I was lucky enough to be staying within walking distance of a Catholic church while away over Easter. For many years I have played for the Tridium locally and experienced the exhausted joy of the resurrection with which most parish musicians are familiar. Being away from home for Easter felt odd enough in itself and circumstances dictated that Easter Sunday morning was the only Mass we could attend. I am grateful that Mass was available.
The priest was in his mid eighties yet proclaimed the gospel well and was acceptedly rambling in his homily for his age. The music was something else though. My wife thought she’d gone through a time warp to the church of the sixties and early seventies. The music was from their own version of the Living Worship Hymnal – the “blue book” and was played by a youngish organist. The assembly was a mixture of all ages. The singing, apart from the priest, was desultory. I have been to masses with really old hymns in areas of retirement concentration and there at least the old songs were sung enthusiastically, but here not so much. The Gloria was recited and there was an indistinct mass setting of some sort for the other parts of the mass although several tunes seemed to be being used simultaneously. To their credit the Our Father was chanted and everyone seemed to know that.
The experience was not joyful. I’m sure I’ve played at masses where the music wasn’t the best but wouldn’t Easter at least be a time to pull out the stops.
The last fifty years seemed to have passed this parish by musically. I suppose we all can get into a rut of what feels comfortable, but I can only assume this parish has become a musical ghetto for some reason. Perhaps we liturgical musicians need to network more to find out if what we are doing really is leading to participation by the assembly.
…and even with a priest keen to continue well past retirement age, it is sad that the talent pool for priests is so small that aged priests don’t get help and dire priests ( I don’t mean this gentleman) are pressed into service because there are no other options. Bishop Morris had some good ideas about this.
As far as I can recall the music was:
Take Our Bread (Wise)
An instrumental version of Strong and Constant (Andersen)
Christ Be Beside Me (tune: Morning Has Broken)
Soul of My Saviour (trad, Maher)
Actually, I like all the above hymns. But I also like discovering music: one year, when preparing the Easter music for an Anglican church, I discovered No 302 in The Australian Hymn Book – the tune and metre Vruechten 67.67 D – Melody from J Oudaen’s “Psalter’, Amsterdam 1685, words by George Ratcliffe Woodward (1848-1934): “This joyful Eastertide away with sin and sorrow…” How interesting and enchanting I thought it! What do people think of it? Is it ever sung?
This Joyful Eastertide is sung quite a bit in the UK – we had it at our Wedding (in 1983). Good strong tune and solid words – a good discovery to have made
I like them too – but not for Easter Sunday!
That said, in some places the stops are pulled out (either metaphorically or even on the organ!) for the Easter Vigil, and Easter Sunday (which attracts mainly the people who only attend twice a year) is a bit of a left-overs day.