Par PART ARVO. Following an initiative by Princess Caroline of Monaco/Hannover to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the reign of his Highness, Prince Rainier III of Monaco, composer Arvo Pärt was commissioned to compose a work for choir and orchestra. The finished work, Cantique des degrés, received its premiere on 19 November 1999 during a special service in the Cathedral of Monte-Carlo in the …

The ?organ plus brass? series presents original works and arrangements for organ and brass choir specially tailored to meet the needs of amateur ensembles and non-professional organists. The pieces may be played by any constellation of brass ensemble. Volume IV contains arrangements of church music by Charles Villiers Stanford, both chorale-based and freely composed. The original works for choir …

Par FAURE GABRIEL. Gabriel Fauré’s Pavane is one of his most popular compositions. What is less known, however, is that the premiere of this stylized dance in April 1888 was actually performed in this present version for mixed choir rather than in the now more familiar orchestral version or instrumental arrange­ments. The text, in the style of Verlaine, sketches the carefree society of the Belle É…

Par MENDELSSOHN-BARTHOLDY FELIX. Mendelssohn’s setting of Psalm 98 was written in a few weeks to satisfy a commission in his new position as general music director of Prussia and was premiered by the Berlin Cathedral Choir on 1 January 1844. As he neither released the work forpublication nor produced a vocal score, his psalm setting did not appear in print until after his death. For this edition t…

Par LARSSON LARS-ERIK. Norge i rødt, hvitt og blått ('Norway in Red, White and Blue') was commissioned by the Oslo Fagott Choir (yes, that is indeed a gay men?s choir) for a concert with The Staff Band of the Armed Forces in 2015. I was given artistic licence to write a more modern and somewhat ?eclectic? arrangement for this originally Swedish melody written by Lars-Erik Larsson, which became som…

I Never Saw a Moor (after Emily Dickinson): This piece expresses a steadfast faith in God, and thus the central message of Dickinson's poem. The music describes feelings of trust and wonder, joy and gratitude. The piece was commissioned for the German women's choir Cant'Ella, who premiered it in Mönchengladbach (Germany) on 25 October 2014 in a concert celebrating the choir's 20th anniversary. / C…

Scored for chorus, children's choir, organ and chamber orchestra, St Luke Passion adopts a pared-back focus on choral voices over its 75-minute span. Seeking a more spiritual, inward approach to match Luke's text, the composer eschews settings of interpolated texts as arias and the customary Evangelist and Christ soli: everything is sung by choral forces. A children's choir grants a measure of inn…

Par BYSTROM BRITTA. Dedicated to Janine Jansen and the Nationaal Vrouwen Jeugdkoor (Netherlands Female Youth Choir) and premiered at the International Kamermuziek Festival Utrecht in December 2019. For SSSAA choir and violin setting text from Ecclesiastes 3. Violin part available: WH33283A Dedicated to Janine Jansen and the Nationaal Vrouwen Jeugdkoor (Netherlands Female Youth Choir) and premiered…