Register Now:
Music Ministry Alive!
July 26-31, 2016 
St. Catherine University 
Saint Paul, Minnesota

As of today, ALL of the application materials and other information for Music Ministry Alive 2016 ("With the Eyes of Mercy") are up and available at: www.musicministryalive.com  

To all potential youth and adult applicants: we invite you to visit the site. And remember that... 

We Three Kings sung at the Church of St. Mary, January 3, 2016.

We three kings of Orient are
Bearing gifts we traverse afar.
Field and fountain, moor and mountain... 

My voice got better. A cold plagued me at 11:30 Mass on Christmas Day. Here is our prelude song for Feast of the Epiphany on January 3.

Brightest and Best, a song for Feast of the Epiphany. Text: Reginald Heber. Tune: STAR IN THE EAST, Southern Harmony, 1835).

Brightest and Best
Lyrics by Reginald Heber, 1783-1826

1. Brightest and best of the stars of the morning,
Dawn on our darkness and lend us thine aid;
Star of the East, the horizon adorning... 

I chose to sing this in key of C rather than Eb. Too much church music is written too high for average voices. When will liturgical publishers get wise re vocal range?

Words: "Corde natus ex Parentis." Marcus A. C. Prudentius, 348-413. Translated by John M. Neale, 1818-1866 and Henry W. Baker, 1821-1877, alt.

Music: from a "Sanctus" trope, Mode V, 11th century. "Piae Cantiones," Greifswald, 1582.

1. Of the Father's love begotten
Ere the worlds began to be,
He is Alpha and Omega, ...

Lo, How a Rose E'er Blooming. Written in key of F. Should be in the key of D! Too high for my baritone voice. I will sing this on Christmas at the Church of Saint Mary in downtown Saint Paul.

Text: German, 15th century. Verses 1,2: Translated by Theodore Baker, 1851-1934. Vs. 3: Friedrich Layritz, 1808-1859. Translated by Harriet R. Krauth Spaeth, 1845-1925.

Music: German, 16th century. Speierischen Gesangbuch, Cologne, 1599. Harmony by Michael Praetorius, 1571-1621.

Lo, how a Rose e'er blooming from tender stem hath sprung!
Of Jesse's lineage coming as prophets long have sung... 

"A Colorful Christmas" is a recently released Christmas album with a wide variety of styling. Richard Schletty contributed three original songs and helped record and/or master four other songs. Richard is happy to be in the company of these hip Baltimore-area artists (former Punk Rock musicians who migrated to Blues/R&B/Pop). Produced by Fetal Records (headed by Azar Dagher who is a TopCatholicSongs.com member). For the songs I worked on, I had brilliant assistance from composer-arranger André van Haren (Sweden) and from Four Hands Project in Spain (Alberto Ayuso Domingo and David Gomez Sanz). The Spanish version of "Sleep, Baby, Sleep" was translated to "Duerme, Niño, Duerme" by my son-in-law, Elias de Andres Martos. He also tried to coach me in Castillian Spanish pronunciation. He says that I sing it with a Minnesota accent. Oh well, I tried!

Official site: http://www.fetalrecords.com/the-christmas-album
Awesome review: http://www.stubbyschristmas.com/home/a-colorful-christmas-fetal-records-review

Happy Holidays and Holy Days,
Richard Schletty

A Christmas song (Khúc Ca Giáng Sinh) made by my friend Joseph Nguyễn Hồng Ân

Khúc Ca Giáng Sinh - 2015 - Ca sĩ Nguyễn Hồng Ân

A free download from Jeff Ostrowski at Corpus Christi Watershed.

Hymnal by Fr. John Selner (1954) – 154 pages
http://www.ccwatershed.org/blog/2015/nov/19/pdf-download-hymnal-fr-john-selner-1954/

TODAY, FOR THE FIRST TIME, you can download a rare 1954 hymnal by Fr. John Selner. In the past, I’ve mentioned that some of the old Catholic hymnals were pretty awful, but this one is splendid. Since part of my involvement with a special hymn project requires searching through rare hymn books, I decided to share this one with you...

Adoration Radio (with host Mary Graham) has expanded its Catholic Music Countdown to include 40 songs (as voted upon by listeners).

The first half of the "Top 40" Podcast can be heard here: Catholic Music Top 40 countdown – part 1
The second half of the "Top 40" Podcast can be heard here: Catholic Music Top 40 countdown – part 2

Vote for your favorite Catholic songs here (scroll down home page): www.cultureoflifemedia.com/vote-here 
Submit your own songs for consideration here: www.cultureoflifemedia.com/song-submission-form

Below are the 51 songs for your consideration in the current Adoration Radio Countdown. When you go to cultureoflifemedia.com, you will see a voting checkbox above each song. Select as many songs as you like and then click the vote button at the bottom. You will help determine the number one song!

Click here to preview all 51 songs: 

Wonderful! Discover Tori Harris at www.toriharris.com

Welcome to our newest registered users at TopCatholicSongs.com. Please help them find what they are looking for. You may enter a comment here if you have suggestions or leads for any of the needs expressed by TCS members. Take a look through the complete registered users list here: List of TCS users

Greetings, TCS members. Please like us at our Facebook Page.

Would love to have you make comments, post your own blog stories and upload your song recordings for others to hear.

Musically yours,

Richard Schletty
Editor, TopCatholicSongs.com

An email announcement from GIA Publishing:

Singing Our Faith Hymnal Resources

An exciting mix of great music, diverse styles, and broad scope—the ultimate music resource for young people, kindergarten through eighth grade.

Leader's/Catechist's Manual and Complete CD set NOW Available!

Click to see: CD set

Click to see: Leader's Manual

Editor: David Dziena

Singing Our Faith, Second Edition is a comprehensive program designed to ... 

Hi! My name is Joanne Wallace, a singer-songwriter from Liverpool, UK.

After years away from the church, I have re-discovered my faith and my love of church music. 

I was always involved in the music ministry at my church growing up and to be honest, thought that part of my life experience was over. Then I had my children and found that through them, all those memories came flooding back. The door was opened once again and once I went through it, all of this music starting to come to me.

"I Call Your Name" has been an unexpected gift to me - if you asked me only 3 years ago,  I would never have imagined I would have rediscovered church and songwriting after all this time and to have released an album of my own original worship music! I write my songs on guitar and piano (although I am really a master of neither!) but my sound does have some gospel influence in the backing vocals.

I now lead the music ministry at our local church and sing new compositions there when it fits with the liturgy. As well as worship songs, I have written more 'traditional' sounding hymns and Mass settings too.  We sing my 'Gloria' every week!  I have had a lot of positive feedback, which is great to hear.

Please listen to my audio samples at www.joannewallace.co.uk.

CDs can be ordered via my website or you can download at www.amazon.com (search Digital Music- Joanne Wallace) and www.cdbaby.com.

I hope you enjoy what you hear.  I look forward to sharing my music and networking with other writers!

Kyrie Eleison

This probably is not the best fit for the situation but it's still a rallying cry: please don't forget the Syrian and other refugee Children as the weather gets progressively colder wherever they are. Thank you :-)

Christ Our Lord, Glorified!

A song by my good Christian friend, Jack Miller (aka Dadai). - Richard Schletty

On Bended Knee (Morning-Evening) by Dadai. More songs by Jack here: www.icompositions.com/artists/Dadai

See our newest members here and say hello to them! Let's help each other grow with Catholic music. 

www.topcatholicsongs.com/users

Richard Schletty
TCS editor