Masterpieces of Gregorian Chant / A New Release in Six Tracks
The introits of the Sundays of Advent, Christmas, and the Epiphany presented on www.chiesa in a brand-new performance by one of the most distinguished choirs in the world
by Sandro Magister
ROME, November 29, 2013 – On the eve of the first Sunday of Advent, which marks the beginning of a new liturgical year in the Church of the Roman rite, www.chiesa is marking a first of its own.
It is an unprecedented "musical offering," which will presented in six sections.
The first section will go online tomorrow, Saturday, November 30. The second, the third, and the fourth over the three following Saturdays. The fifth on December 23, the day before Christmas Eve. The sixth on January 4, the day before the vigil of Epiphany.
Each will be accompanied by a Gregorian "introit," the piece of liturgical music that opens the celebration of the Sunday Mass or the following festivity.
Each introit takes its name from the first words of its Latin text. Here they are, track by track:
AD TE LEVAVI - First Snday of Advent
POPULUS SION - Second Sunday of Advent
GAUDETE IN DOMINO - Third Sunday of Advent
RORATE CAELI - Fourth Sunday of Advent
PUER NATUS - Christmas Day Mass
ECCE ADVENIT - Epiphany
The performance of each of these introits has been recorded for www.chiesa by one of the most distinguished choirs in the world, the "Cantori Gregoriani," founded and conducted by Fulvio Rampi, a Gregorianist of international fame.
But visitors of www.chiesa will be offered much more than a plain performance.
In addition to listening to the the recordings, they will have before their eyes:
- the complete musical score, taken from the "Graduale Romanum Triplex” published by the Abbey of Solesmes,
- a translation of the Latin text
- and a listener's guide written by Maestro Rampi, indispensable for penetrating the treasures of these masterpieces of Gregorian chant.
Treasures that have fallen into general disregard but are here intended to be brought back to light. Precisely as prescribed by the constitution on the liturgy of Vatican Council II in one of its most neglected passages:
"The Church acknowledges Gregorian chant as specially suited to the Roman liturgy: therefore, other things being equal, it should be given pride of place in liturgical services."
Gregorian chant, as is well known, is the foundation of all Western music. And the introits are one of its pillars.
But we will leave to Maestro Rampi the task of explaining why.
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A UNIQUE ENCOUNTER BETWEEN WORD AND SOUND
by Fulvio RampiAmong the many ways of wishing a happy Sunday, I believe that one of these is to share, with those who would like to do so, some reflections on the Gregorian introit of the Mass of the day.
In the singing of the introit that opens the celebration, through the sonic exegesis of the text, we find the meaning and "color" of that Sunday, of that solemnity, of that specific feast. We discover in it the resonances that relate to the whole liturgical year, and make our own the character that the Church imprints upon it time after time.
All of this is recounted to us by a long liturgical-musical tradition, a sort of "thought in sound" and "sound in thought" that make Gregorian chant much more than a generic musical event.
What characterizes Gregorian chant is a fundamental relationship between text and music.
It is this relationship of mutual, absolute obedience between word and sound that has induced the Roman Church to make its own, over the long history of liturgical music, only Gregorian chant and no other musical forms.
The Church has always said so and repeated this in clear letters in the constitution "Sacrosanctum Concilium" of Vatican Council II. It establishes Gregorian chant as "specially suited to the Roman liturgy" precisely because of its unique capacity to communicate with sound the meaning of the Word of God proclaimed in the liturgy.
Gregorian chant has always lived in this space of ecclesial thought. But if, as happens today, it is excluded and reduced to the narrow space of practical functionality, it can undergo every sort of humiliation. It can be misunderstood, rejected, and abandoned even by the Church itself, that Church which has generated it as a supreme act of love in response to its pearl of great price, the Word of God.
But history teaches us that even after years or centuries of burial, it is destined to be reborn: not in a trivial sense, as a musical repertoire and surpassable as such, but as an irreplaceable and absolute paradigm of the sung liturgy.
It will be fitting, sooner or later, to recognize also in Gregorian chant that dimension of "essentiality" which is so greatly invoked today - and not only by Pope Francis - as being of absolute urgency for the life of the Church.
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Fulvio Rampi was born and lives in Cremona. He teaches Gregorian chant at the musical conservatory "G. Verdi" in Turin. In 1986 he founded the choir "Cantori Gregoriani," a professional ensemble of male voices, of which he is the permanent conductor. Noteworthy among his publications is "Del canto gregoriano," Rugginenti Editore, Milan, 2006.
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English translation by
Matthew Sherry, Ballwin, Missouri, U.S.A.
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For more news and commentary, see the blog that Sandro Magister maintains, available only in Italian:
> SETTIMO CIELO
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29.11.2013
