Universalis, your very own breviary in pixels...

Saturday 9 May 2009

Hail Mary, Gentle Woman?

Not that I would program it in any case, but is this actually a common choice for whatever Sunday of Paschaltide falls on Mothers' Day?

A choir member bemoaned at rehearsal this week that we weren't singing it.

Bad enough, as part of the preludial extravaganza, we will be offering On This Day, O Beautiful Mother," (Himself always falls into his Bugs Bunny imitation at the mere mention of the chestnut.)

I find it difficult to believe that the composer of the tune most used for Come Holy Ghost, and of that very sturdy setting of Panis Angelicus could have had such an off-day....

I led several decades of life utterly ignorant of the existence of the song, but it is a parish fave -- my first year on the job I did not know that, did not know it, and failed to program it on Mothers Day, and nearly drowned in the flood of tears from choristers and PIPs who accosted me after Mass.

I'm only half joking, they really did weep.
I felt horrible.

So we're doing it.

But we're also doing that woderful Cherubini canon with the text, "Christ is the true vine, we are the branches," the Pitoni Cantate Domino, and a decent choral Regina Coeli, so...

6 comments:

Dad29 said...

Lambillotte briefly considered a career as a Tin Pan Alley composer.

That was the result.

Mr. C said...

Well, the tune is weepy to the point of dripping; but the "lisping children" line is just plain wrong.
We were gonna do the Hassler CD, but someone busted me about Mom's Day, so we did Victoria's Ave Maria 'stead. Good call, that.

Jaya said...

It's better than last year, when Mother's Day fell on Pentecost. No doubt there were little smackdowns in liturgical committee meetings everywhere.

Mr. C said...

What's a Liturgical Committee?
Bwah-ha-ha-ha-ha-haaaa!
Feh!

Scelata said...

Okay, those music ministers, er..., pastoral musicians. er... oh, you know who you are, who delight to remind us suffering souls that you don't have liturgy committees, are gettin' about as insufferable as our friend Gavin, who liked to make pronouncements about how the collaberation betwixt rectory and loft should be, blithely ignoring the fact that not EVERYONE has Fr Rob Johannson (sp?) for a pastor.

I'm getting fed up and am putting a hit out on you, a Fatwah!

I shall hire all the at-liberty musicians I know to follow you about and tortur--- um, SERENADE you with "Mother Rat."

I'd forgotten about that Pentecost/Mothers Day confluence last year.

But in our parish many things take precedence over major liturgical feasts, the middle 1/3 of the patented 3 Week Baptism Ceremony, Brownie Fly-up, Take Your Pet to Work Day, National Pickle Week...

(Save the Liturgy, Save the World)

Mary Jane Ballou said...

My Mother's Day Masses included something called the "Ave Maria Lullaby," "Hail Mary, Gentle Woman," the Schubert Ave Maria sung by a gentleman who pronounced the "h" in hora, and the Arcadelt Ave Maria. I was braced for "On this day" or "Bring flowers of the rarest." Thank goodness this comes but once a year.