For the past several Lents, I've set myself the task of posting a piece of music for each day of of the season; a melodic meditation, if you will. They're not always tied (liturgically or even thematically) to the particular day, but there's a generally Lenten tone to them all. Mostly.
Here's last year's playlist (of which I am inordinately proud), so you have an idea of what I'm talking about. And here's this year's playlist, to which I will add as we go along.
Today, on Ash Wednesday, it's time to "change our garments for ashes and sackcloth" with "Immutemur Habitu," by José Maurício Nunes Garcia:
Immutemur habitu in cinere et cilicio;
jejunemus, et ploremus ante Dominum;
quia multum misericors est dimittere
peccata nostra Deus noster.
Juxta vestibulum et altare plorabunt sacerdotes et levitae,
ministri Domini, dicentes:
Parce Domine, parce populo tuo;
et ne dissipes ora clamantium ad te, Domine.
Let us change our garments for ashes and sackcloth;
let us fast and lament before the Lord;
for our God is plenteous in mercy
to forgive our sins.
Near the porch and the altar the priests and levites shall weep,
the Lord's ministers, and shall say:
Spare, O Lord, spare thy people;
and do not scatter the mouths of those crying to thee, O Lord.
Attribution(s): "Glockenspiel Bells" by cocoparisienne (via the Visualhunt site).