Come, Holy Connectivity

For Pentecost, our choir will be singing what I consider a really awful translation of Veni Sancte Spiritus. The English words are so out of whack with the traditional chant, that we were still screwing up after a half dozen attempts. In my rarely humble opinion. there's some liturgical stuff that should never have been translated into the vernacular.

And yes, I do appreciate the irony of making a case for chanting in Latin while downloading UberTwitter onto my Blackberry Curve during choir practice.

Find a Messiah Sing-Along! Make a Joyful Noise!

It's beginning to sound a lot like Christmas.

No, not around here. Here, I'm still listening to Advent music, which basically means putting O Come, O Come Emmanuel on continuous play. And not at the mall, which I avoid -- can't risk hearing I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus.

What sounds like Christmas and welcomed by me during Advent is Handel's oratorio, The Messiah. If I had enough energy and throat lozenges, I could spend almost all next week and weekend participating in The Messiah Sing-Along events.

I'd tote my very own copy of the score. (Note: Makes a great gift, that's how I got mine.) I'd be warmed up from singing along with my current favorite recording. I'd certainly know enough to stand with one ear in the alto section and another with the sopranos for easy access to both. I, for one, do not attempt high octave runs any more.

I'd go even if I couldn't read music or sing tolerably well. I stand by what I wrote in The Catholic Home years ago: "Lip sync if you must, but don't pass up the opportunity to be embraced by what is perhaps the most glorious musical tribute to Jesus the Christ ever written."

The God of 2nd Chances: Church Choir

While we may grow weary from granting one another yet another chance to get it right, I believe our God does not. There's plenty of scriptural evidence of God getting annoyed, but as the psalmist reminds us, God's love and mercy endures forever. And so I've come to believe -- and have seen in my own life -- how God always grants divine do-overs.

I've especially noticed this happening for me in the domain of church choir, starting last Advent and Christmas and then carrying forward to present time. I really shouldn't be surprised. The music ministry played a significant role in my faith formation as I considered entering into full communion with the Catholic church.

These days, my Inward Ho adventures continue at a venerable parish where I, a relative newcomer, have finally joined the choir. This morning, the guy who collects the music after Mass actually smiled, possibly because I waited patiently instead of shoving my hymnal at him or leaving it on the piano. Usually he seems exasperated, something I noticed because I was perpetually perturbed when it was my (volunteer) job to collect and refile hymnals and octavos.

Big deal? Surprisingly so. The way I see it, God is giving me another chance to be in harmony on oh-so-many levels.

Back? Forward? Choir!

Looks like I may be back to choir after benching myself years ago, although doing so feels like forward movement on a variety of sacred fronts.

After months of visiting, I've opted for a church choir that usually ends its practice with prayers. Music ministry...what a concept. This choir sings from a loft, a setting that leads to a different set of antics than I've experienced while singing at floor level. It's also as hot as h-e-double hockey sticks up there but I don't care. I adore the perspective.

It was from this aerial view last Thursday that I happened to notice how the sanctuary below was starting to look like a theme park. What was up with all the BVM statues?

"It's May."

Oh. Right.

My Lofty Experience of Singing

Singing this year's Christmas Vigil with a choir turned out to be the healing experience I'd hoped for and clearly needed. How lovely to be so generously invited by a choir director and so warmly welcomed by the regulars. How glorious to sing next to a soprano whose voice transformed the descants into brilliant shooting stars of sound. And on pitch, too!

I was grateful to be standing where I was for another reason. I'd been placed directly across from the Crucifix above the altar -- a presence hovering over Real Presence, and face-to-face with me. Thanks, I needed that.

It doesn't matter whether I'm singing as a parishioner or a choir member, my perspective on the liturgy changes literally and figuratively whenever there's a choir loft in use. In both instances, I'm more focused on what I'm doing, which is praying, whether my voice is floating up or down. This is why I've become such a big fan of choir lofts. Too bad they've been ditched by church building committees.

A liturgist I know says this relatively recent development in church architecture is as much about economics and acoustics as it is about inviting the pew people to participate. Makes sense, I guess. But now having experienced singing from a loft several times, I've become positively retro on the matter. I'm certainly much better able to appreciate Thomas Day's book, Why Catholics Can't Sing: The Culture of Catholicism and the Triumph of Bad Taste, first published in 1990 and still brutally hilarious. Note to self: come up with music selections for my Mass of Christian Burial now.

ADVENTure Continues (4th Week)

It's the fourth Sunday in Advent and I'm busy sucking on lemon mint herbal throat lozenges. My throat doesn't hurt, I just like the taste of church music. It's the closest I ever get to synesthesia.

I'm getting ready for Christmas and excited about singing with a choir again. I haven't sung the Christmas Vigil Mass at midnight in years. My reasons?

Quite frankly, I was growing tired of spending Christmas Day wiped out with oratorio-induced adrenal fatigue. While I loved the rush that resulted from hours of singing, I did not love the subsequent crash. Or, for that matter, the time tripping. It's one thing to stay up all night at home, wandering around in flannel jammies and eating pretzels. It's quite another to begin peeling off pantyhose, swabbing off make-up, and chowing down a full meal at 2:30 AM. Plus, I couldn't help but notice that prayer was slowly being eclipsed by performance.

The lemon mint herbal throat lozenges that had once tasted like hymns, anthems and psalms, started tasting bitter. And so, I opted out and focused on making a joyful noise unto the Lord in my acoustically superior shower stall.

Whenever I think that healing happens in the strangest ways, I remind myself that nothing is impossible -- or strange -- for God. In June, I participated in a Gregorian chant and polyphony workshop. Last month, I went to lots of funerals and sang everything, including whatever the Cantor was offering up.

At one funeral, the healing mercy of God appeared to my right in the form of a former choir mate, one whose voice is like molten gold with threads of silver and flashes of sapphire. By the Alleluia, we were one voice interwoven and lifted in prayer. Shortly thereafter, I realized that singing with others was, for me, an essential spiritual practice. As for singing Christmas Vigil, this seems like the perfect time to celebrate birth as well as resurrection. Gloria in excelsis deo, et in terra pax hominibus bonae voluntatis!