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Wednesday 27 June 2007

The Mundelein Psalter

I just realized with all the gushing I've been doing, I had not mentioned what a pleasure it has been to sing L of the H using this new book.
Well, well, well made volume, good paper, good type face (always good to meet another Garamond fan.) I know that seems like faint praise, but for the love of mike, the construction of a lot of hymnals is shoddy, shoddy, shoddy.
And this is a gorgeous tome (but yeah, it weighs a holy ton.)

I have had much less trouble on first use than in finding my way around, say Christian Prayer.

I do wish that the hymns that have more than 3 verses underlined one of the verses, you know the style I mean?
I may suggest it tomorrow. Not sure to whom...

And I know most of us are professional musicians, but honestly, the psalms and canticles are SOOOOO easy to read, right off the bat.
And sound wonderful

Talk about "noble simplicity."

But forget the pros, it was just as easy having my funeral choir sing one of them two weeks ago. And the priests here seem to be having no trouble, 'tall, 'tall, and they're not all exactly singers.

Bravo.

If this book's use is as widespread as it deserves, it could have an enormous beneficial impact on the quality of liturgy in the US.

I wish every single cathedral parish in the country not already doing Vespers (AS THEY SHOULD,) would start doing maybe just Sunday vespers with it.

Oh and apropos of nothing at all, I'd always wondered where in blazes the "Office hymns" in Christian Prayer came from.... I mean, some of them are quite solid, but some are such CHEEZE. And that they seemed to ignoramuses ("ignorami?") such as myself to have some sort of official status was discomfiting.
So it's reassuring to know that they were pulled from much the same place as so many matter liturgical have been in my lifetime.

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