Product Description

Jade Music is proud to release the first record by the Norbertine Fathers of St. Michael's Abbey - Christmas at St. Michael's Abbey: Chants for the Three Masses of Christmas.

This recording includes the proper chants of the three Masses of Christmas (Midnight; the Mass at dawn, and the Mass of the day) as sung at St. Michael's Abbey. They are still in use after all these centuries, and retain their sacramental quality, their supple vigor, and the ability to dispose the soul for the contemplation of God and His Mysteries.

The repertoires of chant are almost like "dialects" of the Gregorian repertoire - there is substantial overlap of texts and settings found in the Roman Missal (for the Mass) and Antiphonarium (for the Liturgy of the Hours), but there are items that differ in part or completely.

St. Michael's Abbey is a community of Norbertine Canons Regular in Orange County, California. Its first members were Hungarian priests who escaped to the United States to leave communism and settled in California in 1957. The Community was raised to the status of an abbey in 1984, because of its growth. St. Michael's Abbey now numbers nearly 70 members.

Members of the abbey live a life that combines monastic observance and a complete singing of the choral office and Mass every day with an active apostolate.

This is Jade's historic first US chant release.

Track Listing

1. Missa in Nocte: Introit
2. Missa in Nocte: Gradual
3. Missa in Nocte: Alleluia
4. Missa in Nocte: Prose
5. Missa in Nocte: Offertory
6. Missa in Nocte: Communion
7. Missa in Aurora: Introit
8. Missa in Aurora: Gradual
9. Missa in Aurora: Alleluia
10. Missa in Aurora: Offertory
11. Missa in Aurora: Communion
12. Missa in Die: Introit
13. Missa in Die: Gradual
14. Missa in Die: Alleluia
15. Missa in Die: Offertory
16. Missa in Die: Communion

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #19508 in Music
• Released on: 2008-09-09
• Number of discs: 1
• Dimensions: .15 pounds

Customer Reviews

Gregorian Chant in California!!
This is a terrific Christmas album, great to listen to when driving :) The voices feel very young, dynamic and filled with energy. The church bell at the beginning defines the location and creates authenticity. It's wonderful to hear such beautiful chant performed in the United States.

The next best thing to not being there
It is very difficult to take it all in when you are at St. Michael's Abbey for the midnight Holy Mass. The chant, the warm candle lighting, the incense and much more. I am very visual and in order to appreciate the nuances of the Gregorian chant I close my eyes and take it in. Well, then I miss the beauty of the low light. This recording lets me take in the Chant by itself. Next Christmas I will enjoy again the Midnight Mass with a better appreciation for Gregorian Chant. As the late JPII wrote in his letter to artists "Gregorian chant, were beauty is wedded to truth". Thank you St. Michael's Abbey for this great recording.

Amazing and beautiful- a wonderful Christmas treat
The music is incredibly beautiful - true Gregorian chant by a devoted, talented group of priests. Their voices truly convey the spirit of Christmas and Jesus Christ's birth.