2-Music-Classical-Composition Types-Church

conductus

Starting in the 12th century, music {conductus} can accompany priest movements.

cyclic mass

Mannerist masses {cyclic mass} can use repeating parts.

Gregorian chant

Biblical passages were official late-Middle-Ages Catholic Church music {Gregorian chant}|. Gregorian chants use one note per syllable {syllabic style} and one of eight key modes. Modes have different intervals between tones and so have different moods. Modes have a central tone {reciting tone} for melody, a tone {ambitus} one octave above central tone, and a tone {final tone} on which music ends.

mass in church

Catholic Church music {mass, music} {missa} can be for communion thanksgiving service {Eucharistic Service} {Liturgy of the Faithful}, held daily between terce and sept.

parts

Mass starts with preparation {Preface, mass} followed by main events {Sacrifice, mass}. The Sacrifice has three parts: offering {Offertory, mass}, blessing {Consecration}, and partaking {Communion}. Congregations or priests sing mass parts that stay the same {ordinary, mass}. Parts that change daily {proper, mass} are refrains or chants.

Singers can read or intone the lessons using mainly one pitch {lection tone}. Psalms use music phrases in which pitch {psalm tone} rises, plateaus, and then falls.

Preface

First part {Introit} is the entrance and has an antiphon refrain. Next comes the psalm verse, different for different days of year. Next comes the doxology. Next comes Kyrie Eleison (Lord have mercy). Next comes the optional gloria: "Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost" (Gloria Patri) or "Glory to God in the highest" (Gloria in Excelsis Deo). Next comes Te Deum Laudamus (We praise thee God). After the prayers and the lesson, a song {gradual, mass} precedes a rejoicing song {alleluia}, on regular days, or a sad song {tractus, mass}, for penitence or mourning days. Gloria, gradual, and alleluia or tractus change daily. After the Bible lesson comes a song {credo, mass} (creed).

Sacrifice

The Sacrifice has five steps {Sequentia}. First is the Offertory refrain, different every day. During Consecration, a song {sanctus} (holy) accompanies canon prayers, and a priest sings the Lord's prayer. During Communion, a choir sings Agnus Dei (Lamb of God). After Communion, a choir sings a refrain, and mass ends with a song {dismissal, mass}.

Renaissance

Renaissance masses used same phrase at ordinary-part beginnings {head-motif} or same melody for all mass parts {cantus firmus}.

prayers

Dominus Vobiscum (The Lord be with you) can precede formal prayers. Ave Maria (Hail Mary) is a three-part prayer but is not in the mass.

oratorio

Baroque devotional songs {oratorio}| can use dialogue form.

postlude

After church service, organ plays hymn or hymn-like music {postlude}.

prelude

Baroque and Romantic free music form {prelude}| was fantasy, elegy, impromptu, or aria.

processional

Music {processional}| can accompany entrance to ceremony.

recessional

Music {recessional}| can accompany exit from ceremony.

refrain

Catholic-Church choir sings response {refrain, music}. Choir typically divides into two halves that alternately sing parts.

requiem

Masses {requiem}| for resting of the dead omit regular alleluias, doxologies, and blessings. Parts are Requiem (rest), Kyrie Eleison (Lord have mercy), Sequentia Dies Irae (day of wrath), Sequentia Tuba Mirum (wondrous trumpet), Sequentia Rex Tremendae (majestic king), Sequentia Recordare (remember), Sequentia Confutatis (confounded), Sequentia Lacrimosa (mournful), Offertorium Domine Jesu (Lord Jesus), Offertorium Domine Hostias (Lord of hosts), Sanctus (holy), Benedictus (blessed), Agnus Dei (Lamb of God), and Communion.

responsorial chant

Catholic Church music {responsorial chant} can use soloist and choir singing alternately. Responsorial chants can use melisma. Chants can add troping.

strophe in music

Conductus used Latin poems with several stanzas {strophe, music}. Singers sang harmonic parts together, but long melisma can extend syllables.

through-composition

Each stanza can have different music {through-composition}.

trope in chant

Chants can add personal non-Biblical words and music {trope, chant} {troping}. Tropes can follow chant {sequence, trope}. The first harmony started at end of 9th century, when singers sang trope and chant end simultaneously.

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Date Modified: 2022.0225