# Mass Settings Question



## MonagFam

As a Catholic I've always been struck by how many Mass settings are written within classical music, and how those seldom make it into the liturgy of any Mass I attend. To be fair, not many Churches I have attended can support an orchestra or have parishioners that can sit through a five minute Kyrie.

Some questions I have --

1) When a composer wrote (or writes) a Mass, is it usually intended for one use? Or do they write it thinking it will be used each week? 

2) Were (or are) Mass settings analyzed and critiqued as music separate from it's liturgical source? Are there musical journals contemporary to Mozart, let's say, that delved into a Mass setting he wrote? If they were not reviewed as such, at what point did that happen?

3) Do you believe that composers felt their Mass works would be used outside of what it was written for? (Beyond expounding upon themes or ideas that may have originated from that piece). Is Haydn traveling some weekend, stops by an unfamiliar Church, listens to the musc and things, "I wrote that" ? 

4) I should probably have a better grasp on this, but were the churchgoers in the 18th/19th century engaged or participate in the music? 

I'm sure I have more and this may seemed scatterbrained, but I wanted to get these out. Thanks as always for your comments/insight/responses!


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## Pugg

We do have ( a kind of) similar thread:

http://www.talkclassical.com/47428-question-mass-genre.html


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## MonagFam

I did see that tread,but I felt my inquiries were a little different and didn't want to hijack the other one.


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## Taggart

Most mass settings were written for the old or extraordinary rite in Latin. That means that you need a church that supports a Latin mass in the old form. So in general you won't hear these much nowadays.

It is unusual to find a church that supports plainsong - Kyrie, Gloria, Credo Sanctus & Benedictus and Agnus Dei - within the context of an English mass. You may find that combined with the Latin mass in the new rite.

On the thread Pugg quotes, I mentioned a couple of churches that do full sung old style Latin Masses. Both of them belong to orders - the Oratorians in York and the Jesuits in London. York is also unusual in that it has a thriving early music scene as well as being a University town so can provide support for this sort of thing.


Getting on to your points:

When a composer writes a mass it can be: a general purpose mass; a requiem mass - either general purpose or for a specific person in which case it should only have one use; it may be aimed at a specific Saint's day either as a name mass for a patron or for a religious order. Masses for a particular occasion may be used once a year; general masses can be used as needed.

If anybody critiqued them, it would be their patrons.

Composers reused their own ideas. Haydn got into trouble for reusing part of the Creation in his mass No. 13 in B flat major, Hob. 22/13.

As to participation, I think the congregation left that to the professionals. I am aware of one church in London where congregational singing is discouraged because people want to hear the (excellent) choir. Remember the old rite Latin mass was celebrated in silence apart from the music and the sermon. The modern trend for the congregation to join in the acolytes responses is an innovation from the 1950s.

Trouble is the old Latin mass stopped in the mid 1960's and has only recently been revived. That means you have to be in your 60's to have any experience of the old (pre Vatican II) church and its rites.


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## MonagFam

Taggart said:


> Most mass settings were written for the old or extraordinary rite in Latin. That means that you need a church that supports a Latin mass in the old form. So in general you won't hear these much nowadays.
> 
> It is unusual to find a church that supports plainsong - Kyrie, Gloria, Credo Sanctus & Benedictus and Agnus Dei - within the context of an English mass. You may find that combined with the Latin mass in the new rite.
> 
> On the thread Pugg quotes, I mentioned a couple of churches that do full sung old style Latin Masses. Both of them belong to orders - the Oratorians in York and the Jesuits in London. York is also unusual in that it has a thriving early music scene as well as being a University town so can provide support for this sort of thing.
> 
> Getting on to your points:
> 
> When a composer writes a mass it can be: a general purpose mass; a requiem mass - either general purpose or for a specific person in which case it should only have one use; it may be aimed at a specific Saint's day either as a name mass for a patron or for a religious order. Masses for a particular occasion may be used once a year; general masses can be used as needed.
> 
> If anybody critiqued them, it would be their patrons.
> 
> Composers reused their own ideas. Haydn got into trouble for reusing part of the Creation in his mass No. 13 in B flat major, Hob. 22/13.
> 
> As to participation, I think the congregation left that to the professionals. I am aware of one church in London where congregational singing is discouraged because people want to hear the (excellent) choir. Remember the old rite Latin mass was celebrated in silence apart from the music and the sermon. The modern trend for the congregation to join in the acolytes responses is an innovation from the 1950s.
> 
> Trouble is the old Latin mass stopped in the mid 1960's and has only recently been revived. That means you have to be in your 60's to have any experience of the old (pre Vatican II) church and its rites.


Thanks. Since I was born after Vatican Council II, I have never been at the old Latin Mass. We have had some settings (chant) in Latin. I know there might be a local one that does it in Latin Mass (there is another one that isn't in Communion with Rome).

I find it interesting that there aren't a lot of tunes used. I bet we have several "Ode to Joy"-based songs with different lyrics. Yet songs written for the old Rite seem to have no place.


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