SACRED MUSIC, Music has, from very early times, been connected with religious rites. It entered into the worship of the Jews, and both sacred and profane history tell us that, in the primitive Christian church, the service consisted partly of music. Little is known regarding the kind of music used by the early Christian converts; it has been supposed to have been partly Greek, with an intermixture of Hebrew melody. As early as the time of Ignatius, who was a disciple of St. John, the Psalms of David were sung antiphonally, as practiced to the present day—i.e., by two choirs responding to each other, which had doubtless been formerly the practice among the Jews. At first the whole congregation, clergy and laity. joined in the psalm; but difficulties and abuses having arisen from the growing neglect of musical culture, the council of Laodicea, in 363, found it necessary, for the securing of decency and order in worship, to prohibit the laity from singing in church except in certain chants of a very simple and popular character. From that period down to the reformation, the music of the church was almost entirely surrendered to the clergy and trained musicians. See PSALMODY.
The first name of importance in the history of the music of the western church is St. Ambrose, (q.v.), whose musical service (sec AMBROSIAN CHANT) was reformed by pope Gregory (see GREGORIAN CHANT). The use of the organ in churches dates from about the 0th e., and some centuries later counterpoint (q. V.) was introduced to a limited extent into the music of the church. Among the corruptions which followed it, some are of a nature the very mention of which startles us. Not merely were popular melodies of a secular nature often taken and worked up into church music, but the secular words were actually transplanted into the religious compositions, beinghabitually given out by the tenor voice, while the actual solemn words of the church service were being sung by soprano, alto, and bass. Papal bulls having sought in vain to combat this abuse, it was brought under the cognizance first of the council of Basel, and then that of Trent. The council of Trent prohibited the performance of any mass or motett of which profane words formed a part, and also of music founded on secular themes. Some compositions of Palestrina were singled out for praise, and their author was intrusted with the task of remodeling this part of religious worship. He composed three masses on the reformed principle, one of which, known as the Missa Papa Atarcelli (so called as being a trib ute of gratitude to the memory of that pontiff), may be looked on as having saved music to the church, by establishing a type far higher than anything that had preceded it, and still revered by all lovers of music. The mass (including the offertory aryl gradual) has always continued to be an important part of the sacred vocal music of the Rentim Catholic church, and affords large scope for the display of the higher qualities of musical composition.
Various new types of music sprang up in the different Protestant churches after the reformation. The solemn and measured chorale (q.v.). or melody to which psalms or hymns are sung in unison. though generally associated with the Lutheran church of
Germany, was in reality handed down from a very early period. Psaltnody in its modern sense may be considered to have originated in the 16th c., when Clement Marot, the court poet of Francis I., translated fifty-two of the Psalms into French verse. Psalm .singing was at first a fashionable amusement of the gay courtiers of Francis; but, being taken up by the reformers, was soon discountenanced by the Roman Catholics, and 'looked on as a badge of Protestantism. See PSALMODY.
In the full choral service of the church of England, as performed in cathedrals and sc011egiate churches, the greater part of the prayers and the litany are intoned or read in monotone (see INTONING), the monotone being occasionally varied by harmony at the close. The Psalms and Gloria Patri are chanted with the accompaniment of the organ, as.also are the various canticles; the latter, however, particularly the Ts Deans, being often. sung to rhythmical music of a more elaborate kind, called services. The form of the Anglican chant now used for the Psalms seems to have been invented by Tallis. In the single chant each verse is sung to the same music; in the double chant, the whole occupies two verses. The antiphonal chanting. with the Anglican double chant, has sometimes been objected to its repugnant to the proper expression of the words, as couplitrg verses between which there is a full stop in the sense, and as placing a full stop when the sense runs on; and among the high church party there has been a dis position,to recur to the Gregorian chants, whose indefinite musical expression, absence of rhythm, and uncertain accent, give them a power of bending to the requirements of she words. The Gregorian chant has, however, not succeeded in making its way into the service of any of the English cathedrals. The anthem forms a part of the complete musical service. It is somewhat similar in character to the motett of the Roman Catho lic and Lutheran churches; a sacred cantata, in which the words arc taken from the Psalms or other portions of Scripture; and the music is for solo, parts, or chorus, or a mixtumof the three.
In the Presbyterian churches of Scotland, psalmody, until recently, formed almost the entire music; but hymns also are now in general use. Hymns predominate among the English dissenters. Some years ago, church music in Scotland had fallen to the lowest statesof ',degradation; but efforts have lately been made, with some success, to raise its character. Even organs, which were proscribed by the early Scottish reform ers, and have ever since been in disfavor, have begun to be introduced, and chanting has been admitted into some Presbyterian churches.
Of sacred musical compositions not intended to form part of the service of the church, the most important is the oratorio (q.v.), a composition either entirely dramatic, or com bining the drama and epic, where the text is illustrative of some religious subject, and the music consists of recitatives, airs, part-songs, and choruses, accompanied by orchas Wu and organ.