Miserere mei Deus.

Because of the meaning of the words and its calm solemn melody. It elevates the consciousness to the contemplation of the eternal judgement.

Excellent choices PED, I say the rosary to gregorian chant, but will add these to my library and use them today for my roseary

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One commonly overlooked piece is Ubi Caritas, the Gregorian Chant piece that is traditionally sung during the Madatum, or washing of the feet on Holy Thursday.  It is overlooked because it is not very complex nor does it go on for much duration.  But we have composers who have found a simple beauty in the seed of its melody, and have expanded this out to a much larger composition.

"Where charity and love are found, God is ever there."

Of all Catholic traditional liturgical music, an often-referenced piece is this one, Ubi Caritas, and the single most popular composition based on it is by Maurice Duruflé, by the same name.  High school and college choirs alike consider it an all-time favorite.  It's actually part of a four section group of compositions for choir.  Maurice Duruflé takes the theme which is extremely simple, and expands it into a magnificent work of intricate harmony and nuance that is spell-binding, when done well.  The Cambridge Singers, here, do a fine job with it:

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/embed/457nVpxJDkA[/youtube]

This is an adaptation in 6 parts (SATTBB), of the Chant piece that is only one part.  While there are 4 verses in Chant, this polyphony uses only the first verse and the chorus, repeated with great embellishment.



Here are the Cambridge Singers again, with Sicut Cervus by Palestrina:

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/embed/0yd5EE0hAB8[/youtube]

This is also a polyphoninc adaptation of Chant, but it was composed hundreds of years before Duruflé.  Sicut Cervus translates, "As the hart longs for running streams, so too does my soul long for Thee, O Lord."

Both of these are favorites of the Paul Salamunovich standard repertoire.


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Here is a Chant piece that Wolfgang Mozart admired highly.  He was quoted saying that he would have gladly given up authorship of all his works, if he could only be known as the composer of this one piece.  It is usually reserved for Requiem Masses for which its text is the Sequence, and can be sung by a-cappella voices at Requiem Masses.

All Gregorian Chant is properly sung without any organ accompaniment.  This recording, where they end on precisely the same pitch where they began, demonstrates the fact that singers can easily stay in tune without hearing an organ while they sing:  


[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/embed/dsn9LWh230k[/youtube]


One curious fact of history is that in France before the end of the 19th century, a new composition gained rapid popularity, and that endures to this day, 130 years hence.  It was the Faure Requiem, which you have probably heard of.  Gabriel Faure was a bit of a revolutionary, and he didn't like the Dies Irae because it was too somber for him.  I guess he didn't like to think about God's revelation as much as he did his own fantasy, and my priest says that pride is at the heart of every sin, because it puts our will in front of God's will.  All sin is a kind of self-worship.  

Whenever the Faure Requiem is performed, it celebrates this act of pride, because it is a Requiem Mass that is missing the Dies Irae.  There has never been a Dies Irae composed to fit in the work.  I suspect that is because there isn't one possible, since the work is chock full of melody, harmony, rhythm and style that has little or nothing to do with the Dies Irae.  

Faure's Requiem is a fun work to perform and it makes a great crowd pleaser in concert.  We should keep in mind, however, that it was absolutely forbidden in Catholic Churches for several decades from its first appearance, only to be allowed in very few churches, one at a time, beginning in the 1940's.   As you may well imagine, it gained popularity after Vatican II and today is frequently used as a concert piece played inside Catholic churches for entertainment.


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ETA:

Neil O, you are such a blessing.
I am very devoted to St. Anthony, and often pray novenas to him found here:
http://catholicharboroffaithandmorals.com/St.%20Anthony.html

You'll note the Ubi Caritas is the background music playing.  But I didn' t know that.  Just tonight I was hoping I could identify the music, then your post.

I will include your intentions and welfare in my current novena.
(I started a thread about it last Tuesday re: a novena of 13 Tuesdays before his feast day)

God bless you and thank you, as usual.

You're welcome!  

I went to the linked website and heard the recording.  That sounds a lot like Paul Salamunovich's choir, in tone, but not in dynamics or phrasing.  He did not have the singers get so quiet in so many places nor to slow down and take a coffee break in the middle of anything.  But it is a nice recording just the same.  I'd like to know who the choir is, perhaps Robert Shaw?  

Thanks for the prayers, too.  I'd like to request prayers for the Collegial Consecration of Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, as Our Lady asked for it.  These days so many Catholics are giving up on that for any one of several reasons.  So the number of prayers are dwindling, it seems.  

St. Anthony is a favorite saint of mine.  I have a 700-year anniversary album from 1931, produced in Padua, Italy.  It's not in very good condition.  Apparently there were various language versions, and mine is in English, with a few translation errors!  

In Lisbon, Portugal, he is known as St. Anthony of Lisbon.  That is where he was born.  He had become a monk in another order, and sailed to Africa (Morocco) to become a martyr, because he had seen the procession of the 4 martyrs carried through the streets of Lisbon, when they had been killed in Morocco by the Moors.  He arrived there in Africa and got sick, being so severely disabled that he tried to sail back home to Portugal having been unable to fulfill his dream of martyrdom.  But God had other plans, and he was blown off course by a storm, sending him inland to the coast of Italy -- a distance of about 600 miles!  The Storehouse of Sacred Scripture and Doctor of Mystic Theology almost died in shipwreck, before anyone knew who he was.  There, he came ashore and was discovered lying there on the sand by some Franciscan Friars, who carried him to their monastery and nursed him back to health.   Then Anthony became a Franciscan.  He lived in a monastery there, doing menial chores, scrubbing floors, cleaning washrooms, and doing laundry, and all in silent prayer.  He looked on it all as God's will for him, instead of his hoped-for martyrdom, so he was suffering the deprivation of martyrdom, and doing so with joy and humility.

He is one of the few saints in history to have had so many official titles.  He was known as the Storehouse of Sacred Scripture, the Doctor of Mystic Theology (long before he was proclaimed a Doctor of the Church!), Hammer of Heretics, Patron of Expectant Mothers, Patron of Lost Articles, and several other titles.  

He had memorized the entire Latin Vulgate, in Latin, by the time he was 10 (ten) years old.  Can you imagine being his parents??  Actually, it seems they didn't know he was memorizing Scripture.  Nobody knew until as a teenager, in Italy, he was asked to preach to a crowd of 10,000 people, when no one else was available to preach to them.  After a bumpy start, the grace of God touched him and he came alive with his knowledge of Scripture, making the crowd demand that he would not stop.  

The rest is history.  He was contemporary with St. Francis of Assisi, who was present that day when he gave his first sermon, but Brother Francis was too old and frail to preach himself.  Some say it was his idea to have the young Anthony speak to the crowd, when he had not yet been ordained a priest.


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Neil O, I meant to also thank you for the Dies Irae link and information.
"Coincidentally" the sequence is, for me, the most sublime of the Requiem Mass, and the chant the most powerful of all.   Funny you should have selected it.

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Miserere mei Deus.

Mine too, SG!  During Lent and/or March/month of Sorrowful Mother, I play this each day during rosary recitation.  

Although it's tough to pick one favorite, isn't it?  For sacred music, I very often listen to the Barber version of the Agnus Dei.  

Hey it turns out we have this in common bro. I always say the rosary with Misere Mei Deus playing. It is my habit of prayer. Although I start my playlist of prayer with Anima Christi where I recite the Confiteor, then Kyrie and some prayers, thence I continue to the Credo and recite the Rosary.
The Rosary will save us. Trust in its power to convert us.

Dies Irae