HORA EUCHARISTIA: A SOLO PERFORMANCE OF ROMAN CATHOLIC EUCHARISTIC SONGS

ABSTRACT

The Eucharist is an important aspect of the Roman Catholic Church and music is central in carrying out successful Eucharistic celebrations. The music is mostly choral in nature and performed to accompany the serving of Holy Communion to communicants and remind them of its spiritual essence. This study explores the possibility of a staged solo performance of selected Eucharistic songs with piano and organ accompaniment. The researcher/performer effectively realized the spiritual essence of Eucharistic songs in an out-of-church setting and effectively made a significant contribution to Eucharistic liturgical praxis for the Roman Catholic Church in terms of the artistic prospects of adapting choral works for solo performances with piano or organ accompaniment. Recommendations were made that music directors in the Roman Catholic Church should encourage creative adaptation of choral Eucharistic songs for solo performances, that other churches should consider featuring songs from the repertoire of the Roman Catholic Eucharistic songs in their communion services, and that future researcher/performers should consider indigenous audience by featuring indigenous language Eucharistic pieces instead of those in Latin only.