Coming Soon (Hopefully)

I plan to begin writing here starting in January. As of now, I have not decided on where to begin with this rather broad subject.

Culturally Relevant Liturgical Music

Those who are responsible for determining the music to be used for liturgical functions at their parish are faced with the difficult issue of selecting music that is culturally relevant for the people of the parish without blurring the line between the sacred and the secular. The question has to be, "What is fully sacred yet culturally relevant?" The relevance has to do not with the issues of today -- wars, political situations, sports, secular holidays -- but with speaking in readily understandable musical and textual idioms. To illustrate, if I sing a Chinese hymn with Chinese music to someone who does not know Chinese nor has any familiarity with Chinese music, that person will have great difficulty joining with my in praising God. They do not understand the words of the song nor can they determine the meaning of the music -- is it happy? is it sad? is it serious? is it comical?

The Tridentine Reform: Brief notes

From "The Concise Oxford History of Music" by Gerald Abraham (Publisher: Oxford University Press, copyright 1979 Gerald Abraham)

There had for some time been complaints about the secular elements in Catholic church music, the exhibitionism of organists, the use of tropes, the obscuring of the sacred texts by polyphony, and so on. They came to a head in 1562 at the Council of Trent, reconvened after a ten-year break. In September the Council forumulated the general directive quoted in the previous chapter (see p. 207: "the direction of the Council of Trent in 1562 that the words of the Mass 'should be uttered clearly and perfectly, and sink quietly into the ears and hearts of the hearers', not with music 'contrived for the empty delight of the ears'.") and the next year, just before it broke up, two new members actually advocated the suppression of polyphonic church music altogether. (p. 244)