For October – the month of the Rosary – we have a new composition for you, titled “Rosary Mass”. This is a full cycle of masses, and recordings of the regular parts can be listened to for free on all known online platforms.
The composition by Father Wojciech Sznyk OP, arranged by Urszula Rogala, includes both permanent parts (Kyrie, Sanctus, Agnus Dei) as well as the remaining chants of the Mass form: Introit, Offertorium and Communio. The complete sheet music for all songs can also be downloaded for free from the website.
– The idea for creating this set of mass songs appeared during my annual retreat, which I celebrated in the monastery of Dominican nuns in Radonie near Grodzisk Mazowiecki – says the originator and author of the cycle’s melody, Dominican Father Wojciech Sznyk.
– The monastery is named after Our Lady of the Rosary. I turned to Dominican graduals to find melodies and antiphon texts related to this call. There I came across a votive mass on the rosary of the Blessed Virgin Mary (Missa Privilegiata SS. Rosari B.M.V. in the version from Cormier’s Graduale from 1907), which can be celebrated all year round. I thought that it would be possible to transcribe the melody into modern notation, harmonize it and add Polish lyrics, explains Father Sznyk.
To complete this set, Father Wojciech needed permanent parts. He wrote them based on fragments of melody taken from the responsory in the fifth tone “Dilectus meus mihi, et ego illi” (“My beloved is mine and I am his”). The set also included acclamations before the Gospel – Alleluia and Glory to You – which were based on fragments of the Alleluia singing from the antiphon at the Offertorium, as well as the hymn “Ave maris stella” suggested at the end of the mass in the Dominican melodic variant, with Polish text and rhythmized according to the current custom. in many of our musical circles. The harmonization of the single-voice chants was prepared by Urszula Rogala, a composer who has been cooperating with the Dominican Liturgical Center for years.
The performance of the Rosary Mass is available free of charge on YouTube and on all known music platforms. Links to them, along with the option to download a set of sheet music for free, are available on the album’s website.
