Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1929-03-10

ington of several very fine sacred
music programs, the increasing
popularity and box-off1ce value
of choir and chorus attractions
throughout the country, and the an
nouncement not long ago by the st.
Gregory Society of America relative to
banned music in the Catholic churches,
all make peculiarly timely review OF
the status Of religious music. .e-
As a corollary to this increase in
1t is interesting to note the
which arise because
church music today is not better than
It is. It Is no less popular now than
it was twenty, fifty, or O hundred years
ago TO bewail the status Of music in
the churches, to bewail particularly the
intrusion Of the secular or popular note
into ecclesiastical music. The agitation
may not be as violent as 1t was around
1920 and 1922 when churches in vari-
Gus parts of the country engaged the
services of jazz bands and Irish CO.
medians for their Sunday services. en-
ploying such music as had pep and
punch and kick. and would put the
congregation in frame Of mind to
one Denver minister expressed it, but
it needs only a glance at the current
music magazines to reveal that leaders
in church work are far from content
with the state of their music.
There are $50 religious denomina-
tons in the United States; at one time
or another one Of them, at least, seems
to be concerned with the insidious
presence in the fold of humanity's
reaching for a more frivolous means of
expressing Its religious fervor than
through the solemn medium OF the old
hymns.
Periodically, from the very time that
love lyrics and profane drinking songs
invaded the mass itself, this sort of
thing has confronted those interested
Gregory I (Pope from 500 to 604 ADJ,
alarmed by the diversity Of musical
forms employed In the early Christian
church, instituted a rigid reform. Or
ganizing the unified church song,
known as the Gregorian Chant, and
ordered the compilation of the AN
tiphonary," q collection Of the only
Christian chants which could be used
in the ceremonies Of the cult. Bit by
bit, with the evolution Of musical form
in the laboratory Of early church music,
the church constantly ran afo,l Of the
intrusion Of an un-sacred note, and
just as regularly champions OF the
ancient religious music classics de-
plored the state into which church
music had fallen In their respective
periods. No amount Of vigil 1t seemed,
could keep entirely out Of the choir
loft and the pew the lighter spirit of
life, the spirit even Of the dance and
the love song.
In its convention last October the
United Lutheran Church in America
decided to drop two well known hymns
on the basis Of their being too inocu-
lated with "jazz" for inclusion in: the
hymnal. The erring melodies are
Brighten the Corner Where You Are"
and Beautiful Isle Of Somewhere"
F. Emerson Andrews, writing in the
February number of Musical America.
notes that "the makers Of hymnals
have always had to struggle between
the austere music and heavy phrase
the lighter, livelier melodies the people
preferred to sing. That desire for
music that people could sing" (since
the public is not, and never has been,
capable Of handling anything en- n1asse
but the most simple melodies) may ex-
plain well enough the frequent in
clusion in church music Of such airs
as THE Vacant Chair" Alice, Where
Art Thou?" and Drink to Me Only
With Thine Eyes" Perhaps 1t explains
less completely the practices In the
Catholic Church which led up to the
Motu Proprio of Pope Plus x In 1908,
prior to which the church service was
often called "the poor mans opera"
so general had become the custom Of
using operate music to sacred words.
Whole sections of opera were sung;
there were fiimsily- concealed versions
OF the sextet from Lucia" the quartet
from @"Rigoletto," the trio from AT
tila," and even 1.-THE Shadow Dance"
from "Dinorah." Low mass was marked
"Juanita; high mass included the
"sugary banalities" of Gounod, GLORIA,
Mercadante' and Millard the offertory
boosted a bit too often such things as
the "Inf1ammatus," which Ernest New
man has described as being comparable
to the wailing Of Tilted woman. And
years ago 1t was not uncommon to hear
Alpenhorn and Swiss yodel songs, street
songs of Italy and France. and German
student songs. Any music which drew
its themes from dances, such as the
polka. the waltz, the mazurka, and the
quadrille, or from profane pieces such
as national hymns, love songs or
funny songs. was banned in 1884 by
Pope Leo XIII. 49,.
In France, according to Vincent
d'Indy, a devout composer, many of
the melodies used in the hymnals were
nothing more than opera tunes. IL
centious and sometimes blasphemous
drinking songs, taken from the collec-
tons of the eighteenth century"
The introduction of folk songs with
the beginning of congregational sing
ing Tin Germany under the Reforma-
ton and the influence Of Martin Luther
and in France through the Protestant
church, led to mild abuses which,
while not as marked as those In Italy.
were certainly deviations from the
original sacred style.
Thus (Mr. Andrews is the authority
again) we find, in England, that many
of the hymns were mere folk songs and