A year ago I looked at the hymns sung on Easter Sunday. The number of streams was much reduced because of vigil Masses being used for the Easter vigil. The same was true this year; in fact, there were only 16 streams across the diocese.
As far as hymn choices go, there was very little difference from last year. This wasn’t really a surprise, even though the actual churches were not quite the same ones. I think many places use the same hymns each year for Easter.
- Sung on 10 occasions – Thine be the glory
- Sung on 7 occasions – Christ the Lord is risen today; Now the green blade riseth
- Sung on 6 occasions – Alleluia give thanks
- Sung on 3 occasions – Battle is o’er; Lord of the dance
Once again, the number of places singing the sequence was very small. In two places it was sung by the assistant priest and two others sang different settings. 6 places either had the sequence read by a reader or said by everyone. Sadly, 6 places ignored the sequence altogether. And yet, ‘Christ the Lord is risen today’ is a setting of the sequence and was one of the most frequently sung hymns so it’s not like people don’t have a setting they could use. It adds at most three minutes to the length of Mass. Is that too much to ask on the most important feast of the year? Sure, there are people in the congregation that aren’t regulars but they are there because they want to be there.
It was much more likely that places had a sprinkling after the renewal of Baptismal Promises. This is unique in the form for Easter and really doesn’t add to the length of Mass. Many places also had the congregation light candles at this point. ‘Water of life’ was easily the most popular sung accompaniment though one place did use Bob Hurd’s ‘Come to the river’.
But what of the rest of England?
Again, the number of streams was reduced but not to the same extent. Perhaps not altogether surprising as most of these streams are morning Masses and many of them have more than one. The majority also streamed their vigil Masses.
- Sung on 19 occasions – Thine be the glory
- Sung on 17 occasions – Jesus Christ is risen today
- Sung on 12 occasions – Alleluia give thanks
- Sung on 11 occasions – Now the green blade riseth
- Sung on 8 occasions – Water of life
- Sung on 5 occasions – Alleluia sing to Jesus
- Sung on 3 occasions – Blest are you Lord; Christ be our light (Easter version); Hail redeemer; He is Lord; Lord of the dance; This is the day
So really, a very similar picture, except that ‘Jesus Christ is risen today’ was used much more than ‘Christ the Lord’ which was hardly used at all.
I included the songs sung 3 times because I thought that the Easter version of ‘Christ be our light’ (This is the night of new beginnings….) was an interesting choice. It’s certainly a better choice than using it to replace the Exsultet at the vigil which I heard done in at least two places. It might have a resemblance to the Exsultet but it is not a modern translation of it as I heard one priest claim. And yes, they did replace ‘night’ with ‘day’ for the morning Masses.
Countrywide, the sequence suffered a similar fate, being said in 13/33 streams and ignored in 11. There was more variety of settings though the most popular was to use the plainchant either in Latin or English. Two places used ‘O flock of Christ’ which is a good choice for a congregation and one parish did sing ‘Christ the Lord’. I really would encourage people to look at Geoff Steel’s version in ‘Resurrexit’ as it works excellently for cantor and assembly with a nice refrain.
The surprise nationally was really with the sprinkling rite and the number of places that opted not to use music at this point. 30% had the sprinkling in silence. ‘Water of life’ was again the most popular accompaniment though there was a little more variety.
Music, Liturgy and ME 