Due to the departure of our previous music director for a semester in Rome, myself and another member of the schola have taken up the task of directing music here.  I am in charge of the cantoring side of things and Aaron is in charge of the schola side.  Basically, that means I am in charge of scheduling people to cantor and figuring out how the different seasons change what we do.  For instance, in Lent we switch from an Alleluia before the gospel to "Praise to You Lord Jesus Christ..."; I am in charge of figuring out how to do that.   Aaron, in my opinion, has the harder job - trying to turn the group into a schola.  Last semester we sang O Sanctissima  and For All Your Saints Still Striving both of which turned out great, so this semester we have embarked on a bolder scheme of singing once every month or so.  Our first test was Monday during the blessing of the renovated chapel, with the singing of the Sprinkling Rite and then Praise the Lord Ye Heavens Adore Him, both of which turned out fantastic.  (One of the guys videoed it, so whenever the video is up I will post it)

So, yesterday we began to practice for our next songs, Adoro te Devote and Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silent (both which will be in, the more difficult, 4 part harmony).  In Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silent I am in the alto position (rather than the tenor position I was in for Praise the Lord Ye Heavens Adore Him), which means I will have to do less stretching to hit notes, but I won't be singing the melody, so it may be harder to pick up the tune.  Either way, we figured out about 1/4 of that song yesterday and the rest of it will probably really come together at our next practice (on Tuesday).  We didn't do too much work on Adoro te Devote, so that will be interesting.

The first Sunday of advent should be fun!