When I composed the Audubon Park Psalter, my intention was that most all of the settings would be flexible enough to work in a traditional setting with organ and choir as well as a more contemporary setting with piano and guitar. While I have attempted to make recordings of the Contemporary Group at the Cathedral of Mary Our Queen before, because I have been the one at the piano, it has been difficult to capture anything remotely balanced. This week, I was able to be out in the congregation, so captured the psalm while standing next to a pillar. Here’s the resulting video:
What I really appreciate is being able to hear the people sing, even though this is a new piece for them.
I also captured the psalm at the 11:00 Mass with the choir and organ:
The Old Testament reading for the Twentieth Sunday in Ordinary Time Year C is the story of Jeremiah being thrown into a cistern where he is expected to sink into the mud and die. The Responsorial Psalm that follows is a set of verses from Psalm 40 with the refrain, “Lord, come to my aid.” When I first encountered this set of readings back in 1995, the most obvious musical idea was to make it a 12-bar blues. It was a little bit of a stretch to get the verses and refrain to line up consistently, but perhaps more of a stretch to do the premier on a little two-manual German baroque style organ!
As the setting only appears once every three years, I don’t really know how often or where I’ve been able to do it since then. Many times, this pushes the envelope of what is accepted or expected for music in the churches I have served. There is a contemporary group at the Cathedral of Mary Our Queen, and I’ve heard some requests for some more modern music, so I put it on the schedule this year. Here’s the video from the 9:30 am Mass on 14 August 2016:
A child decided it was time to play with the kneelers during verse three. It would have been great to have some well-timed percussion, but sometimes you just take what you get.
Note: This is not included in the Audubon Park Psalter, though it could show up in a later volume of more contemporary/gospel/jazz psalm settings.
Join us for a beautiful, fun and festive evening with your favorite Christmas classics and heart-warming renditions of music you’ll love. From bells ringing and lights gleaming to the warmth of a manger bed, start your season with this annual Christmas tradition for the whole family.
There will be three performances of this concert:
Saturday, December 6 at 5:00 p.m. and 7:00 p.m.
Sunday, December 7 at 4:00 p.m.
Tickets for the concerts will be $10.00 for adults and $5.00 for children under 12. Children under 3 are free.
The concert will be in the St. Luke’s Sanctuary. Doors open 30 minutes prior to showtime and concert goers are encouraged to come early as all seats are general admission. Any tickets not claimed at Will Call five minutes before the start of the performance will be released.
Join us for a beautiful, fun and festive evening with your favorite Christmas classics and heart-warming renditions of music you’ll love. From bells ringing and lights gleaming to the warmth of a manger bed, start your season with this annual Christmas tradition for the whole family.
There will be three performances of this concert:
Saturday, December 6 at 5:00 p.m. and 7:00 p.m.
Sunday, December 7 at 4:00 p.m.
Tickets for the concerts will be $10.00 for adults and $5.00 for children under 12. Children under 3 are free.
The concert will be in the St. Luke’s Sanctuary. Doors open 30 minutes prior to showtime and concert goers are encouraged to come early as all seats are general admission. Any tickets not claimed at Will Call five minutes before the start of the performance will be released.
Join us for a beautiful, fun and festive evening with your favorite Christmas classics and heart-warming renditions of music you’ll love. From bells ringing and lights gleaming to the warmth of a manger bed, start your season with this annual Christmas tradition for the whole family.
There will be three performances of this concert:
Saturday, December 6 at 5:00 p.m. and 7:00 p.m.
Sunday, December 7 at 4:00 p.m.
Tickets for the concerts will be $10.00 for adults and $5.00 for children under 12. Children under 3 are free.
The concert will be in the St. Luke’s Sanctuary. Doors open 30 minutes prior to showtime and concert goers are encouraged to come early as all seats are general admission. Any tickets not claimed at Will Call five minutes before the start of the performance will be released.
Written May 11-2, 2014 for Chris Barletta and the Women’s Choir of Gateway High School in Kissimmee, Florida, with the first performance given at the Baccalaureate Mass at the end of May 2014. The text is by John Dalles and is included in the collection We Turn to God published by Wayne Leupold Editions.
The piece is scored for SSA with piano accompaniment. It is fairly easy and very tonal. Expected duration: c. 2’30”
Originally written for the Diocesan Youth Choir formed to sing for the Chrism Mass at the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in Albany, NY in 2005, This setting of Delores Dufner’s text “A Year of God’s Favor” is scored for SAB choir, piano and optional flute, oboe and violoncello. The audio below was generated by the Finale music notation program.
Written May 9-10, 2014 for the Bel Canto Choir of Gateway High School under the direction of Chris Barletta. The text is by John Dalles. Music is scored for three part women’s choir with piano accompaniment. It was one of two pieces written for use at the Baccalaureate service at the end of the school year. The piece celebrates the success of graduation while looking forward to all the possibilities and challenges of the future. It will be premiered (in unison) at the Graduation Mass for Holy Redeemer Catholic School.
For Good Shepherd Sunday this year, I had programmed an arrangement of J.S. Bach’s “Schafe können sicher weiden” from Cantata 208 with an English text. At each of the choir rehearsals I had however, I became more and more frustrated with the part writing and the irregularity of the text. Finally, in a fit of frustration, I decided I would make my own arrangement and fix both the voice leading and text problems. While I considered trying for a translation of the original German, I opted instead to paraphrase Psalm 23. This is an easy anthem for the choir as they sing a simple four part harmonization of the chorale melody supported at all times by keyboard accompaniment. The piece could also be performed by a unison choir singing the soprano melody.
A performance by the Choir of the Cathedral of Mary Our Queen can be seen here.
Written on April 29, 2014 for Dr. Carl MaultsBy and the St. Richard’s Schola of St. Richard’s Episcopal Church in Winter Park, Florida, this piece in Baroque style is written for two-part choir. It could be done by women alone, a mixed adult choir, or even a children’s choir. The harmonic language is simple with very few accidentals. The accompaniment is a simple three-part texture that could be played on organ or piano.
