www.byzcath.org Forums Mysteries: The Life of Worship The Kliros Musical Notation in Parishioners' Hymnbooks?

In my zeal to demonstrate the viability of such a forum, I posted a poll - back in April https://www.byzcath.org/bboard/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=8;t=002111

Discussion of the topic did take place in several different places within the Byzantine Forum, and my computer skills are not sufficient to collect them all anew. But we can resume the discussion here.

My original question was:

WHY do you (like/dislike) musical notation in pew books intended for parishioners?

Someone made a legitimate objection to the term "Pew Book," but I couldn't find the post to see if they suggested a more workable alternative.

Phil Yevics Cantor
St. John the Baptist, Scranton PA (Passaic Eparchy)

Clicking on the Survey or Results will take you to the relevant Topic within the Town Hall Forum; please remember to return to the Kliros to explain your preferences here.

I was delighted to see that I was no longer the only person who did not like Musical Notation - our ranks have doubled to two!

Actually I have agreed with most of what I read from those in favor of including such notation, specifically the points that we should be striving to have everyone within the parish "singing from the same page" in the sense of singing the same melodies. I also agree that it would be desireable to move towards more consistency/uniformity between parishes within the same tradition.

My "discomfort" with musical notation in the people's books stems from a variety of factors:

1] I am unsure of what the ideal role for "Printed Worship Aids" would be within worship in the Byzantine traditions. I know that some times (most times?) they are a distraction from active participation.

2] I am not confident that all "singing from the same page" results in "all singing the same melody." Often this is the Cantor's fault, some times it is the fault of a stong voiced parishioner, but my suspicion is that neither will yield to something perceived as an "external corruption of our local tradition," be it written or not.

3] While recognizing the ideal goal of unified praise to God, I do not think a "mandated unity" is the best way to achieve this. I do not think a "canonical melody" is something consistent with the Byzantine traditions.

Enough for now!

Phil Yevics

Music notation accelerates the learning process for music. Reading and its alphabet accelerate the process of receiving and eventually comprehending a message. Ithink that if there were no music in the people's book, those who read music already would have a longer learning curve in order to participate in the singing.

Music in pew books seems to be well established now in both the Pittsburgh and Johnstown jurisdictions. And both seem to have adopted the idea that all parishes in the jurisdiction should sing exactly alike.

Seems to me it depends. Has the parish been able to maintain its own oral tradition? If so, I think it should not be disturbed. If not, well, then it might as well take its cue from the eparchy.

The training of cantors is crucial to this question. If you don't have a cantor who sings in the parish tradition, you cannot maintain it. If you don't have a cantor who can sing the chant, you cannot maintain even what may be in a book in front of you. Or in the pew (ok, this was a fairly early Latinization, the pew, but when did we get so feeble?). In general, training for cantors has not received the support it needs over the decades. And let's not pretend that we are maintaining the chant tradition if all the parish sings is the Liturgy and now and then a moleben.

Stephen

I am for notation in "pew" books. Of course, I read music and when I taught public school music, I made sure all my students learned to read music, as well. I can sing better with notes. I have even found it helpful to have several people who can read, to keep wayward cantors faithful to the the score. One would assume more technical ability from cantors, but it doesn't always work that way.

While music in the people's book (pew book) provides the basic framework for the music of the Liturgy, there will always be oral tradition!

Printed music does help the parish learn and follow the less often used melodies, particularly when singing vespers. Its' sad that we don't do vespers in more parishes more often!

Steve Petach
Cantor, Cathedral of St. Mary, Van Nuys

My reservation on music in the peoples' books is the potential to limit the musical repertoire. There are special hymns for most of the feasts that we sing as the cherubic hymn (and thus the communion hymn). Putting ALL of these in a book PLUS the dozen or so NORMAL melodies start to make the book a back breaker.

NOT including them in the "peoples" music book runs the risk of seeing them die. (If they aren't already dead in most areas.) My fear is the "That's not in the book!" response from people over time. If there is NO music then there is not limits to box you in. I suppose the peoples� book could have a clear introduction that indicates the book contains a limited collection of the most common music.

Our chant tradition varies by region and to a lesser extent by village. In my younger days those professors were all trained in the common change of the school at Uzhorod, but they identified themselves and each other on introduction as singing a village tradition by name.

They all knew the same core they learned at school, but variety was there too. With the loss of the school after WWII we lost the core training. The upheaval both here and there after war has disrupted the transmission of the local tradition as well.

What we need is a collection and collation of all of the local traditions and special melodies. Some of this may already be lost.

Steve Puluka
Cantor, Holy Ghost Church Mckees Rocks

Some thoughts on oral tradition:

When I began assuming the duties of our retired cantor, I was faced with the oral tradition he had maintained. He also did not read music. So, I transcribed into musical notation some of his settings, for the benefit of newcomers who do not share his knowledge.

Other settings were introduced in order to conform to common resources within the Metropolia such as the green book. The Our Father we had been using was actually a slight variant of one in the green book.

Sooner or later, most of us wind up singing somewhere else, and will benefit from knowing the same settings in use there. After all, people are inclined not to sing if they don't know the music.

As to music in pewbooks, I have mixed feelings. Where there is an actual choir, it could be a hindrance, but where congregational singing is the norm, a book with several settings for us of a given prayer, such as the cherubic hymn, would work- like the green book did.

Jim, Cantor
St. Thomas the Apostle, Gilbert, AZ