The Schola Abelis at Bel and the Dragon

We have sung our last Mass of the Trrm and the calendar year - and the fist Mass of the litugical year, complete with a Solemn Alma Refemptoris Mater, with the FSSP at St William of York, Reading.

We have repaired to a local restaurant named after one of the more colourful episodes of the Old Testament.

Videos (of the Mass!) to follow.
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St Didacus at St Anthony of Padua

Today is the feast of St Didacus, a great miracle worker of the 15th Century, a member of the Franciscan Friars Minor. Fr Aldo Tapparo sang a Mass in his church, St Anthony of Padua, in Headington, and we accompanied the Mass.

St Didacus is given the Common of Confessors, Justus ut palma. The ordinary our polyphonists sang was by Johannes Brassart (c.1400-c.1455), who was from the south Netherlands.

Here is the Introit Justus ut palma, followed by Brassart's Kyrie.


Here are the Gradual Os justi and the Alleluia Beatus vir.


Here is Brassart's Sanctus and Benedictus.


Here is the Offertory with its verses.




More about this Mass here.

First Masses of Term

We have now sung in Blackfriars, for the LMS Oxford Pilgrimage, in St Birinus in Dorchester, for a parish requiem, and in SS Gregory & Augustine's, Woodstock Road, for All Souls
.


The Pilgrimage Mass was in honour of Blessed George Napier, and before the Archbishop of Birmingham, who blessed a plaque in honour of the martyr whose fourth centenary it was. As well as singing at Mass, we sang the Te Deum, the Litany of the Saints and the Litany of Loreto on the procession, and at Benediction afterwards. Our polyphonists sang an unusual Ordinary, Nicholas Ludford's 'Missa inclina cor meum', and a motet by William Byrd, 'Miserere mei'.

At Dorchester we had a training day with Nick Gale, the Director of Music at St George's Cathedral in Southwark (ie the Catholic one!). We had a session with him before and one after lunch, and then sang a Requiem, again with polyphony. Nick Gale has his own approach to chant which will take time for us to absord and make our own fully, but was a fascinating day which had instant results. Nick's approach, based on the Graduale Triplex, is very much focused on the text (paying attention to the length of syllables in the text, as well as stressed syllables), attention to the dominant note (usually the 'reciting note'), and certain features of the neumes brought out in the Triplex. This all involves stressing and slightly lengthening certain notes, in ways which overlaps with, but is quite distinct from, the editorial suggestions found in the standard editions of the chant. Above all it rejects the rythmical system of 'twos and threes' created in the early 20th Century by some scholars, which attempts to bring the chant more into line with modern music.



We were lucky in our timetabling because we sang the Requiem again a few days later at SS Gregory & Augustine, allowing us to consolidate what Nick Gale had taught us. The next challenge is for us to apply his principles to a new set of propers.

At Dorchester and SS Gregory & Augustine's the polyphonists sang the Requiem of Antoine Brumel (c1460-?1512/3): Kyrie, Sequence, Sanctus, and Agnus.

Freshers Fair!

We are Freshers' Fair, Exam Schools Room 11.


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Term Card for Michaelmas 2010

We meet every week of Full Term on Wednesdays at 8.15pm in The Queen's College.

All our Masses this term will have a Rennaissance polyphonic ordinary
and Gregorian Chant propers.


Second Week
Saturday 23 Oct: Mass for the LMS Oxford Pilgrimage
Blackfriars, Oxford, 11am

Third Week:
Saturday 30 Oct: Training day with Nick Gale followed by Mass
Requiem, St Birinus, Dorchester on Thames, 4pm

Fourth Week
Tuesday 2 Nov: All Souls
SS Gregory & Augustine, Oxford, 6pm

Fifth Week
Saturday 13 Nov: St Didacus
St Anthony of Padua, Headington, 11.30am

Sixth Week
Saturday 20 Nov: St Felix of Valois
Chapel of Mapledurham House, near Reading, 11.30am

Eighth Week
Sunday 28 Nov: First Sunday of Advent
St William of York, Reading, 11am

Eighth Week
Saturday 4 Dec, Immaculate Heart of Mary
Milton Manor, near Didcot, 11.30am

Videos of Milton Manor Mass

The last Mass of term, and of the academic year, was at Milton Manor House on Saturday 19th August. We had a Votive Mass of Our Lady with a polyphonic Ordinary, Missa Sancta Mater, by Francisco Guerro.

Introit: Salve sancta parens


Gradual Benedicta et venerabilis & Alleluia Post partum Virgo



Offertory motet


Sanctus and Benedictus (before and after the consecration)


For photos of the Mass, see here.

Videos of Newman Mass

I've been having a lot of trouble with camcorders and software, and now have a backlog of videos. Here are three of the Newman Society Termly Mass back in March 2010. This was a pontifical Mass celebrated by Abbot Brogan of Farnbrough. It was the Monday after the 3rd Sunday of Lent, a feria.

We sang from the front of the nave, vested, the first time we have done this. There would not be room in the sanctuary for a liturgical schola - certainly not for a schola of our size, there were eight of us.



Introit, In Deo laudabo


Gradual Deus vitam meam, and the Tract Domine non secundum, the latter of which is sung every Monday, Wednesday and Friday Feria Mass of Lent.


Offertory Exaudi Deus


A report on the Mass and the dinner which followed can be seen here.