Foreword
·Once there was a computer scientist and mathematician who was unsatisfied with how the new edition of his book was being produced with different technology. He realised he could make a computer program to typeset books and estimated that it would take about six months. This is Donald Knuth who started the TeX project. He didn’t charge for his software. He actually paid people who found bugs in the program.
It was through this typesetting program taht I came into the world of Gregorian Chant. I learned TeX while preparing my undergraduate thesis at the University of New South Wales. Not long afterwards, I was asked to type up the hymn Adoro Te Devote for a children’s class. The tools available were a long way from those available today. More requests for chant booklets followed. I would type it up, then the choir or master of ceremonies would find all the mistakes and explain the right way to set things out. In this peculiar way I learned a lot about reading square notes as well as bits about the Mass and the Divine Office.
This ability to type chant served well what I started leading a little choir for Sunday Mass. The full propers were too complex, so I would make psalm toned copies of anything that I couldn’t master from the Liber Usualis. I also started making videos for other choir members to learn the pieces by ear. The process of simplifying and recording pieces helped me gain more facility with the music. Over years I grew better able to make sense of the melodies and hopefully make pleasing music in the service of God.
In 2020 I had some more spare time thanks to Sydney’s precautionary measures. My video of the main hymn from the Little Office, Memento Rerum, was the most popular of all my videos. Earlier I had toyed with the idea of making an online course, scripting and recording a few videos exploring the Salve Regina, but this had been knocked back as being too short. Maybe I could make a course teaching how to sing the Little Office of Our Lady in Latin. I was already singing Prime and Compline. I thought I knew enough to sing the rest. Soon this endeavour was capably filling up my spare time.
At first I thought it would be an easy task as the Baronius Press books included the music. I would just read from these. Maybe this could work for one person singing by themselves, but when teaching people exactly what and when to sing, the Baronius Press books were woefully inadequate. I started setting out a few psalms and soon realised I would need to type up the whole thing.
The course was more successful than I had imagined and still remains helpful despite my less-than-professional setup. The booklets remain in an inconsistent state, some with English translations, some without. I fix up mistakes as they are pointed out, but making a consistent book seems like a far off goal. I would like to fix up the course. I have learned so much since I started and no doubt there are still more things to learn! Maybe the course and the booklets will develop together.
This is where the work of Mr Acevedo has been so astonishing. He has taken a fairly haphazard collection of words and music and fashioned a beautiful new book in Latin and Spanish.
How did I come to be asked to write a foreword for a Chilean edition of the Little Office of Our Lady? There are many factors, but basically it is because I am Catholic and I pray the prayers of the Catholic Church. Mary is my Mother and I have made a consecration following St Louis Montfort. Of course I say the Rosary, and that is very important, but there is always more to learn from the patrimony of the Church’s prayers.
I learned about the Little Office by learning about the Divine Office. The Maternal Heart of Mary Latin Mass Community in Sydney sings Terce before Sunday Mass and Compline after some evening Masses. There were a few occasions when Vespers would be celebrated. It was easy to join in Compline each week after Thursday evening Mass. In time we embarked on singing Compline at home. Opportunities for learning more about the liturgy came about when typing up booklets for different services. When Baronius Press brought out their little Little Office books, I had a good foundation ready to sing from those books.
The Little Office is easier for daily use than the full Office. The Divine Office is an amazing treasure, but requires a great deal of varied repertoire to sing daily. The hour of Compline is less variable and we still sing it each evening as a family. One year for Lent we sang Prime from the Divine Office and it was fun and edifying, but the prospect of keeping it up for the rest of the year was a bit daunting. Vespers is a beautiful hour, featuring Our Lady’s Magnificat, but very overwhelming to learn the hundreds of antiphons required. Vespers from the Little Office of the Blessed Virgin Mary uses six antiphons for each of its three seasons. One extra if you include the Regina Caeli which is the Magnificat antiphon in Paschaltime. Learning half a dozen antiphons three times a year is a much more manageable undertaking.
This edition is a good first step towards singing Our Lady’s Little Office. The chant is all there in clear four line notation. The psalms are pointed, which means there are italics and bold characters to show where the tune bends. This is a very important advantage over the Baronius Press copy which I started with. This edition starts you off with three very interesting hours - Matins, the most imposing hour with the amazing responsories; Vespers, with the beautiful hymn Ave Maris Stella and Compline for the end of the day, finishing with one of the four Marian antiphons. The translations are there in the right column. I can guess the Spanish from the Latin, so perhaps it could be helpful for people learning Spanish. Although the remaining hours are yet to come, this gives a good selection for morning and evening prayer.
Where to start? Find a time and pick a piece. In the morning you might like to sing the Invitatory or the Te Deum. In the afternoon you might start with Ave Maris Stella. You don’t need to pray the whole thing straight away. Find someone to pray with you. Recite the psalms in whichever language works for you. Choose something manageable and see if you can make it a daily prayer. At first the pronuniciation and intonation might be distracting, but soon that will become easier and you can meditate on the words. New things take a while to become familiar, but there are many treasures to uncover here and what you don’t cover in this life you can learn from the saints and Our Lady in the life to come, God willing.