# Gregorian Chants still alive?



## In Honorem Dei

In the Netherlands there is this strange contradictive situation. Within the churches gregorian Chants slightly decreased over the past 40 years. It has become rare to experience each sunday a classsical original Mass served with gregorian chants.

Still there is such a place. In Schiedam (near Rotterdam) every sunday this tradition is being preserved since 1880. Schiedam Basilica

At the same time, while non-believers over the years increased, the need for mindfullnes and transcedent music also increased. Now here starts the weird part.....

By average Gregorian Chants are being experienced as mindfull, relaxe and spiritual music. You don't have to be a catholic to appreciate this musical cultural inheritage.

Within the Church this awareness is not present. Their attention is replacing this traditional habits with dutch songs.
With four or five other places in the Netherlands this location in Schiedam is one of the last places that is conducting this tradition.

*My question is how is this in the UK of other countries?*

Listen to some of our chants.


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## Guest

I don't know about Gregorian, but I'm told there are other types of chants in the Catholic Church. Here's a brief example of one at Notre Dame: I absolutely love it!!


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## Taggart

Plain Chant is alive and well. We have the Missa de Angelis regularly as well as the English mass in one of several modern plain chant settings.

There a number of churches that use plain chant either in the ordinary or extra-ordinary form of the mass. The Jesuits at Farm Street in London and St Aloysius have a regular sung Latin mass on Sundays. The Oratory church in York and Oxford also have sung masses. Some of these services will include more modern music by Byrd, Lassus, Palestrina and others as well as plain chant settings.


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## millionrainbows

I see Gregorian Chant as being merely symptomatic of the "drone" and spirituality in music, which precedes any religious dogma or restrictions. So I see it as still alive and well, not as a specific form, but as a manifestation of the human spirit. I'm not interested in Chant except as it performs the function of all such spiritually-oriented music. This includes "The Mule" by Deep Purple.


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