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This site is a work in progress targeting Australian Catholic congregations with limited resources who wish to sing at least some traditional style (metric) hymns and/or (chanted) responsorial psalms.
For each major event in the Australian liturgical calendar, a page is being prepared with a music selection believed to be appropriate for that celebration. Each item will have links to sources, downloads, and YouTube videos to aid those involved with music. The site’s YouTube channel, youtube.com/@LiturgyShare, has grouped playlists that mimic selections on the liturgical pages.
Hymn content here is inspired by Australia’s officially approved hymnal, Catholic Worship Book II, but many other Catholic hymnals have been drawn upon.
If your parish is subscribed to OneLicense.net, you have legal access to a vast array of hymns no matter what hymnal you may be using, and this site will help you make the most of it. Just remember to report what you use and check beforehand that OneLicense covers the hymn you want to use!
Downloads for each hymn depend on whether it is in the public domain (freely copyable) or is copyrighted (requiring a license to use if you don’t have it in a hymnal):
Responsorial psalms and gospel acclamations have been composed specifically for this project with chant-style verses and simple responses, all in a narrow note range following the Australian lectionary exactly. There are freely downloadable keyboard accompaniments, lead sheets, cantor sheets, and assembly images. Additionally there are references to other sources suited to Australian liturgy.
The site is ad-free and all LiturgyShare downloadable materials (blue links) are free without any licensing or reporting required. External weblinks (red links) only go to YouTube and reputable Christian publishing sites. External websites change, so it is likely that some links will go dead, and some external YouTube videos will be removed.
This is a one-person production so please be charitable about errors: I will correct ASAP after notification!
Four options are given for each processional with the following principles generally (but not always!) observed:
For many years music suggestion guides looked at fillings for a four-hymn sandwich, but this downplayed the importance of music in other parts of the Mass (ordinary and propers). In fact, the first consideration should be the Eucharistic acclamations. Having said that, Mass settings are not available on this site, but only referred to, for copyright reasons: only the ancient chant settings in the Roman Missal are in the public domain, and they are readily and freely available elsewhere on the Internet.
Officially allowed psalm translations include The Grail (as used in current lectionary and missals) and Abbey Psalms and Canticles (formerly known as the Revised Grail, before revision) which I understand will be used in the next edition of the lectionary. References are only given to settings with simple chant style verses that follow these standards. It is always possible to sing the refrain and say the verses (with any setting), and in in some cases psalm tones from this site are suggested for use with other composers refrains.
Entrance and communion antiphons in the missal are normally only said if there is (sadly) no singing at Mass. However, the General Instructions give the option of singing them. Although not shown in the missal, psalm verses (for a cantor or choir) are associated with each one, and the traditional practise is to sing the antiphon at the beginning, then an appropriate number of psalm verses, a doxology (Glory be …), then a repeat of the antiphon. This is not going to be considered at most parishes as it takes away the realistic possibility of the congregation joining in.
There are, however, a number of options for congregational support of the antiphon and these are referenced in the music suggestion pages:
In my experience, most congregations are reluctant to sing during communion despite being asked to in the General Instructions, and sometimes leave singing to the end of the procession. Singing an abbreviated communion antiphon (with cantor or choir singing psalm verses) should make it much easier for the procession to join in as the people don't need hymn sheets or to be distracted by a screen.
An additional complication is that antiphons in the Missal were intended to be said, not sung, and many would regard it as a better practise to sing the English translation (from Solesmes Abbey) of antiphons in the Graduale Romanum. While probably 90 % are much the same as those in the Missal, others allow for a closer connection to the day’s liturgy. They are shown on each music suggestion page.
Adam Bartlett’s Simple English Propers settings are fairly straight-forward, but for those with limited time to learn and practise the antiphon, consider singing it to one of the popular psalm tones from St. Meinrad Archabbey. Download a guitar accompaniment here or a keyboard accompaniment here. The mode should be the same as that used by Bartlett.
Please note that older pages on this site don’t share everything suggested here, but will be eventually be updated.
chris@liturgyshare.org
My name is Chris Wroblewski, and this developing site is the result of a long-time vision of mine. I have been associated with liturgy since the mid 1980s, primarily in small country parishes, and am currently looking after music for a small congregation in Hobart (Tasmania). Feel free to contact me with any queries at the email address above.
| 28 September 2025: | 26th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C |
| 5 October 2025: | 27th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C |
The hymnals page, a seasonal and topical index, has now been rewritten. Listings for Christ the King, Advent and Christmas are currently included, with much more to be added over time.
Hymns from Michael Joncas’ Within Our Hearts Be Born collection have been boxed off in the index because the hymns are very specific to liturgies, frequently referencing first, second and gospel readings. They are all in the style of traditional hymns, properly rhymed and strictly sticking to the meter; nothing like his On Eagle’s Wings, a hymn which seems to antagonize a lot of traditionalists! The freight cost makes the book expensive to send to Australia, so the cheapest way to use them is to download an accompaniment from this site and get the words from OneLicense (which you obviously need to report). In some cases, alternate hymn tunes are suggested either due to copyright or because Michael’s provided tune has (in my opinion) difficulties.
The hymn index has been completely rewritten and should now reference every hymn with a unique page on this site. Please note that where hymns have multiple titles and/or originate from a Latin or other non-English source, there will be duplicate entries to make them easier to find.
There is a great deal of inconsistency with hymn numbers in the Divine Office 1974. Because of differences in the location and numbering of hymns in the full set of three books and the single volume containing Morning and Evening Prayer, I renumbered the lot in a hopefully logical order that tries to be consistent with the order found in the books. A full list of hymns can be found at this link: Divine Office 1974, but for the time being it has no links to hymn pages. DO74 numbers referenced in hymn pages will often not match this list, though the numbers in the new hymn index should be correct. Fixing this is on my to do list!
Pages with hymn tune and meter indexes have been completely rewritten and should now reference every public domain hymn tune on the site. For each tune you can download the accompaniment in keyboard and chord editions, listen to demonstration audio (melody alone, then with accompaniment), and download a melody-line image, particularly useful for congregational worship aids.
Additionally, I have collated all the tunes (250+) into one pdf file which you can download here: Traditional Hymn Tunes with Chords • Traditional Hymn Tunes for Keyboard. These are “working” documents in that they will be continually updated as and when new tunes are added or corrections made. Be warned that they are reasonably large documents (~ 88 MB) and will take a little while to download.
The hymn tunes are used in major Catholic hymnals and are not intended to be a comprehensive collection as can be found at, say, hymnary.org. The main copyrighted arrangements not included are by Ralph Vaughan Williams, and it is especially sad to not include DOWN AMPNEY, the tune used by Come Down, O Love Divine; however these will become copyright free in 2029.
There are a few tunes credited with generic accompaniment for copyright reasons: they are a bit little like generic products at the supermarket - they work, but not as well as the branded products!
If you find any errors, please let me know!
The hymn text index update is well underway, and will hopefully be finished in a few weeks.