Storrington Mass
15/11/14 09:07
Storrington Mass - a review by Dave Thomas
Well, it’s been about four years since the “Revised Roman Missal” came into effect (November 27th, 2011) and with it we were informed that the Archdiocese of Kingston was strongly suggesting that all choirs use a common Mass setting. Unfortunately we were told this would be by Fr. Geoffrey Angeles.
We found this to be clumsy when played on guitar but went along with the selection for over a year. During this time we started learning the John Dawson setting. We had found the refrain in the Gloria to be too long and repetitious so we modified the Dawson Gloria by omitting the repeated refrains. We played the Dawson setting for a year and were happy with the fact that with the two guitars we could play in different registers. During the year 2013 my good friend Larry who I had been playing guitar with in a number of churches became ill with cancer and succumbed to it in early 2014.
Since then I have been playing solo guitar with two lady vocalists. Since March of 2014 the ladies had pressed for a different Mass setting. This summer I set about examining the various re-written settings such as Mass of Creation, Mass of Light, etc. as well as a large number of original scores based on the Revised Roman Missal.
“The Storrington Mass” by Marty Haugen was agreed upon. The setting was written for an order of Roman Catholic priests called “Community of Canons Regular of Prémontré”, (or 'Premonstratensians'). The priests are also known as Norbertines after Norbert of Xanten, the Founder of the order. Because of their white habits, another name for members of the Order is White Canons. The priests follow the Rule of St Augustine.
It is very playable on guitar and the timpani and brass are not required. It is a complete setting, including a Penitential Rite and a Lenten Gospel Acclamation.
Admittedly the Gloria is not a very lively score, but taking liberties with the tempo improved that.
We had looked at other settings but found the re-written versions awkward (Mass of Light, Mass of Creation). Other new versions weren’t as complete and we’d still have to find Penitential rites, Lenten Gospel Acclamations to name a few.
The Storrington Mass is available from GIA as sheet music and MP3 for downloading (D-7696G and G-7696CD, respectively).
Here’s a Youtube link for most of the vocal music https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aTYBLPx58N0
Well, it’s been about four years since the “Revised Roman Missal” came into effect (November 27th, 2011) and with it we were informed that the Archdiocese of Kingston was strongly suggesting that all choirs use a common Mass setting. Unfortunately we were told this would be by Fr. Geoffrey Angeles.
We found this to be clumsy when played on guitar but went along with the selection for over a year. During this time we started learning the John Dawson setting. We had found the refrain in the Gloria to be too long and repetitious so we modified the Dawson Gloria by omitting the repeated refrains. We played the Dawson setting for a year and were happy with the fact that with the two guitars we could play in different registers. During the year 2013 my good friend Larry who I had been playing guitar with in a number of churches became ill with cancer and succumbed to it in early 2014.
Since then I have been playing solo guitar with two lady vocalists. Since March of 2014 the ladies had pressed for a different Mass setting. This summer I set about examining the various re-written settings such as Mass of Creation, Mass of Light, etc. as well as a large number of original scores based on the Revised Roman Missal.
“The Storrington Mass” by Marty Haugen was agreed upon. The setting was written for an order of Roman Catholic priests called “Community of Canons Regular of Prémontré”, (or 'Premonstratensians'). The priests are also known as Norbertines after Norbert of Xanten, the Founder of the order. Because of their white habits, another name for members of the Order is White Canons. The priests follow the Rule of St Augustine.
It is very playable on guitar and the timpani and brass are not required. It is a complete setting, including a Penitential Rite and a Lenten Gospel Acclamation.
Admittedly the Gloria is not a very lively score, but taking liberties with the tempo improved that.
We had looked at other settings but found the re-written versions awkward (Mass of Light, Mass of Creation). Other new versions weren’t as complete and we’d still have to find Penitential rites, Lenten Gospel Acclamations to name a few.
The Storrington Mass is available from GIA as sheet music and MP3 for downloading (D-7696G and G-7696CD, respectively).
Here’s a Youtube link for most of the vocal music https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aTYBLPx58N0