Liturgical Seasons
One of the joys of working as a church musician is that I live my life in the rhythm of the seasons of the church. And like the seasons of nature, the seasons of the church are ever changing. We are nearing the end of Epiphany; Ash Wednesday and Lent are coming quickly. I love all the seasons of the church year, but there is a special somber beauty to Lent, both in hymnody and liturgy.
From the joyous last Sunday after Epiphany to Ash Wednesday is only four days, but the difference in music and liturgy is immense. Marion Hatchett, author and authority on the 1979 Book of Common Prayer, writes that we must enter in silence on Ash Wednesday—there should be no organ voluntary, no opening hymn. The procession of priests, choir and acolytes is silent. A period of silence should be kept following the processional. Hatchett says it is “appropriate for the procession to include incense, crosses, torches, choir and ministers”.
For the first Sunday in Lent, we are expected to do the Great Litany, usually in procession. The Litany enumerates our sins and weaknesses, and we ask deliverance from them. This is to be done the first Sunday after Ash Wednesday, so in the space of five days, we are deeply and penitentially in Lent. Our Great Litany is a revision of the first English litany, written by Archbishop Thomas Cranmer and introduced by King Henry VIII in 1544, five years before the first Book of Common Prayer. It was intended to be sung in procession.
If we take the seasons of the church year into our hearts, and live them deeply, we come closer to the divine, through the beauty of words, of prayer and supplications, and of music.
Lynn Gardner, Organist/Choirmaster
