suffice to say that the week started in Oxford and ended with an Extraordinary Form Mass at the church of Our Lady of the Rosary, Blackfen. Some of you may already know the Parish Priest. :-) If you want to experience a sung EF Mass in a normal parish setting, then I strongly recommend that you visit at least once! It was a pleasure to meet Mac again, who I hadn't seen since the Pontifical High Mass at Westminster Cathedral last year. It was also wonderful to meet so many others including Patricius, whose blog Singulare Ingenium is now well and truly bookmarked!

Between Oxford & Blackfen, I managed to spend some time in Kent, replenishing my stock of Real Cider with some excellent stuff from Badgers Hill Farm which I cannot recommend highly enough. I've been here once before and the quality is as good as ever. I also took the opportunity to do a little Channel Hopping over to France, where I visited Lille [where I sang whilst in Leeds Cathedral Choir] and brought back copious amounts of Rosé wine, which even accounting for the not so favourable exchange rate, was still a bargain due to the fact that French duty on alcohol is so much less than ours is here in the UK.... I almost ended up stranded in Belgium at one point due to misreading my French railway timetable, but that's another story!

All in all, a good trip. Photos can be seen here.

Brinkburn, 2009

I got home from Northumberland at about 5.30pm. After a 7.00am start, a round trip of 230+ miles including singing, I promptly nodded off for a few hours! The TV was on in the background, & I vaguely remember something about Slovenia scoring at Wembley..

Now awake again, but not completely refreshed [I'm going to have some more tea in a minute, which will probably keep me up half the night, but never mind!] I thought I'd post some photos taken at Brinkburn earlier today. It was, as ever, a fabulous occasion, and the music was very enthusiastically received. I'm already looking forward to next year, when we hope to sing the Tallis Mass we'd planned for this year until a shortage of Tenors this weekend made us alter our plans.

I'm having a well earned rest first thing tomorrow, & not doing anything remotely musical until Vespers @ Bishophill in the evening. I'll write more about this later, as, at the moment, it's only a trial to see how we like it.

Anyway here are some of the photos from this afternoon.

More can be found here.

Plans after Brinkburn

My apologies for not posting as often as I should. I can't believe it's over two months, since I last wrote anything here...

Anyway, first things first, the excellent Fr Brown has already written about the Brinburn Solemn High Mass here, so there's little more for me to add, other than that it should be a splendid occasion.

Afterwards, and after my holiday [which begins with a trip down to Oxford to sing for the Solemn Profession of a Dominican friend of mine whom I've known since he was a choral scholar in Leeds Cathedral Choir], there are musical plans afoot in Yorkshire. For those of you reading this whom I've already emailed, this is the same information! For everyone else here goes...

I know this will appeal to some more than others, so I crave your indulgence, if you're not too interested in Chant. I wonder how many people may be free on the 29th September [Tuesday evening]. There is to be a Mass at the Church of the Sacred Heart, Howden at 7.30pm. We need singers for the Missa de Angelis. At the moment, Seishi [one of our most enthusiastic Schola Members] & I are singing the Propers, but more voices would of course be welcome! If there's a decent quorum, we could even try & sing the Dering Panis Angelicus again which will be sung at Brinkburn + possibly Isti Sunt Sancti also. We sang both pieces in Everingham on Michaelmas Day 2000.

On Thursday the same week 1st October, many of you will know that the relics of St Therese of Lisieux will be coming to York Minster. I'm proposing that our Schola sings 2nd Vespers that day which is her Feast Day in the New Calendar. I've been given the Carmelite Chants for the Antiphons & Hymn by a Carmelite Monk & very good friend of mine who some of you know, as he was the previous Catholic Chaplain to the University of York. It would be great though if some people could come along & sing the psalms with us. They're not difficult, as they'll be straightforward Gregorian tones which I can provide but only if I know you're coming! The venue for this will most likely be St Mary's, Bishophill Jnr, as it's most unlikely we'd get into the Minster, as all the good time slots are already taken. The time for this will most likely be 7.30 as well, which is the latest time I dare contemplate starting Vespers!

Looking beyond October, the full choir are booked to sing a memorial Requiem in Scunthorpe on 7th November and the Annual Carol Service in Bishophill on 21st December. New members will of course be very welcome, so please feel free to point interested singers [especially Tenors] in our direction!

For those intrepid souls who are free on Christmas Eve, and fancy being part of what will probably be the only Midnight Solemn High Mass of Christmas in the entire North-East of England & Yorkshire, please let me know. The drawback [for some] is that it's in North Ormesby where we sang in June! Plans are currently the Missa de Angelis again, [as well as the Propers] but if enough singers are free & want to take part, there may be a possibility of some polyphony. I'm meeting the parish priest, Fr Bill Charlton again on the 8th after the Haydn Mass for Our Lady's Birthday, so may know a little more about what else is planned for Christmas then.

Looking forward to seeing some of you this Saturday at Brinkburn, & everyone else soon!

Music Workshops

After having experienced drivel masquerading as Liturgical Music in so-called 'choir festivals' back in the 1980's, this comes across as a very refreshing change!

How long will it be before our own musicians can be persuaded to do something along similar lines?

Many thanks to Joseph Shaw for spotting the link.

A Tale of two Chant Performances

Last weekend I went down to London for the Annual High Mass of the LMS. Much of what went on has already been reported here and here, so I'm not going to regale you with another version of official events, but instead offer my thoughts on the music.

The choir of Westminster Cathedral are renowned world-wide for the quality and standard of their musicianship, as can recently be evidenced by the Installation of Archbishop Nichols, so it was a shame, but not totally unexpected that we only got the Lay Clerks this year. Even though there was no Cardinal this time, surely it would have been fitting to hire the full choir for the principal Mass of the LMS's year? Money, I'm fairly certain, shouldn't have been an issue - should it? :-)

Back to the music. The Ordinary of the Mass was Duruflé's Missa 'Cum Jubilo' with the Chant Propers for the Saturday Mass of the BVM. I have to admit that I felt thoroughly deflated. My friend, roydosan who I stayed with for the weekend, offers his thoughts here. Normally I would agree, but if the Chant Mass suggested was sung as operatically as the Propers were on Saturday, I'd have been tempted to stick cotton wool in my ears and just follow the Mass visually! Honestly, it felt like listening to Pavarotti! I've sung in Westminster Cathedral myself, and whilst not a professional singer, am certainly no mug, and definitely don't think the music, particularly the Chant, came across at all well.

Now, on to Sunday. As roydosan had never been to a Byzantine Catholic Liturgy before, we decided to go to the Ukrainian Catholic Cathedral in the morning - a much more satisfying experience! The choir sang music which I am largely familiar with, so I felt quite at home here. I particularly enjoyed listening to the old man in front of me singing from memory - and in time - the Bass line to some of the major choral parts of the Liturgy, even though the choir were in another part of the building!

After a brief visit to St Patrick's, Soho Square, a quite outstanding church, and lunch in Chinatown, we ended up at the Oratory for Sunday Vespers & Benediction. This was simply superb, marred only by the woman in the front pew who insisted on standing throughout Benediction when everyone else, including clergy of course were kneeling...

My faith in the singing of Gregorian Chant was completely restored, not only because the Oratory Choir proved that you don't have to sing like one of the Three Tenors[!], but also because of the tempi at which the psalms in particular were sung. I've often been accused of singing chant far too quickly, but after hearing this performance (also sung by professionals btw), I feel completely vindicated. :-) If anyone accuses me of singing too quickly now, I can just reply by saying "well, the London Oratory Choir chants just as quickly, if not quicker." Thanks, guys!

Sunday was super (It's a shame that Saturday's experience was so disappointing), and has inspired me to make Sunday Vespers in York actually happen instead of just thinking about it, which I've been doing for far too long now! It's my intention that this will become the main Rudgate Schola service at Bishophill from September instead of Compline. (You saw it here first!) I'll decide on a time later, when I find out what's happening with the York TLM also scheduled to restart in September, as I don't want the services to clash for the obvious reason that I'm likely to be involved in both of them! I do quite like the idea of 3.30pm though, as is the custom in London.

That's it for now - back to nursing the blisters I acquired whilst walking around London at the weekend...

Reminder. Missa Cantata *this* Saturday!

For those of you able to go, we have a Missa Cantata this Saturday at 3pm in the church of St Alphonsus, North Ormesby, Middlesbrough for the Patronal Feast of the Diocese, Our Lady of Perpetual Succour. The Mass will be sung by the full choir who will sing Palestrina's Missa 'Veni Sponsa Christi' with motets by Elgar and Croce. The Gregorian Chant Propers for the feast will be sung, and the Mass will conclude with the singing of the Solemn Salve Regina.

Please do come if you can, and encourage others to do so!

A further note: we desperately need servers for this Mass! Please email me via the choir's link if you are able to serve.

Thank you.

Admin. *Sigh....*

Having a website for the choir is great, but can be rather time-consuming, especially with regard to dates and events. I know I should try and update it more regularly so when I eventually do get around to working on it, it wouldn't take me ages each time to bring it back up to date!

Anyway, the current version can be seen in the links to the right of this blog, or here if you prefer!

There are also a couple of photo sets on Flickr which may be of interest. Forthcoming Rudgate Services is a bit like the Ronseal Ad, in other words, contains photos of the next venues of our 'forthcoming services'. Rudgate Venues is quite literally, a selection of churches, cathedrals and other locations where we have appeared over the years.

After Saturday's successful Mass in Halifax, I'm quite looking forward to - in a manner of speaking - putting my feet up and listening to someone else do all the work. :-) In this case, it's the St Philip Neri Singers, based at the Holy Name in Manchester who are singing a Mozart EF Mass tomorrow evening. I'm not back at work yet, so a leisurely train ride via a liquid [and food as well!] lunch at the legendary Buffet Bar @ Stalybridge, followed by the Mass itself. A recipe for a good day out!

Some Good News! Young Catholic Adults Douai Abbey Retreat Gets Bigger and Better

These are thoroughly recommended, though I don't personally get to go as I'm not a *young* Catholic Adult anymore!

During the weekend of the 18-20 September 2009. Young Catholic Adults (YCA are part of the international Juventutem Federation) will be running a Traditional Retreat at Douai Abbey in the south of England, the weekend will be led by Juventutem Ecclesiastical Assistant Fr de Malleray. Summorum Pontificum must be working - at least in a "brick by brick" fashion, just look at the following:-

-For the first time Young Catholic Adults will be using the main Abbey Church for Mass

-For the first time YCA will be organising a Missa Cantata, sung by the Douai Singers; this will be followed by a Marian Procession

- YCA has booked out the whole of the retreat complex this year, on the advice of Douai Abbey itself, as the monks were so pleased with the YCA retreat last year

Places are limited so please book early

-YCA will have the retreat centre to itself
-There will be a social in the evening
- Fr. de Malleray FSSP head of Juventutem will preach the retreat, all Masses will be in the Extraordinary form
- There will be a Sung Mass (Missa Canta) on Saturday 19th September 09’ at 10am. The choir will be the Douai Singers, in the main Abbey Church, followed by a Marian Procession at 11am (starting from the main Abbey Church) around the extensive grounds of the Abbey (weather permitting, if the weather is poor there will be Marian devotions in the main Abbey Church )
-The weekend will be full-board (except for the Sunday lunch)

How to book

The cost of the weekend will be from as little as 25 pounds for students (or 48-88 pounds for non students) for more details, please see http://www.youngcatholicadults.co.uk/news.htm or email juventutemcatholicam@yahoo.co.uk or ring 07908 105787

Events Open to the Public

The Sung Mass (Missa Canta) on Saturday 19th September 09’ at 10am followed by a Marian Procession around the extensive grounds of the Abbey at 11am (starting from the main Abbey Church) are open to the public.

There are also a few rooms allocated for all age groups (not just YCA) so please book soon.

There are limited places so please reserve your place early!

For photographs of previous Douai Retreats go HERE!