Not "either/or" but "both/and"....

Although of less importance than other elements of the Mass, the reality is that the first thing that most parishes will consider when preparing music for a Mass is the hymns to be sung – the oft-derided "hymn sandwich". 

Building up a repertoire of hymns, rather than just singing the same old-same old, is good and healthy on so many levels – for both the music group and the Assembly.  The learning-curve for our Vigil Mass congregation, the Music Group and myself has been very steep over the last 4+ years.

There is no great secret but, for what it’s worth, here is how I work.

The first criterion for me, as much as possible, is that the hymns we use are relevant to the season and/or “theme” of the Mass.  Unless you have an encyclopaedic mind then you need some help here and I use two sources; the suggestions at the back of the hymnal and suggestions provided within the pages of “Music and Liturgy” – the periodical produced by the Society of St Gregory.  I note down all the suggested hymns, including the ones I don’t know, and then begin to reflect on which ones would be appropriate and where in the usual slots to place them.  The ones that I don’t know I look up on t'internet, usually through YouTube.

The temptation for groups like ours (guitars, flutes, mandolin) is to limit the selection to post-Vatican II hymns – the sort of music that used to be called “folk-Mass” music (Ugh! – I do NOT like that term!) – and to avoid “traditional” hymns.  This would be a shame.  Not all music produced since the 1960s has merit and a lot has been very poor – so many hymns that we sang in the 70s and early 80s are, quite properly, simply no longer used.  I guess that it’s always been thus – something new is produced, it’s tried, tested and assessed and then either kept and passed on as being of value, or it is dropped.  But also, there are so many wonderful hymns from before the 60s with great tunes and beautiful lyrics.

We cannot, however, simply recreate the sound and style of these hymns as sung to an organ accompaniment; we must adapt.

Compare these two versions of “O God of earth and altar”:

O God of earth and altar - "traditional"    &   O God of earth and altar - "modern"    

I didn’t know this hymn when it came up among the suggestions.  But I liked the words and so looked it up on YouTube and discovered that it has a great melody as well.  However, we could not successfully pull off this hymn in the style that it is sung in the first recording and so have adapted the style from the second, with the introduction and musical bridge played by a flute. 

And now these two versions of “Be thou my vision”:

Be thou my vision - "traditional"   &   Be thou my vision - "modern"

The people at CJM have done a couple of things to make this marvellous hymn work with their setup.  The main thing is that they have simplified the chords; traditional, organ-based hymns tend to have frequent chord-changes – usually at least two or even four for each bar of music.  This doesn’t work on the guitar and so they have cut many of those chord-changes.  The second thing that they have done is simply to change one chord towards the end of each verse, which just gives it a completely different feel.

In truth, I like both versions of both hymns, but with our setup the second versions work better.  

As a rule, we tend to have a mixture of pre and post-Vatican II hymns.  In fact, if memory serves, at one Mass we had music from the 9^th, 16^th, 19^th, early and late 20^th and the 21^st centuries!  

That was fun!!!