Chants of the Vatican Graduale - MusicaSacra

Easter Sunday 183
cry out: Though you plant both feet solidly upon the earth, there is no
escaping; you must experience how at some period this solid earth and
all things mundane will be shaken and destroyed. And all the world's
clamor, its pomposity and boasting, its presumption to independence
and autonomy, its singing and exultation will one day become mute
when God comes in judgment. The magnificent Easter triumph which
the Victor Rex gained over His enemies, over death and over all the
powers of this world, guarantees also His final victory. The quaking of
the earth on Easter morn is only a prelude to the mighty cataclysm which
will come to pass at the end of time.
The first phrase ascends gradually. After trimuit it rests on the dominant
of the mode, depicting perhaps, the fear of all creation. With et
the melody reaches a height seldom attained by the fourth mode and
strains the attention: even the boastful world will at some time come to
feel exceedingly small and dejected. The final neums of this phrase were
also used to conclude the first phrase of the Offertory of the Midnight
Mass at Christmas. The second phrase bears some resemblance to the
first. It also begins and ends with d, closes its first half with a, and twice
reaches high c. Here the melody gains in amplitude and becomes more
expressive of victory, especially at judicio with its quint, the pressus,
and the harsh gbaga. Alleluia in its first member is related to that on
the feast of the Ascension, although the latter is in the first mode. Now
the melody no longer reaches to c—the b which preceded it even becomes
6 b—the whole becomes more tender, more personal. He who is one day
to appear as our Judge, today again becomes our Redeemer in the Holy
Sacrifice.
COMMUNION (I. Cor. 5: 7, 8)
1. Pascha nostrum immolatus est 1. Christ our Pasch is immo-
Christus, alleluia: 2. itaque epule- lated, alleluia: 2. therefore let us
mur in azymis sinceritatis et veri- feast with the unleavened bread of
tatis, 3. alleluia, alleluia, alleluia. sincerity and truth, 3. alleluia,
alleluia, alleluia.
The first phrase has the same text as the alleluia after the Gradual.
There it overflows with joy, like a rushing paean of triumph which is to
inundate all the earth; here it is in an intimate Communion song, in
which the exultation is more reserved. There an authentic mode is employed
(7); here a plagal (6). In the former melody everything strives
toward the dominant and above it, while here it centers about the final
note, almost too much so; the lowest note is a fourth below and the
highest a fourth above the finale, as if it had been measured with a rule