In my attempt to pray the Liturgy of the Hours, I'm doing a bit of work learning to chant.
My general goal for a while has been to develop greater discipline in daily prayer. A guiding principle I adopted has been to practice that kind of prayer that lots of other good and holy people recommend. I began with Fr. Thomas Dubay and his book Prayer Primer (highly recommended). He says to start with vocal prayer, suggesting the Liturgy of the Hours as an excellent way offered by the Church. This structure has helped me immensely over the past few months! It's also a wonderful source of scripture for meditation, the next highest kind of prayer.
The Church teaches - all evidence to the contrary in our parishes - that latin and Gregorian chant are to be given priority in the liturgy at mass. So, on a related note I've been trying to learn to chant and combining this with my practice of praying vespers every night. Here are some gems I've culled from internet slag:
Simple Way Lay Apostolate This site offers the single best resource for learning the LH and simple chant. Discovering Prayer is a free downloadable booklet with quick and easy directions for praying all of the hours, as well as reading neumes (chant notes). Included, or available as a separate download, is a Liturgy of the Hours Help Card that includes the latin for all the ordinary prayers (God come to my assistance, Glory to, Our father, Benedictus, Magnificat, Nunc dimittis, May the Lord bless us, etc.) as well as all eight psalm tones for chanting in english or latin.
Jubilate Deo A booklet of traditional prayers and hymns that were recommended by the Sacred Congregation for Divine Worship in 1974 as a "minimum repertoire of Gregorian chant".
An Idiot's Guide to Square Notes Not as trite as the title suggests. Very useful.
The Church Music Association of America "is an association of Catholic musicians, and those who have a special interest in music and liturgy, active in advancing Gregorian chant, Renaissance polyphony, and other forms of sacred music, including new composition, for liturgical use." MANY articles and chant sheetmusic for download.
St. Cecilia Schola Cantorum A parish schola with a great many pieces of chant and polyphony available for download.
Choral Public Domain Library Searchable database of free public domain compositions for download.
Vatican Radio Lauds, Vespers and Compline prayed daily in latin and available for listening.
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1 comment:
Excellent! Thanks for the links.
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