Church Music

I’ve stepped back from playing music and helping with liturgies as we are further along with relocating to Tasmania. I had been having frequent trips there, but Queensland is currently locked out of Tasmania and their rules for entry sometimes come down to whether you have been in Brisbane (where I have been going to mass) or not. So I’m not.

I’m still being sent the liturgies so I will post the great work of the liturgy team.

Entrance: Gather As One  (McKenna) AOV NG 48

Psalm 44 (McKenna)

The queen stands at your right hand arrayed in gold.

Gifts: The Magnificat (Kearney) AOV 1/52

Communion:  Seed, Scattered and Sown (Feiten) CWB II 592

Thanksgiving: Gentle Woman (Landry) GA 544

Recessional: Hail, Queen of Heaven (Gather Australia 547)

I’m currently looking at the songs added to Breaking Bread in 2018 by OCP.

This is a useful song from Bob Hurd for Eucharist and when the readings have shepherd motifs (hint – fourth Sunday of Easter). The tune is more inventive than many hymns and has much to recommend it.

OCP will sell you the sheet music and provide the text in their preview.

OCP chose this beautiful Bernadette Farrell song with a text based on Psalm 42 for Breaking Bread in 2018. It would be lovely for Preparation of the Gifts.

The sheet music can purchased at OCP where the text is in their preview.

This is a very gentle bossa version from BIAB.

I’m going to jump from GIA to OCP and blog the songs that were added to Breaking Bread in 2018. I have covered the more recent additions but still hope to find reasonably new songs for our liturgical celebrations.

This is a gathering song from Jesse and Jennah Manisuban. Jennah is his daughter. The text, available in OCP’s preview, shows a church that gathers and values the forgotten in society. The tune is lightly syncopated but still singable and appears to be popular based on the number of YouTube clips.

OCP sell the sheet music here.

As usual, I made a BIAB backing to sing along with to help learn the piece.

Another song unrelated to the above:

This isn’t in a collection I have, but was used at Ryan’s parish recently and is a song of consolation. It was written by Ron and Carol Harris. It has a fair old range and a few tricky rhythms and long held notes so I would be thinking it was a solo, but maybe your assembly is up for it. There is a risk of schmaltz so keep it simple.

The lyrics are here and it could purchased for download at various sites including this one.

BIAB is good for songs like this:

My mother was a big fan of Stan Freberg and she passed the fandom onto me. “Wun’erful, Wun’erful” introduced me to the Lemon Sisters. It was only years later I heard the real Lawrence Welk and the real Lennon Sisters.

…and they sing this song too.

…turn off the bubble machine.

The last song in Volume Two of the guitar version of Gather 3rd ed. is Francis Patrick O’Brien’s song based on 1 Cor 13:1-2,8,13. Singing the line ” I am like a noisy gong” sounds great to me.

GIA have the sheet music for sale and the text in their preview.

There is another whole volume of this edition of Gather, but seems a good spot to look at something else for a while.

This song expressing love for God was written by Duy Thiên (Fr. Nguyễn Văn Thăng) in Vietnamese with an English translation of the text by Rufino Zaragoza.

More remarkable than a Vietnamese song showing up in Gather, is the fact that is an OCP copyright. An obvious song if you have a Vietnamese community in your parish.

The sheet music can be purchased at OCP where the text is in their preview.

My backing is not intended to offend, it’s just that BIAB has few Asian options.

Goodness, a Marty Haugen song I don’t know. He sets a text based on 1 Cor 13:1-3 with a lovely tune, including a bridge after the second chorus.

GIA have the sheet music for sale and the text is in their preview.

More TAIZE goodness from Gather 3rd ed. The text is credited to the Taize Community and is based on Romans 8:39 and Psalm 56. The music is also credited to Taize.

The text of the refrain is here and the verses can be found in previews at Hymnary.

Taize sell the sheet music.

This is a gospel version of Psalm 27 by Lillian Bouknight. It might be better for choirs.

The text is here. I couldn’t find it for sale anywhere but it is in lots of hymnals and there is an arrangement here.