Tag: Composition

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Psalm 146 – Praise the Lord!

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This psalm setting was commissioned by Elsa Heckman for the music ministry of Our Lady of Grace in Palm Bay, FL on the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the parish. In discussing with Elsa that kind of composition she wanted for the event, we decided that an upbeat Gospel style setting would be most appealing for the occasion and the congregation. The two recordings below are from a live performances at Holy Cross in Orlando in 2011.

1. Listen now - Morning Mass     
2. Listen now - Afternoon Mass     
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Psalm à la Mozart Part 2

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I don’t think I could be more happy with how the performance turned out. Sarah Whittemore, the Basilica Choir, and orchestra all did a wonderful job with the psalm! Listen to the live performance below to hear for yourself.

1. Listen now     

Read about how this piece came to be here.

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Psalm à la Mozart

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For the Mozart Coronation Mass at the Basilica of the National Shrine of Mary, Queen of the Universe, Dr. William Picher asked if I’d like to collaborate on the musical setting of the psalm to be used at Mass that evening. Since most of the music for Mass is by Mozart, he had found a phrase from a Mozart string quintet to use as the refrain and asked if I’d write music for the verses. Bill has used several of my psalm settings previously, so was looking for a simple tone much like those I’ve sent him previously.
After having a look at the last movement of K. 516 that Bill used for the refrain, I found a portion of the string quintet that lent itself as a nice chord progression for the psalm verses. Knowing that there would at least be strings available, it made sense to me to create an entire orchestration for the composition. A recording of the live performance is now available here.

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Vexilla Regis

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Written by Venantius Fortunatus (530-609), Vexilla Regis is one of the great chant hymns of the church. Appropriately sung at vespers from Passion Sunday until Holy Thursday, on the Feast of the Triumph of the Cross and even on Good Friday, the hymn was originally written to celebrate the arrival of a large relic of the True Cross in Poitiers, France.

In the French Classical tradition when singing hymns, the organ alternated verses with the choir. Having always enjoyed the sounds of the French Classical organs, when I had the opportunity to play a recital at Westminster Presbyterian Church in Albany, NY on Palm Sunday, I decided to write a suite for organ on this great hymn of the cross. The suite contains six movements and uses traditional tonal language and registrations of the period.

Vexilla Regis

  1. Plein jeu
  2. Duo
  3. Récit de voix humaine
  4. Basse de trompette
  5. Tierce en Taille
  6. Grand jeu
1. Listen now     
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Festival Celebration Choir

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One of my many pleasures during my tenure in Albany was working with the Festival Celebration Choir. Founded by my predecessor at the Cathedral, J. Robert Sheehan, the group was initially quite large. By the time I encountered the group, it had become a more moderate 60-80 voices. While under its second director, Deacon Neil Hook, I was offered several opportunities to accompany the choir for different concerts, including a presentation of the Mozart Requiem on June 6, 2004. The group even commissioned me to write a Te Deum for them. Eventually, Neil decided it was time for him to retire as the group’s conductor and passed the baton to me. Regrettably, only a year later, I had to pass the baton along again as my tenure in Albany came to a close and new opportunities awaited for me in Orlando.

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NPM Mass Competition

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The Third Edition of the Roman Missal presented opportunities for composers to create new musical settings of the texts used for celebration of Mass. The National Association of Pastoral Musicians took advantage of the opportunity to sponsor a competition. All entries were to be judged initially by a panel of five judges. The final winner was determined by popular vote after presentation at the convention in Detroit. The entire competition was conducted blindly with even the finalists only being announced after the voting had taken place. The musical setting of the new translation of the Mass that I submitted was awarded third place.

You can here the Lamb of God with choir, strings, and flute below.

1. Listen now     

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John Dalles

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I have been very thankful for the generosity of John Dalles in sharing his unpublished texts with me. I discovered his published texts while I was serving at the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in Albany, NY, making use of them on several different occasions. After moving to Orlando, I was delighted to discover that he resides in the area. We first met after the local AGO chapter held an event at the church where he serves. Since then, he has been kind enough to share several of his texts with me. As you can read in his biography below, it was a great pleasure for me to discover such a wonderful hymn writer here in my back yard.

A Presbyterian minister and hymn writer, John Dalles has served as Pastor of Wekiva Presbyterian Church, Longwood FL since 1997. He is a graduate of Penn State, Lancaster Seminary (M.Div.) and Pittsburgh Seminary (D.Min.). Before Wekiva, he served Fox Chapel Presbyterian in Pittsburgh (1986-1997) and First Presbyterian, South Bend (1982-1986). Author of more than 800 hymn texts, John’s “Come, O Spirit” and “God Bless Your Church” are in the Presbyterian Hymnal. His hymns are also in: The New Century Hymnal, The Moravian Book of Worship, Worship Together, The Covenant Hymnal, The Book of Praise (Presbyterian Church in Canada) and The Australian Book of Praise II. His commissioned hymns include those for Presbyterian Heritage Sunday, Augsburg, Goshen, Maryville, Tusculum,
Wilson and Knox (Toronto) Colleges, American University, Pittsburgh and Lancaster Seminaries, Peachtree Presbyterian Church and the Lutheran World Federation. A Life Member of The Hymn Society, he is the author of a book of 65 hymn texts called “Swift Currents and Still Waters” by GIA: www.giamusic.com. Wayne Leupold Editions has recently published two other collections: “God Is the Singer’s Friend” and “We Turn to God”.

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Regina Caeli

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Regina caeli laetare, Alleluia,
Quia quem meruisti portare. Alleluia,
Resurrexit sicut dixit, Alleluia.
Ora pro nobis Deum. Alleluia.

Intended for use during the Easter Season, this is the second Marian antiphon I set for SSAATTBB choir. The traditional chant melody is cast in a modern tonal language. A piano reduction of the SSAATTBB piece provided in the score for rehearsals. The audio below was generated by the Finale music notation program.

1. Listen now