Notepaper Music Development in the churches of the Diocese of Lincoln Quarterly news
Trinity 2011 www.lincoln.anglican.org/music
What’s going on?
I’m often asked what I actually DO in this job. Here is the current answer.
Teaching New organ-study groups are being started in Winterton and Folkingham nr Bourne this July. (Spilsby and Dunston are fledged, with their own tutors). It is planned to start and bequeath study groups to local tutors all over the diocese. A short course in singing the Exsultet for the Easter Vigil was offered in Lent, and courses on Singing the Office simply and unaccompanied are ongoing. Individuals seek coaching if required. I teach organ*, piano, singing, conducting, composing/arranging . Village Services A liturgical year of DIY sung services for congregation only is being toured around, with rehearsal, then worship. Materials, compiled by me, are supplied. Places hosting this: Donnington on Bain, Owmby, Keelby, Gt Hale, Winterton, Deeping St Nicholas, Orby, Swineshead, Nocton, Bicker… The aim is to facilitate parishes in using the materials without me in future (reminder CDs issued) so as to bring sung worship to congregations without instrumental or vocal leadership. RSCM link As part of 2011’s Celebrating the Small Church, the RSCM is keen to engage with modest choirs new to the network. 4 taster-workshops shared between Eric Wayman [RSCM Chair] and myself have gleaned 50+ new singers so far. Parish visits Invitations since last June came from Dunston, Alford, Boston, Sleaford, & Bailgate Methodists (concerts), South Elkington and Corringham Deanery (talks). and Brumby (choir and musicgroup teaching) and Boston again - for junior chorister-coaching. Advice People discuss recruiting, appointment-making, repertoire, technical and policy matters with me, mostly by phone/ email but some visits and meetings are involved. Ladies’ Choir The choir launched in September 2010 at Stow (Evensong) and has presented the Advent Experience at Halton Holegate at the Bell Inn, the Lent Experience in Spilsby Theatre, Carols at Doddington Hall, an Annunciation Eucharist at Stow under Will Harrison, a concert at St Margaret’s, Roughton, and contributed a short
anthem to Bishop John’s Leaving Service. Training them, arranging music, and compiling the Advent/Lent Experiences are part of my work. La Chorale, our Swedish twinnedchoir, visits Lincoln from17-20 June ; see the poster on Page 2 for details of our joint events. Materials Music for the Eucharist, for Psalms, for unaccompanied singing, blueprint liturgies , organ study items and teaching materials for Placement students are written and supplied from this office. Most can be sent electronically. Modest sums are charged! Placements Eight churches with strong musical provision are offering to host and train teenagers for the future as leaders, either of bands, or as organists. Sing Out Hosanna This was recorded from 2009-10 and is available for teaching 9 – 11 yr olds basic church singing and Christian understanding. It includes words/music books and delivers both a lesson and an act of worship for each week of the academic year by CDs. Saxilby, Halton Holegate, Whaplode, Pinchbeck, Morton, and Scampton have used it. Versions for older and younger children are envisaged – but not just yet! www.singouthosanna.org will take you on a guided tour of the materials. Projects Some plainsong enthusiasts based at Skirbeck St Nicholas have studied the chant with me and are now ready to sing this in worship for other churches. Full translations are supplied. The group is ecumenical and numbers about 12 people. The initiative came from Fr Paul Noble. Linda This term Linda Wass has joined Music Development on the admin side, working 6 hrs per week. Her work has speeded up my output majorly; I am grateful for her cheerful and accurate co-operation. *not to be confused with my work for the RCO/St. Giles Organ School which is independent of the diocese.
What’s on?
La Chorale and the Diocesan Ladies’ Choir
Weekend Events
Diary June 18, 19 20 23, 24 25 July 1 2
5 6 7, 8 9 15, 16 21, 22 23
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La Chorale Ladies’ Choir visit - details on the right. Morning only – La Chorale farewells Office / parish visits 9.45 Lead worship for new Churchwardens’ Training day
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e Jun
Come, hear, and delight in the combined forces of the ladies’ choirs from the Diocese of Lincoln and its twinned Diocese of
Office Market Rasen 9.30 meeting, then Ladies’ Choir rehearsal 11.00, Middle Rasen Liturgy committee meeting, 14.30 RSCM Festival rehearsal, Caistor, 19.00 – 20.30 Organ study group starts, Winterton, 15.00 – 16.00 Office Ladies’ Choir rehearsal 11.00, Middle Rasen Office/parish visits Office/parish visits Plainsong Vespers, 18.00, venue tbc
Härnösand, Sweden, over a summer’s weekend in June.
Saturday 18th June Concert, 3 pm
St Peter & St Paul, Middle Rasen
Sunday 19th June Eucharist, 9.30 am Lincoln Cathedral
Evensong, 6 pm
St Andrew’s, Witham on the Hill
August 28
Working in Lincoln weeks beginning 8th and 22 Plainsong Vespers at Skirbeck, 18.00
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Reporting The year of Celebrating the Small Church is half-way through already! The very valid question “where do we go from here?” is being asked. Here are some ideas: 1
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Start using some of the Village Service music in otherwise said Services. The Psalm-tones for example could be used very widely. The Psalm is properly part of the Common Worship Eucharist, so don’t feel that without Matins or Evensong the Psalm is off-limits. Adopt the unaccompanied Eucharist setting (The Meon Mass) for your Village Eucharist. Sections of it are in use in the Village Services and the whole thing is published and recorded for teaching. Schedule another Village Service for the future, and acquire the whole set so that you can run one should you wish to, from the prepared materials.
The RSCM’s initiative to make contact with small choirs not necessarily already part of the network, has borne fruit in that upwards of 50 singers attended the taster-workshops, and are intending to join the “regulars” in the Festival Service on October 8th in Lincoln Minster. Additional note-learning rehearsals for this are planned for July 5 and 7, Caistor and Horncastle respectively, and again in September (12 and 14, South and North respectively). It is not too late for additional singers to join, so please keep spreading the word. Ladies’ Choir Two presentations for Advent and Lent are ready to go on tour now, having been used initially in secular surroundings at Halton Holegate and Spilsby. Each presentation uses a screen with artwork, texts, and summaries, whilst Biblical and poetic readings are given live, together with varied, attractive music and some “props” e.g. lighting the Advent wreath etc… If you would like to host either version please let me know. The choir does not charge, but we have to budget £200 for harpist and harp-transport for the Advent version. If you would like us to present the Advent Experience but cannot muster the harp-costs, please let me know.
Notepaper is published four times a year with updates about the Music Development work at times when you need them. To contact Rosemary for further information or general enquiries: Rosemary Field The Old Palace Minster Yard Lincoln, LN2 1PU
Rosemary’s work will doubtless take her out of the office just when you ring, so please do leave a message and don’t give up at that point! Direct Dial: 01522 504023 Mobile: 07525 966 832 Email: rosemary.field@lincoln.anglican.org Linda Wass Email: linda.music@lincoln.anglican.org
Church Music Lesson
There are some very specific names for things in church music, and it is good to get the right tag with the right thing to avoid confusion. Here are some which are often misapplied:
Gloria
Can be Gloria in excelsis (Glory to God in the highest) from the Eucharist, a theological tour around the role of Jesus written to refute heresy. Often abridged for good-ish reasons, with dire results for the comprehension of the people. It is dropped in Lent anyway!
Gloria
Can be Gloria Patri, the doxology (praise-verse) Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit……this is applicable to the end of most things and is not dropped in Lent.
Responses
Simply, a dialogue. Not to be confused with the Gloria in excelsis, Sanctus (Holy) Agnus Dei (Lamb of God) or anything else!
Psalm
Any text from the book of Psalms, howsoever set to music, or not. Often taken to mean Anglican chant in harmony; may also be unison, plainsong, responsorial, paraphrased in regular metre, or a worship-song.
Setting
A musical version of the unchanging parts of a service, usually described by the composer’s name and the key, i.e. Bloggs in B minor, or the title, such as The Anglican Folk Mass.
Propers Ordinary Alleluia Sung Choral Cantor Soloist Pie Jesu Ave Maria Requiem
Texts which belong to a set day only Texts which happen all the time Take a close look – no “l” before the last syllable! It means, God be praised, and is the church’s great Easter song of triumph, hence it is banned in Lent for greater impact on its return. With singing, usually congregational Sung by a choir A choir of one person! Handy for singing the tricky bits. Like a cantor, but might be worse and more expensive. The last verse (Kind Jesus, grant them eternal rest) of the medieval Dies Irae - a vivid description of the Day of Judgement. This is often sung at weddings, which beggars all belief in anything. Nice tune. Tough words. The Gabriel quotation which announced our salvation. Properly used at Advent, Annunciation (Mar 25) and perhaps if your church is St. Mary’s. Several settings are equally well-known: do check which is required! A Eucharist prayed over the body of a dead person. Not a setting of the Passion of Jesus in Latin, nor meant for Good Friday, the words have inspired many famous big-choir settings. If you want to do a Requiem choose November when we “do” the departed.
Viewpoint
A little of what you fancy does you good...
This statement is seldom chal- enjoyment topping the list of crilenged: if you don’t enjoy it, teria starts to look rather shabby there’s no point. in this light. But, we are human and the power of music and other Applied to worship as it often is, art-forms to move and inspire us amazingly, this has potential to is the prime reason for using them change our perspective from of- in worship, so there will always be fering God the worship which is that dilemma. Another mistake is his right into having holy fun to think that we need to be fired around the God topic. We may up with tangible emotion every enjoy things for impeccably holy time for worship to have been reasons – this song moves her to real, or our souls fed. Emotional, repentance, that psalm consoles artistic, intellectual and spiritual him over the mystery of injustice responses are very different – but that is personal and subjec- things. To interpret emotional tive, and therefore perfect for surges as spiritual reactions is private devotions. Public worship risky. is not a voyeur’s snoop on private prayer; it is collective and general prayer, made in community and to some extent, on behalf of all.
Emotional, artistic, intellectual and spiritual responses are very different things. Private devotion has taken a back seat since the middle ages, affecting the way public worship is now conducted. The church is trying to read us our Bible (hence the 3–yr readings cycle) lead us in prayer, feed us sacramentally, and enjoin us to witness and live the life, all in one hour a week some weeks. It’s a bit of a squash. The rationale of public worship is hard to nail across all viewpoints, but it cannot be denied that firstly it is our duty as believers in the risen Christ, who overtly ordered it; secondly it is a means of receiving grace through word and sacrament; then fellowship, witness, outreach and evangelisation all stem from that. To select materials for worship with personal
We need to enter woship with confidence and humility, with an open ear and mind, and to remember what we are really, really doing. The view that if we don’t enjoy it we will go on spiritual strike, stalk out and withdraw our “support” (as though the Church were a charity shop or a volunteer group) is one which inverts the places of Creator and creature, a primal mistake surely worth dropping by now! That said, worship this side of the grave will always be imperfect both in content and intention; flaws of self-seeking, even when doing good, are part of the Fall - we are condemned to
drag particles of tainted motives along with the pure ones. We cannot escape this; it is the curse of human nature to mean well, and God in his mercy knows that it’s the thought that counts. Perhaps we may re-examine the thought. To reduce the Judaeo/Christian worship heritage to a jolly romp through the things we enjoy most is to mistake it for what our forebears did round the piano on a Sunday evening – a good old devotional sing-song of faves. Now I am all in favour of the heartfelt devotional sing-song; the Songs of Praise format houses it perfectly. But I do see where Old Nick slips his callingcard under the vestry door if people absent themselves from worship if their favourite tunes are not played, or are horrid to others about it. So when you hear of petty mutinies over such things you are witnessing a power struggle like any other, born of a worldconformed and narrow mindset. That is not to say that we have no right to deem some items inadequate, trite, or even unfit for purpose. That is a valid decision, all too frequently applicable. There is much dross in print and some very unsound teaching, too. Personal opinion masquerading as theology is dangerous, and a lot of it is set to pretty feeble music. But mere Top-10-ism fails to save tomorrow’s treasures, and damages yesterday’s. ‘Pink Donuts series’ photo used by the kind permission of pixaio.blogspot.com Notepaper is written by Rosemary Field, the Music Development Officer of the Diocese of Lincoln.