St. Louis Jesuits : Folk Mass Music [my title]

Ad Orientem ^ | Jan. 15, 2003 | Mark C. N. Sullivan

[Dajjal]

Which obsolete team from the Arch City do you prefer?

The St. Louis Browns?

Or the St. Louis Jesuits?

I have to go with the Brownies. There was an appealing honesty regarding their merits. They were pretty much horrible and nobody made any bones about it.

Not so with the Jesuits who gave us the St. Louis Sound in folk Mass hymnody, and who still are upheld as trendsetters in parish music ministries across the land.

Check out the site of "Sing a New Song" and "Here I Am, Lord" composer Fr. Dan Schutte, SJ, responsible for the Lamb of God you hear at just about every local parish (and probably many of the other hymns, besides).

Give a listen to "Meadows and Mountains." Then sample "Join in the Dance."

It's as if Bernie and friends from Room 222 had cut short a rap session with Mr. Dixon to try their hands at sacred music.

Shades of Love, American Style! Shades of New Zoo Revue!

Why, 30 years after 1972, after Godspell and bell-bottoms have gone out and in and out of style again, is this sort of peppy Aquarianism still the musical standard in as many parishes as it is?
1/15/2003

[Desdemona]

This stuff is putrid, and these people are artistic wreckers.

They didn't know the first thing about music. They didn't then and they don't now.

[VermiciousKnid]

Every time I hear "Here I Am, Lord"...I want to strangle the choir director

Get in line, Palladin...I've got first dibbs.

Regards,

PS: Oh, and BTW, Godspell was mentioned in the article. The music in Godspell is MUCH better than the music currently circulating in Catholic churches these days. But as good as it is, I still wouldn't want to try singing it during Mass. At least everybody can sing Hail, Holy Queen without too much trouble. Can't say the same for By My Side. (A terrific song, but unless you are a trained professional, don't try it.)

PPS: One more thing! Why, oh WHY have they changed so many of the words to so many standard hymns? Even and Amazing Grace! Dag nab it, I HATE it when they do that!

End of rant.

[Desdemona]

Well, at least the Browns made it to the World Series once. They lost to the Cards, but who's keeping score?

Incidentally, John Foley is still at SLU, too. I actually met him once - at the funeral of a man who detested modernism.

[AnAmericanMother]

They changed the words to "Amazing Grace" because they don't want to call anybody a "sinner" or a "wretch". Might hurt their self-esteem y'know.

My favorite (or un-favorite) is what the new Episcopal Hymnal did with that great old Sacred Harp mainstay, "Wondrous Love" (No. 159 in the SH for those of you who have the book). The old Verse 1 included a mention of "to bear the dreadful curse for my soul", and the old Verse 2 "as I was sinking down/beneath God's righteous frown/Christ laid aside his crown for my soul, for my soul."

Much too negative for modern liberal churchgoers - they cut and pasted verses 1 and 2 to remove all the offending bits, and they don't even rhyme any more.

BTW, Desdemona, the old-time Sacred Harp music is country, and it's Evangelical to a fault, but by all the saints and the twenty-four elders it is MUSIC! Difficult to read, usually four part SATB with the melody in the tenor. One of the hallmarks of the style is that each part can stand on its own as a melody, another is the fugue setting of the chorus in almost every hymn.

What amazes me is that you can go to some little country church and find people singing this stuff and singing it WELL. A lot of folks seem to be stuck on fortissimo, and there isn't much tempo variation (conducting is traditionally done with a sort of sideways straightarm salute, and it looks like hanging wallpaper to me) but it's incredibly difficult from a technical point of view. Plus, most of the folks who sing it read sol-fa rather than staff notation.

Get the book if you can (there's a guy in Bremen GA who will be happy to sell you a copy - they're cheap) and find a copy of the recording "Rivers of Delight" by the Word of Mouth Chorus to listen. It's another planet, but it's a fun planet.

[Scupoli]

I was just informed that one of the local Churches has "moved beyond the 60's". They have drums and cymbals.

[Desdemona]

Sacred Harp always sounded more Irish to me, not country. And I do like it.

In "Be Not Afraid" (if I never hear it again, it will be too soon), they took out all the men but the "wicked men" in verse three. I didn't think that was very nice. Changing the words is SOOOOOOO annoying. I used to complain about it all the time and the feminists would stomp me. Well, not literally, but I finally gave up.

[Desdemona]

I was just informed that one of the local Churches has "moved beyond the 60's". They have drums and cymbals.

That's nothing. Try electric guitars and basses.

[AnAmericanMother]

I think if you went back into the mists of time, you'd find that Sacred Harp is heavily Irish-influenced. It's most popular in the hill communities that were settled by the Scotch-Irish immigrants that couldn't get along with the flatlanders . . . that would be my ancestors. :-D

While the tradition originally came out of the New England Congregational singing masters (like Justin Morgan who is better known for owning the foundation sire of the Morgan breed - but he composed some anthems that would tax a good choir, his "Judgment Anthem" is a killer) it headed South in a hurry, and the Sacred Harp and Southern Harmony are heavily influenced by the minor-modal harmonies of Irish tradition.

I annoy our feminists too. . . . it's good exercise and it amuses me. Most of them are so flabby intellectually though that it's like slapping a baby . . .

[HowlinglyMind-BendingAbsurdity]

"There is an Austin-Powers-like quality to much in the Church, where time is frozen to the era around 1963-69."

LOL!

Valid point. Most of the clerical proponents are not quite as "cool" as Austin though. Equally silly, yes. Some church historian or sociologist should check on the history of "shag" carpeting at Catholic institutions in the '70s. I remember some sort of psychedelic burlap banners with garish orange and purple being exhibited in a college chapel in the 1980s! The jargon of "the spirit of Vatican II" and "Renewal" have been used to cover a variety of absurdities.

" The creepy thing is that the style of V-2 Catholic liturgical music has not been "pop" for over thirty years! It's another V-2 fly in amber, stuck in the '60s."

Yes. It's been "out of style" for quite a while. I started kindergarten in the late '60s so I remember the authentic "folk" gnosticism in liturgies well. A little too well maybe. You remember the version of the Lord's Prayer sung to the Maryanne Faithfull/Rolling Stones "As Tears Go By" melody? How about the Byrds' "To everything, turn, turn, turn..." at Mass? Or (horrors!)...the Godspell Masses? It's sad but occasionally some idiots still stage Godspell at Catholic colleges and high schools. Apparently completely oblivious of the outrageous bad taste and silliness of a clown mime Jesus in denim overalls.

Part of the problem is that elements within the clergy apparently come from dysfunctional families carrying a lot of strange and peculiar issues. They tend to try to work through their emotional complexes by these ridiculous displays of moronic idiocy. The in-your-face bad taste imposed on other Catholics is one of the worst symptoms of this malaise.

There is a STRONG need to teach Catholic sacred music, sacred art and architecture properly to the clergy and laity. How such monstrosities of bad taste, such as the ones exhibited over the last 35 years or so, are ever approved by pastors and bishops is a disturbing question. Liturgical gnosticism, wreckovation, minimalism, radical modernism in stained glass and cathedral architecture...all of these banalities are funded with the tacit approval of bishops and their staff. It's sad because the Catholic tradition offers such wonderful music and art to choose from.

If those who directed and funded the erection of that monstrosity parody of modernist kitsch in LA were unaware that minimalist modernism had been satirized long ago as the epitome of bad taste, one wonders what the clergy read or studied in college. Too much time viewing alternative magazines perhaps.

[Desdemona]

There is a STRONG need to teach Catholic sacred music, sacred art and architecture properly to the clergy and laity. How such monstrosities of bad taste, such as the ones exhibited over the last 35 years or so, are ever approved by pastors and bishops is a disturbing question.

Yes, there is. But there is also a very strong psycho-social divide to cross first - people need to realize that great art is not just for the wealthy, it's for everyone. I run into other people's mental blocks a lot.

[HowlinglyMind-BendingAbsurdity]

And...the whole question of taste, style, and artistic selection is not just a Catholic problem. It's a modern American one.

The idea that good fine art or music is "elitist" and therefore bad is part of this socialistic, left-wing levelling instinct that has some parallels in American Puritanism. Certainly anyone who is going to become a pastor or bishop, making decisions on such matters, should be REQUIRED to study something about the history of Catholic sacred art and music. I have been to parishes before where they sing these "gospel spirituals" from the Southern Baptist tradition and the whole congregation gets this giddy, silly hand-clapping circus going. It completely alters the mood of solemnity and reverence into something else which feels quite un-Catholic. I have never met an educated Catholic who says they like this and I have no idea who the people are who decide to pull such pranks at Mass, where they come from, or where they studied.

[HowlinglyMind-BendingAbsurdity]

"Much like the way Catholic philosophy and theology (and all Church pronouncements) are couched in the language of '60s existentialism and phenomenology."

Another whole cultural safari altogether, going back to the 1920s, and even 19th- and 18th-century Germanic ideology considering that Hegel and Kant have something to do with it. What has happened to theology and philosophy at Catholic universities and seminaries is tragic. One of the more idiotic maneuvers was the turn toward Wittgenstein and "dialogue with analytic philosophy" at Notre Dame. The ideological distortions creeping in have corrupted much of Catholic higher education. Pandora's Box. Just consider that there is no universally accepted model of reality at work here. They make it up as they go along.

Nonsense always sounds more profound if Heidegger and Sartre can be enlisted in its defense along with highbrow-sounding German and French jargon. Relativism and nihilism answered to certain ideological needs in the '60s for studied ambiguity and pseudo-sophisticated obscurantism as the upwardly mobile middle class sought to disengage itself from Western Christian civilization and the structure and mores of traditional family life - the beginnings of the long road to Clinton and the Beavis&Buttheadization of America. But this was all part of a broad package including Kinsey, Transpersonal "encounter group" psychology, I'm OK, You're OK gnosticism, and, of course, the Madison Avenue pop paperback version of Freud. We're paying the price for it now. In spades.

[Dajjal]

The idea that good fine art or music is "elitist" and therefore bad is part of this socialistic, left-wing levelling instinct that has some parallels in American Puritanism.

It's quite possible that the church architecture, music, vernacular translations, etc., are intentionally bad, operating on the theory that "elitist art" distances people from each other and causes people to indulge in private, individual contemplation, while anti-aesthetic surroundings, words, and music encourage people to "draw together" as a corporate body.

[HowlinglyMind-BendingAbsurdity]

It's quite possible that the church architecture, music, vernacular translations, etc., are intentionally bad, operating on the theory that "elitist art" distances people from each other and causes people to indulge in private, individual contemplation, while anti-aesthetic surroundings, words, and music encourage people to "draw together" as a corporate body. 33 posted on 01/16/2003 9:50 PM PST by Dajjal

Interesting point. It is certainly tied in with the lavender mafia and their resentment complexes. The various forms of modernism supposedly are thought of as challenging bourgeois conformity and as "shattering" traditional forms. I'm familiar with a church which had semi-abstract modernist stained glass put in that looks awful. Someone on the "building committee" knew the artist friend whose "work" was sold to their innocent and unsuspecting fellow Catholics. There's a subtle suggestion of affirmative action for fringe "artists" who materialize out of nowhere virtually, imposing their mediocrity on everyone else.

No idea how they put together these building committees. In some cases you have this nepotism of multi-generational vulgarian contractors who have been scamming the church for years, milking their fellow Catholics for their contribution dollars. Bishops who not only tolerate this trash but continue to approve the funding of it do serious damage to the church. We sort of need the equivalent of a pastoral letter "clarifying" exactly what church policy is on sacred art, architecture, and music. The forms that are chosen to express the Catholic faith should be of the best quality available. There's no excuse for trash and bad taste being erected around or in front of a tabernacle. Likewise, bad music and music of questionable taste and quality do not belong at a Mass. Even if it were only a minority who were offended that's enough of a reason for it to be excluded. There's no inherent mandate for bad art or bad music to be funded by the church. But how can it be stopped? No one belongs on a church building committee who is too stupid to recognize that the modernist kitsch of the LA cathedral, for instance, is bad. What a disaster.

[VermiciousKnid]

That's nothing. Try electric guitars and basses.

I can beat that, Desdemona...we have a "song leader" who thinks he is Elvis (or perhaps the next contestant on American Idol). You should see him gyrating up there on the altar, strummin' his geeetar. Bleeech!

And in our parish, one in which the tabernacle is placed WAAAY over to the side, BTW...they've got a "charming" little hymn announcer. It's one of those LED signs that flashes a number at you. Every time I see the darned thing, I think I'm waiting in line at the DMV. "NOW SERVING 363."

They are building a new church even as we speak, but oddly enough, the pastor refuses to show us what the inside of the church will look like. I wonder what in heaven's name they're going to do; can't be much worse than what we have now, because at the moment the current church more closely resembles the Brady's TV room (ugly paneling and all) than a house of worship. I'll make a prediction: It will be a church in the round and ugly as sin.

Regards,

[Desdemona]

Honestly, you all have my sympathy. My archdiocese has been blessed with a very conservative, orthodox bishop from the Holy Father's inner circle. Among other things, ALL Tabernacles have been ordered to the foot of the Crucifix in each church. The only exceptions are if it is on a side altar visible in all parts of the church. Many parishes who had already made renovations were furious, but too bad.

Church renovations in this archdiocese must be approved by the Chancery. All contractors have to be bonded and approved. Other than the "reconciliation rooms" and removal of the Communion Rails, I haven't seen anything completely objectionable of late. I can't say the same of the previous regime.

The music around here has definitely improved, but it's spotty. We've gone from guitars to pianos, which wouldn't be so bad if the pianists had any artistic ability. Most of them are frustrated pop band people trying to sing and play bad imitation pop. The archbishop is working on at least being sure there is an organ in each church - whether or not they are used is another question. St. Francis Xavier, the church at SLU where all the Jesuit crap started, to my knowledge, still doesn't have one. The old one was HUGE with all these big pipes. They're talking $1.5 mil to replace it. Now the organ loft is the "band set". They do have a beautiful Steinway Concert Grand, but when they did the renovation, they put non-acoustical tile on the floor and the sound dies.

As for "Song Number announcements" - I don't like it, I've never liked it and never will. And if musicians can't act with dignity on the altar they should not be there. Put them back up in the choir and organ lofts where they belong, not in the front.

[VermiciousKnid]

Oh, my, Des...we have no "choir loft." Too separatist, don't you know?

Nope, we've got a "music ministry" section. It is right up front next to the altar. The "music ministry" has a better seat in the house than the tabernacle. And while the choir clearly has some talented individuals, they are encouraged to sway and clap whilst singing (bad songs).

Next year my son will receive his First Holy Communion. I plan to at least be on the planning committee for that, and I hope to be the Chairman. At least that way I can rest assured that it won't turn into a circus. Wish me luck.

Regards,

[Desdemona]

Nope, we've got a "music ministry" section. It is right up front next to the altar. The "music ministry" has a better seat in the house than the tabernacle. And while the choir clearly has some talented individuals, they are encouraged to sway and clap whilst singing (bad songs).

Ah yes, music ministry. Part of why I'm shopping around for another parish. Vocal music is my gift and I would like to return it, but so much of the "music ministry" stuff drives me up the wall. Not only that, this is going to sound snotty, but after 16 years of voice training, it's a little insulting to have to cheapen the gift with the crap being used right now. There's no depth, no art.

I know having the choir in the front is vogue right now. In my mom and dad's parish, that idea was nixed by the renovation committee, much to the chagrin of the liturgy committee. And then there were the fights over the kneelers...they did it right in the end. All they really needed was paint, a new carpet or other flooring, new padding and covering for the kneelers and a restroom in the Narthex. But nobody ever listens to me.

[TotusTuus]

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