| Entrance | Lord Jesus, think on me |
| Kyrie | (Dinah Reindorf) |
| Psalm | Ps 125 (Romuald Simpson) |
| Gospel Acclamation | Praise to you, O Christ (James Walsh) |
| Prayers of Intercession | Lord, in your mercy (mcb) |
| Preparation of the Gifts | Lord, for thy tender mercy’s sake (attr. John Hilton, d. 1608) |
| Sanctus, Acclamation, Amen | Mass XVII & Missal tones |
| Agnus Dei | Mass XVII |
| Communion | Unless a grain of wheat (Bernadette Farrell) |
| Recessional | Praise we our God with joy |
An odd fact about some of the best known Tudor anthems in English is that their authorship is unknown. In our music library, both This is the day and Rejoice in the Lord alway are filed under “Anon, 16th c.”. Lord, for thy tender mercy’s sake, which is filed under the name of John Hilton the elder, probably ought to be in the same category. It is usually attributed either to Hilton or to Richard Farrant, but as far as I can tell both attributions first appear at least a hundred years after the piece was written, and there’s no good reason to believe either.
Whoever the composer, this well-known and much-loved setting of a text from Prayers commonly called Lydley’s prayers published in 1568 is a simple and heartfelt prayer for help in meeting today’s Gospel message of forgiveness and repentance.
Special mention today for Anthony our magnificent organist, who had eye surgery a few days ago and yet played faultlessly—and mainly from memory!—this morning.
How is Mass XVII going down with your congregation? We used it for Advent and we're using it again during Lent. People are getting the hang of it, I think! We still have moans from the older members of the congregation, though, who say they thought they'd seen the back of "all that Latin stuff!"
ReplyDeleteNo-one's moaned to me! I think that must mean it's going down ok. I certainly get a sense that the people know it better now than five weeks ago. We sing the Sanctus and the Agnus Dei, and I think it helps that the melodies of the two resemble each other closely.
ReplyDeleteI'm glad that our singing assembly now has three plainchant Masses in its repertoire: Missa Orbis Factor (XI), Missa Deus Genitor Alme (XVIII) and now this one. We could probably count on Missa de Angelis (VIII) too, at least among the older members of the congregation. But it's not one we've sung very often. Which one should we learn next?