Diocesan Mass for Musicians, 2018

Saturday of Week 14 in Ordinary Time

14 July 2018

 

Entrance	All that is hidden (Bernadette Farrell)
Kyrie	Kyrie Eleison (Dinah Reindorf)
Psalm	The Lord is King (Paul Wellicome)
Gospel Acclamation	St Agatha Alleluia (Martin Barry)
Preparation of the Gifts	A Hymn to the Trinity (P.I. Tchaikovsky)
Sanctus, Acclamation B, Amen	Mass of Creation (Marty Haugen)
Agnus Dei	Paschal Mass (Alan Rees)
Communion	Taste and See (CJM)
Recessional	Thanks be to God (Stephen Dean)

The Mass for Musicians came at the end of a magnificent training day for the musicians of the Diocese, linked to the Hope in the Future initiative. The Cathedral Centre was packed to overflowing, for a day of talks and workshops (led by Daniel Bath, Nick Baty, Anthony Hunt and yours truly), ending in a Mass for all the participants. The packed timetable had left us with very little rehearsal time before Mass, but we managed to master everything, from Tchaikovsky to CJM’s Taste and See, which at one point involved sixteen voice parts.

The music was all chosen to fit the texts of today’s Mass, which included the angels crying Holy, Holy in Isaiah (for which the Tchaikovsky fitted like a glove), and everything now hidden will be made clear from chapter 10 of Matthew. Paul Wellicome’s boisterous psalm setting might have been written for the occasion, and taste and see was the Communion antiphon.

The day itself felt as though it met a huge need, and the feedback afterwards was certainly appreciative. I hope there are many more such days to come.