New website welcome video

Jul 6, 2012 | Blog

With Quill Lake joining the parishes of Watson, Englefeld, and St. Gregor, it was necessary to do some re-vamping of the parish website (watsoncatholic.ca). Along with this came the need to create a new parish welcome video. Here it is, in HD! (720p version is below. It can also be seen in resolutions up to 1080p.) One of the strange challenges was with the background music. I'm planning to use this music for a different video. And I didn't want to re-use the same music as last time, in part because certain, national corporations saw fit to use the same, Apple Jam Pack music in nation-wide advertising campaigns, and so everyone's heard it a lot. (Moxie's, I'm looking at you, too. Surely you guys can afford to use other music beyond what's provided in an $80 Jam Pack and leave that for us amateurs?) So I've elected to use a couple of different pieces from the Jam Packs included with Logic Studio. The rest of the video was produced with Final Cut Pro X. Hope you enjoy it!

New music

Jul 4, 2012 | Blog

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I've been working on a new, up-tempo orchestral piece for use as video background music. Of note, I'm using some software instruments that were provided for free by EastWest a while back, in addition to instruments and loops that come with Logic Studio. It's still a work in progress, but what do you think of it so far? And can anyone think of a better name than "Orchestral Epic-Sounding Dance Piece?" :-) Play/Download the track here. (MP3)

Fr. Robert Barron is amazing

Feb 23, 2012 | Blog

As many of you know, we are beginning to show the incredible Catholicism series in Watson. This is the 10 part miniseries that was created by Fr. Robert Barron, a priest in Chicago. Well, it's now Lent, and so this other reflection by the same Fr. Barron somehow seemed appropriate. (Be sure to check out his many reflections on his Youtube page!) In this video, he looks at the Biblical readings behind Bob Dylan's famous "All Along the Watchtower." The lyrics are based on Isaiah -- and also on the human struggle for goodness and justice, especially as it's existed in the past decades. These are shown to ultimately find their redemption and fulfillment in the death and resurrection of Jesus. Check it out!

Workshops: Mass and Music

Oct 20, 2011 | Blog

The past week I've been involved with workshops, both preparing to give a session and attending several sessions. Next week I will be giving a morning session with Jason Cody, a teacher with Greater Saskatoon Catholic Schools. The topic is to be about the Mass and conversion. To help prepare, a podcast episode was recently dedicated to this topic. I also travelled to Saskatoon this past Friday to meet with Jason to plan things out a bit. Since I was near the construction of the new Holy Family Cathedral, I took some quick photos. Here is a neat one of the spiralling roofline and towering cross that goes up to about 170 feet. Photos don't really do this project justice, however. It is *huge* and is one of the largest things you notice when you enter the city from the north and east. To me, the soaring cross and roofline looks like a beacon to people who are searching for deeper meaning in their lives. (Don't worry - the scaffolding won't be there for long!) I was also in Humboldt this past week with many musicians from all over the diocese (as well as from my own parishes). We were attending workshops by Fr. Geoffrey Angeles and Bernadette Gasslein, who were presenting on music in the liturgy and on what the new changes in translation mean for the music. I studied in the seminary with Fr. Geoffrey, so it was cool to see him again and to catch up.

Music for the new translation of the Roman Missal

Oct 12, 2011 | Blog

In my parishes we are currently in the process of examining / choosing a Mass setting that we'll use for the newly translated Roman Missal. Anyone have any suggestions of good settings that they've come across? Here are ones that I've looked at so far. Revised Mass Settings - Mass of Creation by Marty Haugen - Mass of Light by David Haas - Heritage Mass by Owen Alstott - Mass of God's Promise by Dan Schutte - Missa Ubi Caritas by Bob Hurd New Mass Settings - CCCB Mass Setting A by Fr. Geoffrey Angeles - CCCB Mass Setting B by John Dawson - CCCB Mass Setting C by Michel Guimont - Belmont Mass by Christopher Walker In no particular order, here are a few observations: - The revised settings are familiar and thus easier to learn (theoretically) - The revised settings are familiar and thus easier to get confused with the older versions (theoretically) - It seems to be really hard to compose a good setting for the new Gloria translation. The new words don't seem to be quite as musical as they were in the older version. - I'm tending toward preferring a refrain/verse structure for the Gloria in order to make it easier for the people to sing, at least initially. - The Mass of Creation is easier to sing than the Mass of Light, but I find the Mass of Light easier to play. (I improvise with the guitar chords, though. The actual piano music for the Mass of Light can be challenging for some pianists.) I do love the priest parts for those two settings! - I like the Heritage Mass. - The Mass of God's Promise seems ok, too, though it does add a word into the Gloria ("'Give' glory to God. . ."). I'd really like to stick to the translation we've been given as close as possible. - Bob Hurd's Missa Ubi Caritas is beautiful. I'm a big fan... but I'm not sure how many other people think the same way about the Latin/English hybrid nature of it. - I really like the new setting by Fr. Angeles... and it's not just because I studied with him in seminary. :-) I do note that it can be a bit challenging for people (especially the pianist) to learn, however. Also, two of my parishes do not have a piano. - I really like the Belmont Mass Gloria, which has more of a chant style. It seems easy to learn and sing and has a noble simplicity to it. What are your thoughts?