The best way for the listener to the plainchant of the Western Christian church to get an idea of how it was originally used is to attend an Orthodox church service, where everyone is standing and singing for most of the time, and the music is not an abstract elaboration of the meaning of the service but the meaning's primary carrier. The same is true of this recording of Good Friday music that might have been heard at and around the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in medieval Jerusalem, even if the performances were taped in ...
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The best way for the listener to the plainchant of the Western Christian church to get an idea of how it was originally used is to attend an Orthodox church service, where everyone is standing and singing for most of the time, and the music is not an abstract elaboration of the meaning of the service but the meaning's primary carrier. The same is true of this recording of Good Friday music that might have been heard at and around the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in medieval Jerusalem, even if the performances were taped in Stanford, California, by the male singers of the U.S.-based Cappella Romana. The word "around" is used because the Greek-language service music heard here was, to use one of the many new words listeners will learn if they buy this album, "stational" because it moved from church to church, evoking physically and musically the crucifix procession. Byzantine chant in general is less often sung than the chant of the Western church, although its history is equally long and unbroken. It...
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