EOPLE JUST LIKE YOU participate in the Sacred Music Symposium for multifarious reasons, but one item often overlooked is the seminar I teach on vocal recordings, like the one below. I walk the participants through a process which has helped our volunteer choir very much.
Click on the link below (#90206) to download the PDF score:
REHEARSAL VIDEOS for each individual voice and PDF score await you at #90206.
PEAKING “Stabat Mater Dolorosa,” the creation of the St. Jean de Brébeuf Hymnal has necessitated making hundreds of comparison charts, helping us choose the best text for each hymn. I was able to convince the committee to let me post a sample chart, but only on the condition that all original translations were omitted—so this chart only contains about half:
* * PDF • Sample chart (incomplete) comparing translations
Look what Monsignor Ronald Knox does in verse 12:
12. Love exceeding hangs there bleeding,
My cause pleading, my love needing—
Bid him share his cross with me.
Look what Denis Florence MacCarthy does in verse 12:
12. Ever leading where thy bleeding
Son is pleading for my needing,
Let me in His wounds take part.
Look what Monsignor Hugh Henry does in verse 12:
12. Who, from bending Heav’n descending,
Came amending earth’s offending—
All His pains with me divide.
Now examine the original verse 12 to see why they did what they did:
1. Stabat Mater dolorósa
Juxta Crucem lacrimósa,
Dum pendébat Fílius.2. Cujus ánimam geméntem,
Contristátam et doléntem
Pertransívit gládius.3. O quam tristis et afflícta
Fuit illa benedícta
Mater unigéniti!4. Quae maerébat et dolébat,
Pia Mater, dum vidébat
Nati poenas íncliti.5. Quis est homo qui non fleret,
Matrem Christi si vidéret
In tanto supplício?6. Quis non posset contristári,
Christi Matrem contemplári
Doléntem cum Fílio?7. Pro peccátis suae gentis,
Vidit Jesum in torméntis,
Et flagéllis súbditum.8. Vidit suum dulcem natum
Moriéndo desolátum,
Dum emísit spíritum.9. Eja Mater, fons amóris
Me sentíre vim dolóris
Fac, ut tecum lúgeam.10. Fac ut árdeat cor meum
In amándo Christum Deum,
Ut sibi compláceam.11. Sancta Mater, istud agas,
Crucifíxi fige plagas
Cordi meo válide.12. Tui nati vulneráti,
Tam dignáti pro me pati,
Poenas mecum dívide.13. Fac me tecum pie flere,
Crucifíxo condolére,
Donec ego víxero.14. Juxta Crucem tecum stare,
Et me tibi sociáre
In planctu desídero.15. Virgo vírginum praeclára,
Mihi jam non sis amára:
Fac me tecum plángere.16. Fac ut portem Christi mortem
Passiónis fac consórtem,
Et plagas recólere.17. Fac me plagis vulnerári,
Fac me cruce inebriári,
Et cruóre Fílii.18. Flammis ne urar succénsus,
Per te, Vírgo, sim defénsus
In die judícii.19. Christe, cum sit hinc exíre,
Da per Matrem me veníre
Ad palmam victóriae.20. Quando corpus moriétur,
Fac ut ánimae donétur
Paradísi glória.
But that’s nothing compared to what Bernard of Cluny routinely did—such as this.