{"id":1543,"date":"2015-03-14T12:57:48","date_gmt":"2015-03-14T18:57:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/janetheactuary\/?p=1543"},"modified":"2015-03-14T13:00:21","modified_gmt":"2015-03-14T19:00:21","slug":"on-getting-catholics-to-sing-a-question","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/janetheactuary\/2015\/03\/on-getting-catholics-to-sing-a-question.html","title":{"rendered":"On getting Catholics to sing: a question"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

This is more of an open-ended post for reader comments, on something I\u2019ve been thinking about for a while. \u00a0(Politically-oriented readers, sit tight; I\u2019m reading America\u2019s Bitter Pill now, and will have comments on that soon. . .)<\/p>\n

Remember a couple weeks ago, when I lamented <\/a>that Catholics, by and large, do a pretty lousy job of singing at mass? \u00a0(My metric: \u00a0can I hear the voices of everyone around me, or just my own voice and\/or that of the cantor?)<\/p>\n

Since I wrote that, I\u2019ve been off-and-on thinking about whether there\u2019s anything concrete I could do to change this in my own parish, though I am not particularly well-connected with the \u201cmanagement.\u201d \u00a0Ironically, my Lutheran husband has more relationships, due to his role as Assistant Scoutmaster, than I do.<\/p>\n

Could I prod the music director and the music selection committee (to the extent that there is one) to pick songs based on the degree to which the assembly is likely to sing, rather than just enjoy listening to the choir? \u00a0(Note: \u00a0I like singing, but I\u2019m not a particularly good vocalist, and, what with scheduling issues, I\u2019ve never joined the choir, but the music director knows me as Alex\u2019s mom \u2014 he plays trumpet in the teen choir \u2014 and Michael\u2019s mom \u2014 when he was very small, he liked to sit by the choir and watch the musicians.)<\/p>\n

Could we (OK, they) take \u201crequests\u201d? \u00a0And would parishoners be more likely to sing songs that have been \u201crequested\u201d or would they, in the end, be songs that everyone likes to listen to, but not actually sing?<\/p>\n

For the teen mass, where the music is generally printed, words-only, in the worship aid, would including the music encourage more singing, less listening?<\/p>\n

Would some actual nagging work?<\/p>\n

Or, alternatively, would \u201cmanagement\u201d be open to extra worship opportunities, say, a vespers that doesn\u2019t follow the Liturgy of the Hours liturgy but is more of a \u201cpraise hour\u201d with singing and scripture? \u00a0 Would enough musicians \u2014 the teen or adult choir, or others who can pick up a guitar or sit down at the piano to accompany \u2014 be interested?<\/p>\n

Or would it rock the boat too much, in terms of parish politics, to raise the issue at all?<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This is more of an open-ended post for reader comments, on something I\u2019ve been thinking about for a while. \u00a0(Politically-oriented readers, sit tight; I\u2019m reading America\u2019s Bitter Pill now, and will have comments on that soon. . .) Remember a couple weeks ago, when I lamented that Catholics, by and large, do a pretty lousy […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2209,"featured_media":1388,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[8,7],"class_list":["post-1543","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-catholicism","tag-liturgy"],"yoast_head":"\nOn getting Catholics to sing: a question<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"This is more of an open-ended post for reader comments, on something I've been thinking about for a while. \u00a0(Politically-oriented readers, sit tight; I'm\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/janetheactuary\/2015\/03\/on-getting-catholics-to-sing-a-question.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"On getting Catholics to sing: a question\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"This is more of an open-ended post for reader comments, on something I've been thinking about for a while. \u00a0(Politically-oriented readers, sit tight; 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