Let’s talk about all Christmas carols, not just this one. What alterations have you noticed? What do you think is an improvement, and what not?

The purists, I suppose, can sing the only correct version of the above carol, the original “Hark! How All the Welkin Rings.” The rest of us can have a serious discussion about text alterations which, after all, have been going on since the beginning.

Meanwhile – God rest ye merry, peoplekind.

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There is Worship 4 and Gather 3 and Lead Me, Guide Me 2 and Oramos Cantando from GIA.

OCP doesn’t seem to mention it on their website but I believe they’re planning to revise JourneySong to come out in 2012.

There are several hymnals from the “traditional/conservative side” competing for a small but growing market:

the Vatican II Hymnal from Corpus Christi Watershed,
the Adoremus Hymnal from Ignatius Press,
and St. Michael’s Hymnal from Linda Schafer and Br. Michael O’Connor, OP.

We’ll have occasion to talk more about all these hymnals.

But for now, let’s step back from the hymnal contents and look at the prior issue of the editors of hymnals – the background and knowledge editors need to do their work of editing.

What qualifications shouls hymnal editors have? I’ll start the conversation with this short list. (I’m limiting myself to English-language hymnals.)

Knowledge of the reformed liturgy: an understanding of all the reformed rites of the Catholic church, and a vision of the role of music in the reformed rites. Because there are competing visions of the meaning of Vatican II out there, it is now more necessary than ever for editors to be well-informed in liturgical theology and well-read in liturgical scholarship.

Experience and practical knowledge in promoting congregational song. This includes the ability to recognize melodies (of Mass settings, or refrains and antiphons, of hymns) that are and are not singable by congregations.

Practical wisdom on layout and presentation. For example, knowing what a congregation needs (clear font for text, music for all sung items) and what it doesn’t (guitar chords, page references for accompaniments, planning help and advice alongside congregational repertoire).

Understanding of the role of the choir in Catholic worship so that appropriate distinctions are made between things sung by choir and things sung by congregation. Choir editions should help the choir carry out its unique ministry rather than duplicate the congregation’s role.

Knowledge of Gregorian chant in Latin and English, with good sense about the available repertoire, what is appropriately provided to congregations, and how it is best laid out to encourage congregational participation.

Openness to cross-cultural expansion of congregational repertoire– both because Church documents call for cultural sensitivity and because the canon of English-language church music is being expanded in many directions (culturally, linguistically), as seen in so many recent hymnals.

Then there are so many things needed to edit the hymns.

Knowledge of the liturgical role of strophic hymnody in Catholic worship, including both the extensive history of Catholic congregational vernacular hymnody at Mass and the wide latitude granted to liturgical planners by current Church legislation. A vision of how hymnody relates to the rites, and how hymnody relates to the Mass lectionary, is very important.

Knowledge of the [ever-changing, ever-growing, ever-being-redefined] “canon” of congregational hymnody in all its historical depth. A good hymnal editor should be a hymn/hymnal geek, with a large collection of hymnals from many traditions. A lifetime of regular attendance at Hymn Society conferences would be a great help.

Knowledge of the sources and reference material so that wise editorial decisions can be made about melodic and textual variants. On the editor’s shelf should be Julian, Higginson, Westermeyer (Let the People Sing), Routley (the one on texts and the one on tunes), and the like.

Commitment to ecumenism and love of the ecumenical richness of hymnody. Catholics have sung vernacular Protestant hymns at Mass in every era since the Protestant Reformation. (Yes, this is really true. For further info, see chapter 23 of my big book.) The reformed liturgy offers an excellent means for ecumenical convergence between Catholics and other Christians, and the editor should know how to make good use of Protestant hymnody.

What would you add to or change in this list?

W4 is 80% organ-based, 20% piano/guitar-based. It looks to be the strongest traditional/classical hymnal on the market for use with the new missal.

Friday morning, Ansgar Franz of the University of Mainz spoke at the IAH meeting in Timişoara, Romania. His topic was the history of standardized, unified canons of hymns among German-speaking Catholics, and also the official Italian hymn repertoire recently approved by the Italian bishops’ conference and the Vatican.

Since at least the mid-19th century, there have been efforts to standardize the hymns sung in various versions by German Catholics. In 1848 a certain Bishop Müller called for a national council and a national standardized hymn canon. Müller also wanted greater national German unity politically, and greater independence of the German Catholic Church from Rome. For that and a variety of reasons, his call for standardized hymnody didn’t go anywhere. During World War I, chaplains complained that German Catholic soldiers couldn’t sing one single hymn hymns together because they all knew different versions from their home dioceses. In 1916, amid strongly divergent opinions and strong defense of local traditions, the bishops’ conference was able to agree only on a canon of 23 hymns for inclusion in future hymnals. In fact, some but not all these few hymns were even included in subsequent German diocesan hymnals. Later, the private collection Kirchenlied (“Congregational Hymns”), with 140 hymns, was widely used among Church youth movements throughout Germany, in effect creating a hymn canon for the entire country. Over 2 million copies of Kirchenlied were printed from 1945 to 1972, and 79 of these 140 hymns were taken into the 1975 official national hymnal Gotteslob.

Historically, Austria has enjoyed more national unity in its hymnody than Germany, reflecting the political history of each country. Hapsburg Empress Maria Theresa decreed in 1783 that the Normalmeßgesang (‘Standardized Mass Hymns”) be used in every parish in the country. This was a series of Mass hymns which remained constant for every Sunday, with only one melody provided for each of its nine hymns. It was prescribed by force, in many cases against the will of the faithful. But as Franz-Karl Praßl has remarked, in hymnody as in human relations, with enough familiarization and sufficient time, something like love eventually can set in. These Mass hymns have remained in use to this day. By 1948, the Austrian bishops were able to establish a national canon of 119 hymns plus several strophic paraphrases of the Mass Ordinary.

In Switzerland, the redrawing of diocesan boundaries by the state in the early 19th century made standardization necessary, since in many cases peoples coming from various dioceses with their own hymn traditions now belonged to the same diocese. Because in 1958 the Swiss Catholics bishops had authorized work to begin on their own national hymnal, and because so much work had already been done by 1963, the Swiss decided not to become part of the Austrian-German Gotteslob. By 1978, the Katholisches Gesang- und Gebetbuch der Schweiz (“Congregational Hymnal. Catholic Hymnal and Prayer Book of Switzerland”) had about 100 hymns in common with the German-Austrian Gotteslob. And then, things went in a surprising direction. The next official Swiss hymnal of 1998, Katholische Gesangbuch (“Catholic Hymnal”) contained many hymns from Gotteslob, but it also had no fewer than 238 songs, including 153 strophic hymns, in common with the hymnal of the Swiss Reformed church that appeared at the same time. This was a strong move in the direction of ecumenical standardization.

Italy has little in the way of a national heritage of congregational hymnody. In the north, under Austrian influence, an Italian version of Empress Maria Theresa’s Mass hymns was introduced in 1783,  Inni per la Messa. Litanie ed Orazioni giusta la normale di Vienna (“Hymns for Mass. Litanies and Prayers According to the Standardized Practice of Vienna”). This was unknown in the southern part of the country. With some exceptions from the north, congregational singing has not been strong in Italy over the centuries.

Thus it is a sort of “Copernican Revolution” that the official national repertoire Canti per la Liturgia, approved by the Italian bishops and the Vatican, was published in Italy in May, 2009. It has 384 hymns and songs for Mass, including Mass parts, refrains and antiphons, and strophic hymns. The 25 pieces for Lent are typical of the entire collection: there are two chant pieces from Solesmes and 4 melodies by historic composers (Bach, Crüger, Neumark und Decius), but everything else is from the 20th century. This is not so much because the Italians are particularly open to things new, but because there is little by way of a tradition of congregational hymnody to draw on. The old hymn tunes, one notes, are all by German Lutherans.

The foreword states that the official national repertoire should be integrated into existing hymnals as soon as possible; in dioceses which have no hymnal, the national repertoire should form the core for future hymnals, along with the free addition of local hymns and songs.

*          *          *          *          *

I have some observations on the liturgies celebrated by the IAH conference participants: two Catholic Masses, one Lutheran Eucharist, and one Orthodox Vespers.

I write as a Roman Catholic. With all due respect to my Protestant and Orthodox fellow Christians, from which my church certainly could learn very much, I admit to being rather proud of the Vatican II-reformed Catholic rite of Mass as I celebrated it with other Christians from other traditions.

I’m drawn to the beauty and sacredness of the Orthodox liturgy, the sense of an inherited tradition not invented by us, the absence of commentators and announcers and songleaders waving arms at us, the absence of ad-libbing celebrants, the purity of vocal music without accompaniment. But the people do not seem to form a community celebrating the liturgy together. Each individual makes the Sign of the Cross repeatedly, seemingly whenever moved to do so; only when a certain word or phrase is picked up by the worshipers did they (or many or most of them) make the Sign of the Cross at the same time. The iconostasis, as artistically beautiful as it is, distorts the liturgy and divides the assembly too much into privileged clergy and excluded people, even though the entire church space is clearly sacral, and the people are clearly connected to what is going on behind screen, even when the doors are closed and they can only hear but not see the liturgy.

At the Protestant Eucharist (see part one) – and this is probably because I like what I’m used to – I missed the familiarity of the Catholic ritual. I certainly appreciated the excellent selection of solid, traditional Protestant hymns and the strong preaching. But the outline of the service didn’t seem adequately rooted in the Western tradition. I wished it were closer to, for example, the 1983 ecumenical statement Baptism, Eucharist, and Ministry.

Maybe this is only true of conference liturgies, but it always seems like we’re unsure when to sit and when to stand at IAH Protestant Eucharist, and it doesn’t always seem clear why either is done. Ease of participation is facilitated by familiarity in bodily ritual, and one is drawn into the sacred mysteries through such strong signs as, for example, always standing for the Gospel reading.

The Catholic Mass, reformed according to the instructions of the fathers of Vatican II, got it right, in my view. It is clearly traditional (more so than the Protestant Eucharist) and clearly communal (more so than the Orthodox liturgy). The “high church” rituals are there – kissing the altar and Gospel book, bowing, genuflecting, crossing oneself – but they have clearly been brought into a communal action, and only to the extent that they serve the communal action. Ritualism in the pejorative sense is avoided.

I hope this very personal expression of my views doesn’t sound too prideful. There are plenty of problems and deficiencies in Catholic practice, also at IAH conferences – still distributing Communion primarily from the tabernacle, still offering Communion under only one form to the people (only the ordained deserve two forms?!). No one could claim that the level of preaching or of congregational singing is consistently high yet across the Catholic church.

In a future ecumenical collaboration aiming at greater interdenominational agreement, I would be open to changes and improvements to the Catholic ritual of Mass as we gained from the strengths of other Christian traditions. (Shared translations of liturgical texts would be a nice place to start, or continue, but for now, let’s not go there.)

Call me old-fashioned, but I still rather like the great dream of Horace Allen and Geoffrey Wainwright and Gordon Lathrop and so many others: gradual ecumenical convergence through gradually increasing similarity in our liturgical forms.

And I continue to believe that the Missal of Paul VI, now under siege from, of all places, the Pope from above and zealous Catholics from below, has a singularly strong contribution to make to the ecumenical endeavor.

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The Internationale Arbeitsgemeinschaft für Hymnologie (IAH – International Fellowship for Research in Hymnology), meeting in Timişoara, Romania last week, had much to discuss around its 2011 theme “The Future of the Hymnal.” Such as:

• Will projection screens entirely replace hymnals in the future?
• Is it the future to construct an electronic database from which local planners can select from thousands of texts and melodies to create leaflets for each service?
• What role does a canon or core repertoire play in supporting and conveying a church’s identity and teachings?
• Is it not necessary to have a printed hymnal to define and preserve such a canon, even as it grows and changes?
• How large should such a canon be? How many hymns can be learned and sung by the people?
• Are not printed hymnals indispensable for singing and teaching hymns in schools, at parish meetings, in the home?
• When there are many regional variants and alternate traditions of melody and text, should this variety be preserved, or should standardization be brought about?
• What is the role of hymnals in fostering ecumenical unity through standardization of texts and melodies across denominations?
• Which is more important – standardized form of the melody and text across denominations within a country, or standardization within the same denomination among Christians in other countries who speak the same language? (Example: should German-speaking Swiss Catholics have standardized commonality with Swiss Calvinists, or with Catholics in Germany and Austria?)
• Should hymnal editors include good, unknown pieces (old or new) in hymnals? Or should they only include what is actually sung by the people?
• Should hymnals include rapidly changing repertoire from the spiritual movements (Taizé, Neocatechumenate, Focolare, etc.), or is such material better printed in supplements, pamphlets, and handouts?
• Through its hymn selection, can a hymnal help unite a Church with such diverse movements as “We Are Church” and “Legionnaires of Christ”?

Most of the discussion seems to be moving in the direction that printed hymnals are important and will remain in use, probably alongside other resources and media.

*          *          *          *          *

On Wednesday morning, IAH vice president Alan Luff of England spoke on the role of the hymn editor. The Church of England has never had an official hymnal. Hymns Ancient and Modern issued a revised edition in 1904 – and it flopped. Congregations rebelled against changes to familiar repertoire, e.g. that the editors returned to the original wording for “Hark how all the welkin rings.” By 1906 the editors had reprinted the 1889 edition, to great success. Luff emphasized that there are limits to what editors can accomplish – despite their best plans, e.g. with cycles lectionary-based hymns, much depends on how well local congregations use the hymnal’s contents.

There was discussion about altering hymn texts, which of course has consistently taken place across history. Charles Wesley kept altering his own hymns throughout his life, as well as those of his brother John, which makes it more difficult to argue that Wesleys’ texts must appear unaltered today. Most alteration today is to eliminate language many find exclusive, or to make overly archaic language contemporary. Alteration works better with some hymns than others – sometimes the loss is too great poetically. In such cases, the editors must decide whether to use a text unaltered, or to eliminate it from the hymnal. There was a tendency a couple decades ago among some to eliminate all archaic language. Now there is increased tendency to compromise and accept inconsistency, and to accept archaic language in some cases within a text collection which has much alteration.

*          *          *          *          *

Fr. Rastislav Adamko spoke of efforts to change the direction of hymnody in the planned official Catholic hymnal of the Slovak Republic. Project leader Juraj Lexmann has argued that there is a liturgical need for non-strophic open forms, refrains and antiphons, along the manner of the Graduale Simplex and the Graduale Romanum. This would be in addition to the existing large treasury of Slavic strophic hymns. In the absence of printed materials, such new-composed antiphons (I gather they are ‘commons’ usable within a season more than ‘propers’ for each day) have been used experimentally by teaching them to the congregation by heart before the liturgy. Younger clergy are a bit more open to this innovation, but there has been resistance at all levels of the church. The refrains sound too much like the Responsorial Psalm – do we really want the same genre for several parts of the liturgy every Sunday? Sufficiently trained cantors and choirs to sing the verses are not available in all circumstances. The people are quite attached to singing hymns at Mass. For all these reasons, work on the hymnal has come to a standstill, and no one knows if or when it will ever appear.

*          *          *          *          *

Richard Mailänder of Cologne gave a progress report on the revision of the official Catholic hymnal for Germany and Austria, Gotteslob of 1975. The current hymnal has a core section of hymns common to both countries, plus unique appendices for Austria and Germany respectively, plus an appendix for each diocese. (There are many local traditions, and in a few cases only the hymn text is given, with a rubric explaining that the old hymn is sung to several different melodies within the diocese.) In the core section, hymns on the ecumenical list with the same text and melody as Protestants are marked with an ö (ökumenisch = “ecumenical”). The 1975 hymnal eliminated many beloved 19th-century hymns – they were considered too “sentimental” and “devotional” – and included almost no pop/contemporary material. The revised hymnal will see increases in both categories.

German-speaking Catholics have a highly organized structure for revising their official hymnal, all supervised by the bishops. Work began in 2001. There are ten working groups dealing with, e.g. hymns, psalmody, catechetical texts (including brief catechism), prayers, images and graphics, and so forth. The hymnody working group began by examining over 50 hymnals – the Canadian Catholic Book of Worship is on their list! – and began with a list of almost 3,000 hymns to consider. There was extensive trial use of new material in selected parishes, and feedback sessions with music directors in every diocese of Austria and Germany. As they narrowed down the core repertoire to about 300 hymns, each hymn was sent for feedback to the German Liturgical Institute (a study center funded by the bishops’ conference) in Trier, to the inter-denominational “Working Group for Ecumenical Hymn Repertoire,” and to the hymnological study center at the University of Mainz. About half the core repertoire of hymns is appearing for the first time. Of this, about a third (c. 50 songs) is pop/contemporary. It is expected that additional contemporary material will appear in diocesan appendices, and especially in local pamphlets, handouts, and via overhead projector.

Much revision and renewal has been needed for Lenten hymns. The large treasury of traditional hymnody is full of “Passiontide” hymns, but there is a lack of material related to the reformed lectionary with its Lenten themes of baptism and new life in Christ. (Note that the German-speaking Catholic bishops and musicians are working toward lectionary-based strophic hymnody.) The core section will contain many strophic loose paraphrases of the Mass Ordinary long known and beloved by the people, as the bishops have already indicated they will approve. (And we in the U.S. wonder whether it’s legal to use alternate Christological invocations for the first three words of the “Lamb of God”…)

As of now, the Austrian and German bishops still plan to retain “for you and for all” (“für euch und für alle”) as the translation of pro multis in the Eucharistic prayer. So far the bishops have been adamant in their rejection of Vatican demands that it be the more literal (but misleading) “for many” (“für viele”). We shall see.

It is hoped that the new German Catholic hymnal will be used outside the liturgy more than the current one – in homes and at church meetings and prayer gatherings of all sorts. It is planned to be a “prayer book and hymnal” with prayers for every occasion in family life. There will be increased emphasis on the basic teachings of the Catholic faith, and extended introductory explanations for all the rites and sacraments of the Church.

Each bishop in Austria and Germany has received the entire contents of the proposed hymnal and had opportunity to offer suggestions. It is expected that both bishops’ conferences will approve the hymnal this fall. Then it will be submitted to Rome for recognitio (approval) – it is hoped, without delay. The hymnal will appear Advent 2013 at the earliest.

*          *          *          *          *

Thursday morning the speaker was Rev. Jørgen Kjærgaard of Denmark, who was to be elected new IAH president Friday afternoon. Kjærgaard was part of the team that revised the official Danish Lutheran hymnal in 2002. Because 80% of the population belongs to the state church, a revised hymnal affects not only the church, but also the Danish national cultural identity.

When Kjærgaard recently read a newspaper report on a Danish Lutheran church that installed a big screen, he googled (in Danish) “church” and “flat screen”… and discovered that the practice has become quite common. He wonders whether most or almost all Danish Lutheran churches will not have a projector screen within 5 or 10 years. And whether there will still be hard-bound hymnals. He hopes so, for the sake of preserving and fostering a core body of hymns supportive of the Church’s identity and tradition.

On the role of hymnody in Lutheran worship, I quote from Kjærgaard’s paper: “The hymnal is a tool for the proclamation of the Gospel in the mouths of the congregation… Through hymn-singing the whole congregation becomes active co-preachers of the Gospel – the hymn book is the congregation’s pulpit.”

*          *          *          *          *

Also speaking Thursday morning was Franz Metz of Munich, a German born in Romania. Metz spoke of the long tradition of hymnody among German Catholics in Eastern Romania (the Banat). At one time the population here was about one-quarter German, but many were expelled to Russia by the Communists after World War Two, and most of the remaining Germans were able to relocate in Germany in the 1970s after negotiations with and financial support from the West German government. Metz has done the arduous and loving work of collecting hymn materials from the attics and choir lofts of 140 German Catholic churches in Romania, many of them abandoned overnight, now dilapidated and locked up. He is editor of the recent German Catholic Romanian hymnal Katholisches Gesangbuch der Donauschwaben (“Catholic Hymnal of the Danubian Swabians”) for use by Banat Catholics still in Romania or emigrated to Germany or elsewhere.

Little contact with the West was possible in the Communist era, which means that Banat German Catholic hymnody was mostly not influenced by the Biblical and liturgical renewal in West Germany after World War Two and especially after Vatican II. Banat hymnody remained largely devotional, above all Marian. Several strophic paraphrases of the Mass ordinary also remained popular. I was interested to learn that the first such strophic Ordinary in all Banat hymnals since the 18th century, and also in the recently-released hymnal, is the one by Michael Haydn – the one I recently adapted to English for the collection Lift Up Your Hearts from LitPress.

The traditional custom is to sing vernacular hymns slooowly, and to add harmony in thirds and sixths. Anything else, the people don’t think it’s “pretty.” Gregorian chant has never taken hold among the people in these parts, whether Hungarian or German or Slavic. What has been attempted to be introduced in the last hundred years – e.g. Mass VIII – soon fell into ¾ time, with “pretty” harmony (3rds and 6ths) add spontaneously, and the tempo made interminably slow. It makes one wonder about the zeal of some in the U.S. to force Gregorian chant onto Catholics attached to their (sometimes sentimental) contemporary music – and I say this as a supporter of Gregorian chant and a proponent of at least a small repertoire of Latin chant known by all Catholics.

Here is what Bishop Martin Roos of Timişoara wrote in his foreword to the new Catholic hymnal for the Banat: “For us who come from this region or still live here, this is a piece of our very selves. By means of this rich body of hymnody, we Danubian Swabians have grown into the world of faith, this is our religious home in which we find security and consolation, as did our ancestors. Such an inheritance is to be cultivated and passed on.”

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The IAH has been meeting since 1965, and it is an ecumenical group. At every conference there is a Protestant Eucharist and a Catholic Eucharist. Everyone is invited to receive Communion at both liturgies – although this year the Catholic invitation was not public and explicit because the priest who has always made the invitation was not present. Almost all the Catholics this year received at the liturgy celebrated by a Danish Lutheran minister (“priest,” as they say in Danish). Whenever the Catholics sing a Marian hymn at a workshop or liturgy, everyone joins in without hesitation. Each day begins with ecumenical morning prayer. (BTW, I note with interest that when a Protestant minister prays a collect, he or she inevitably turns around in the center aisle to face the front.) Since I travel with a Latin breviary but no Bible, I had to read the morning Scripture on Tuesday from the screen of a laptop.

Hymn singing is a long tradition common to Catholics and Protestants in IAH who come mostly from north, north central, and eastern Europe. Interest among these Catholics in Mass propers, for example writing new antiphons in vernacular? Zilch, near as I can tell. If you were to tell any of these Catholics that hymns don’t belong at Mass, they aren’t liturgical, they aren’t Catholic, I expect they would look at you as if you had two heads.

* * * * *

What do they talk about at an IAH conference? Monday began with Dr. Erich Renhart of Graz, Austria, asking whether the next hymnals will be e-books. An e-book would be more flexible, make it possible to draw on unlimited resources, and each user could magnify the page size as desired. But it would be expensive, works only when there is electricity and the technology is functioning, and no longer delimits a stable content which reflects and passes on a tradition and identity. Renhart concluded that there are many situations and contexts in the Church’s life when e-books and projector screens might be appropriate. But the printed book should remain the medium for use in worship. He ended with a plea for beauty and quality in the workmanship of printing books. In the discussion, Alan Luff pointed at the already in the 18th century, hymn texts were displayed on large banners in Westminster Abbey to enable the people to join in.

* * * * *

Dr. Felician Roşca spoke on Romanian Protestant hymn traditions. Germans have been in Romania since the Middle Ages, and Lutheranism arrived already in the 16th century. The Calvinist reformed tradition has also been present in Romania since the 16th century, primarily among Hungarian speakers. In both cases, hymns and psalms from the homeland of the reformers were brought to Romania. More recently, Protestant free church Christianity has come from the U.S. The author told of an evangelical Protestant being permitted to travel to Vienna during the Communist years and finding a hymnal of contemporary songs he wanted to bring back to Romania. If a Christian book were found in his luggage, he would face imprisonment. He hid the hymnal in the garbage on the train as the guards searched him. He then rescued the hymnal and smuggled it in.

* * * * *

The group attended Vespers, sung in Romanian in the beautiful Romanian Orthodox cathedral late on Monday afternoon. Attendance at the Orthodox liturgy remained high throughout the Communist years, and today about 87% of the country is baptized Orthodox. Many local people came and went during the liturgy, for the most part not staying for long. Young and old, male and female, they came in great numbers to kiss the icons, cross themselves repeatedly, and pray.

The Communists outlawed the Greek Catholic church and gave what they didn’t confiscate to the Romanian Orthodox Church. After 1989, the Orthodox patriarch has worked mightily to return the churches to the Greek Catholics.

* * * * *

Mass Monday night in the Roman Catholic Cathedral had Mozart’s Coronation Mass and “Ave Verum” by the Timisoara philharmonic and the music department of the University of Timişoara. Following the practice common for several centuries in these parts, the propers were replaced by the set of strophic German hymns from Schubert’s “Deutsche Messe.” The choir sang in parts, the congregation joined in.

* * * * *

There is much debate about standardizing hymn tunes so that all the Christians within a denomination, or Catholics and Protestants within a region, know the same versions of hymns. If a tune is to be standardized, is the earliest version of a hymn tune always the best version? On Tuesday David Hamnes spoke on unified hymnody in Scandinavia. The official Catholic and Lutheran hymnals in Sweden share much common material as a result of collaboration in planning. The same is true of the Australian Hymn Book (With One Voice) of 1979, and its successor Together in Song of 1999, with hymns for Anglicans, Congregationalists, Methodists, and Presbyterians, and a further edition with Catholic supplement for use in Catholic worship. There have been efforts in the course of the 20th century to create common versions of hymns throughout Norway, and also throughout Sweden, to eliminate local customs and agree on a common version for Lutherans. Hamnes argued against such standardization. Music is what is actually sung, not what it on the page, and where traditions of folk singing are strong, there are always local alterations and embellishments and evolutions. Hymnal editors imposing standardization, as good musicologists, have overvalued the printed page. The 16-member churches of the Christian Council of Norway have considered developing a canon of hymns in common with standardized versions, but pulled back from the goal. Such a canon is best achieved when several denominations are working on hymnal revisions at the same time, which is not the case in Norway. The council settled for documenting all the hymns already in common use but not attempting to reduce them to standardized versions.

* * * * *

From my friendship with a fellow student in Graz in the 1990s, a Romanian Orthodox priest, I knew that the Romanian Orthodox Church has been working in recent decades for more frequent reception of Communion by the faithful and the reintroduction of congregational singing. (The people did not sing at Vespers; the singing was done partly by clergy and mostly by three cantors, two in black robes and one in street clothes, singing into microphone.) My impression then of an ecumenical attitude and openness to western ideals of liturgical reform was confirmed in my visit with Orthodox priest Fr. Vasile Grâjdian, who spoke to the IAH on Romanian Orthodox Chant Books and Song Books. Fr. Grâjdian said the Orthodox have no grounds for throwing stones at Roman Catholics, for their liturgy remained in Old Church Slavonic for many centuries before being translated into the vernacular, Romanian, in the 18th century. Clerical domination and loss of sense of community hurt both traditions equally. (I think he’s being generous to Catholics on this point.) The priest should be, he emphasized, the community’s “presider” (his term – we were speaking German and he said “Vorsteher”). The priest is one from among the people them who leads them in the liturgy which is their work.

* * * * *

The Lutheran Eucharist Tuesday night followed the Danish church order, celebrated mostly in English but with much in Danish. The hymns were taken from Colours of Grace, the European Protestant multilingual hymnal, allowing all to sing simultaneously in many European languages. This isn’t typical of IAH, but we sang all traditional Lutheran chorales at this service – Nun bitten wir den Heiligen Geist; Allein Gott in der höh; Liebster Jesu wir sind hier; Was Gott tut, das ist wohlgetan; Erhalt uns, Herr, bei deinem Wort, and Lobe den Herren.

“The Lord be with you. And with your spirit,” we began. Pray Tell readers might find of interest the order of the service:

* Organ prelude, Introductory greeting

* Old Testament reading, strophic Gloria, Gospel reading, Apostles’ Creed, hymn, sermon, Intercessory prayers, hymn

* Spoken dialog beginning with “Lift up your hearts to the Lord” and including parts of the Sanctus, strophic Agnus Dei paraphrase, beginning of Eucharistic Prayer, Lord’s Prayer, Institution narrative with the words of Jesus, distribution of communion, hymn

* Final prayer and blessing, closing hymn, organ postlude

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Over the past 25 years, Ken Wilson, music minister at Knollwood Baptist Church in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, has fostered a culture of hymn singing amongst the entire congregation through a remarkable program of hymn memorization for children in grades 3 – 5. Through the program, children systematically memorize one or two stanzas of 20 hymns, carefully chosen to fit year A, B and C of the Revised Common Lectionary. The children are exposed to part-singing early as they learn to sing both soprano and alto parts. The basics of hymnody such as hymn forms and tune names are also taught.  Children who successfully memorize 60 hymns are awarded with a place on the “hymns for a lifetime all-stars” board that is displayed in the church sanctuary.

This video gives you an idea of what has been accomplished:

Learning the Language of Praise from Stephen Ball on Vimeo.

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As part of his presentation, Ken Wilson shared 10 reasons for developing a culture of hymn singing among children. A few that struck me:

• Children are prepared for a lifetime of service as church musicians – starting them young, and having them take on leadership roles in younger choirs, help the singers experience music as ministry.
• The children set the tone for learning and singing for the rest of the church – having a child sing a hymn by memory beside an adult during worship is incredibly inspiring.
• The memorization of 60 hymns equips the young with a repertoire of theological language to express themselves with through high and low moments of their life.
• A hymn-singing culture becomes a place where it is very easy for the transforming love Christ to become “indelibly engraved” on the hearts of all who sing.

The third point stands out to me, as a Roman Catholic. One of the intentions for introducing responsorial psalms into the post-Vatican II mass was to enable the faithful to learn the psalms and hopefully use them as a language for prayer. But has that worked? How many Catholics (non-liturgical musicians, especially) express themselves by quoting or singing the psalms?

Given that a “hymn-singing culture” in the Roman Catholic church is either non-existent or in its infancy in most places, what then, is our theological language outside of the mass? Is hymn singing something worth cultivating? How would such a program in a Catholic parish impact the lives of parishoners? Can/should a hymnody program be part of faith formation, and possibly integrated into all other ministries so that singing becomes a culture?

Audrey Seah is pursuing an MA in Theology (with a concentration in Liturgy) at Saint John’s School of Theology·Seminary in Collegeville, MN.

Morning prayer was coordinated by Anissa Bacon, a UCC pastor, who involved the society’s scholarship recipients, past and present, in leading these services. Many of these young people are not only the future, but also the present, of musical leadership in their respective denominations. The services blended a diverse selections of hymns with readings taken from college students’ reflections on the relationship between humankind and nature. Evening prayer was led by Crystal Jonkman, an organist for an Episcopal church, based on a liturgy from Evangelical Lutheran Worship.

As always, there were a number of new products to learn about. Representatives from OCP Publications shared the story of the third edition of the Flor y Canto hymnal. A number of hymnwriters and composers shared new collections, including Dan Damon (United Methodist pastor and jazz pianist) and Benedictine Sister Delores Dufner. Sida Hodoroabã-Roberts led an anthem-reading session through a variety of hymn-based concertatos and anthems.

A wide variety of breakout sessions covered topics as diverse as 19th-century children’s hymns to the hymnody of Charles Price Jones to Genevan Psalmody in 20th-century Hungary to solo settings of hymns.

In our free time, many conferees rode the train to the top of Pike’s Peak; others visited the Garden of the Gods or participated in an organ crawl through Denver churches.

The United States Air Force Academy (Protestant) Chapel

Our closing hymn festival was at the United States Air Force Academy’s chapel. In this majestic space, we sang hymns inspired by another Shirley Erena Murray text which begins “Look in wonder, hold in honour all the beauty of the earth!”  Comprised largely of recently-composed texts and tunes, this festival invited us to contemplate again “all the wonder that surrounds us.”

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For more information on The Hymn Society in the United States in Canada, please visit www.thehymnsociety.org or look up the group on Facebook. Next year’s meeting of the Hymn Society will be in Winnipeg, Manitoba, on July 15-19, 2012. The theme will be “The Meeting Place,” and the focus will be on how congregational song brings people together.

Our second plenary speaker this year was Dr. I-to Loh, an ethnomusicologist, hymnal editor, and a  former seminary president. His talk, “Sound a Mystic Bamboo Song: Sounds & Images of Christ in Asian Hymns,” explored the contributions Asian cultures make to a global Christianity. Many of his examples were from “Sound the Bamboo,” a hymnal he edited for the Christian Conference of Asia. To prepare for this hymnal, he visited indigenous communities from Pakistan to Bali to record folk melodies. Many of these melodies were incorporated into the hymnal with Christian words, or inspired new compositions.

Dr. Loh reminded us that beauty is not universal. For example, Western 4-part harmony or “bel canto” singing would sound very strange in Indonesia or India, just as some Asian styles of singing and playing seem “out of tune” to Western ears. Similarly, he demonstrated how many aspects of music that Western Christians take for granted are not universal. While we used a piano for demonstration purposes, these hymns would often be accompanied by indigenous instruments — we heard a drum and a jaw harp. Instead of a regular meter, some hymns used additive rhythms — we sang Loh’s “Loving Spirit” in 7/8, 3+2+2. Instead of a Western tonality, hymns used scales not often used in the West, such as one based on a “gypsy mode.” And the imagery used was more meaningful to Asian cultures, such as “The Rice of Life from Heaven Came.”

One question Dr. Loh was asked — is it alright to take indigenous, non-Christian melodies and fit Christian words to them? In his response, Dr. Loh noted that this is something is something not limited to Christians, singing an altered Christian hymn he’d heard: “Buddha loves me, this I know…”

I think also of the response of Dr. Tinker, our previous plenary speaker, when addressing a similar question. He said that if people give you a song, then yes, you can (and perhaps even should) use it. But realize that it is changed — it is no longer the original piece that you heard. It takes on new meaning.

For parishes, a hymn festival could be a wonderful alternative to a choir concert. The choir can lead and ornament,  but this form invites — if not commands — the participation of everyone. Being in the midst of a group of people singing is inspiring and transformative. It’s an excellent form of ecumenical prayer. It can be a chance for a parish to reflect upon its history, or even a time of retreat.

Hymn festivals are a big part of Hymn Society conferences. Each involves the participation and planning of many people. On Monday night, the Rev. Jim Mitulski, pastor of New Spirit Community Church in Berkeley, CA, was narrator and co-coordinator for a festival titled “A Heart to Praise Our God: Celebrating Lesbian & Gay Poets & Composers.” He shared stories of faithful Christians who often were (and are) unwelcome in their faith communities. We sang a hymn used at a notable healing service for those with AIDS. We sang “Singing for Our Lives,” a gentle song of protest. And we sang hymns written for congregations that are mostly lesbian and gay. Jim shared the poignant story of Marsha Stevens, the composer of “For Those Tears I Died,” a 1969 song popular among evangelical Christians. After announcing that she was a lesbian, she received many copies of her own hymn, torn out of hymnals and mailed right back to her. The stories and hymns made for a powerful evening of reflection.

On Tuesday night, we gathered at St. Paul Lutheran Church in Denver for a festival titled “Rooted in the Rockies: Congregational Song with a Colorado Connection.” Mark Alan Filbert, Cantor at St. Paul, was co-coordinator of this festival, which demonstrated many ways to embellish hymns. Members of the Young Voices of Colorado, a renowned children’s choir, joined us along with bell-ringers, an ensemble of Orff instrumentalists, and brass players. Every hymn had a Colorado connection — some obvious, some surprising. Prolific choral composer Natalie Sleeth was a longtime Colorado resident. The composer of  the tune for “You Satisfy the Hungry Heart,” Robert Kreutz, who for many years a choir director in Colorado. Even composers like Paul Manz or Gerre Hancock, long associated with other states, were included in this festival for the time that they spent and music they wrote in Colorado.