1959 Dominican Holy Week Chants available

I am pleased to announce that, through the kindness a friar reader of Dominican Liturgy, we can now make available at Dominican Liturgy, in PDF format for download, the chant book Cantus Gregoriani ad Ordinem Hedomadae Sanctae Iuxta Ritum Ordinis Praedicatorum (Rome: Santa Sabina, 1959).

As many of our readers know, and as I have explained in my history of the Dominican Liturgy from 1950 to 1970, the Dominican Rite Holy Week rituals underwent extensive revision in the 1950s to make them conform to the reformed Roman Liturgy. As the Dominican Rite is a monastic rite and did not have any provisions for blessings of the font (non-existant in monastic churches), baptisms, and other aspects of the secular liturgy, this was a major revision. To supply chants for the reformed rites presented great challenges. The editors of the Cantus Gregoriani sought out as many authentic medieval versions of the chant as they could find and adopted others from the modern Roman tradition.

This set of chants represents the last effort to conform the Dominican Rite Holy Week to Roman practice using medieval music. In 1965, this material would be consolidated into the last edition of the Officium Hebdomadae Sanctae, but in that edition the music would be drastically revised to conform to the Solesmes methods of execution and notation. Those interested in the music of the Dominican Rite before accommodation to the Solesmes regime will find this download especially useful.

The music may be downloaded on the side bar under Hebdomadae Sanctae Cantus Novi.