In this unaccompanied motet Vaughan Williams sets a text by the English poet John Skelton (c.1463-1529). The music captures the spirituality of the text with floating choral lines and a sophisticated harmonic language, employing eerie dissonances to create a sense of otherworldliness. The work carries the following dedication: 'To the memory of my master Hubert Parry not as an attempt palely to reflect his incomparable art, but in the hope that he would have found in this motet (to use his own words) 'something characteristic'.'.

These four splendid anthems were composed for the coronation of George II in October 1727 and have since retained a position at the heart of the English choral tradition. The popular anthem Zadok the Priest has been performed at all subsequent coronations, and Handel's other contributions to the royal occasion - Let thy hand be strengthened, The King shall rejoice, and My heart is inditing - have the same majestic grandeur, with affecting contrasts between different sections of the sacred texts. The editor, Clifford Bartlett, has corrected various inconsistencies in Handel's score, and complete details of sources and editorial method, additional performance notes, and a critical commentary are included.

Spirituality is not a permanent high, a continual blissed out state. To experience the heights, one has also to know the depths. In this book based on speeches and sermons delivered in marquees, cathedrals and local churches, John Bell deals with issues as diverse as private devotion and public debt. The picture of God that emerges is not one of a 'celestial sadist' but rather a compassionate being who asks that we do only what we can, starting from where we are, to be just and compassionate too. John Bell is a minister of the Church of Scotland and a member of the Iona Community. He lectures and preaches throughout the English-speaking world. With his colleagues in the Wild Goose Worship Group he has produced several books of congregational songs and collections of anthems, and is an occasional broadcaster on radio and television.

Haydn's Missa brevis Sancti Joannis de Deo dates from c.1775 and was written for the Order of the Brothers of Mercy based in Eisenstadt. The mass is known for its distinctive 'Benedictus', which features elaborate soprano writing and an extensive obbligato organ part from which the work's alternative title, 'Little Organ Mass', derives. This edition includes the elongated 'Gloria' composed by Haydn's younger brother Michael, with Haydn's 31-bar original included as an Appendix. The full score - also available on sale - contains a critical commentary and full details of sources. Complete orchestral material and vocal scores are available on hire/rental.

Milton, Music and Literary Interpretation: Reading through the Spirit constructs a musical methodology for interpreting literary text drawn out of John Milton's poetry and prose. Analyzing the linkage between music and the Holy Spirit in Milton's work, it focuses on harmony and its relationship to Milton's theology and interpretative practices. Linking both the Spirit and poetic music to Milton's understanding of teleology, it argues that Milton uses musical metaphor to capture the inexpressible characteristics of the divine. The book then applies these musical tools of reading to examine the non-trinitarian union between Father, Son, and Spirit in Paradise Lost, argues that Adam and Eve's argument does not break their concord, and puts forward a reading of Samson Agonistes based upon pity and grace.

for SATB, optional baritone solo, cello, and string orchestra This is a tuneful epiphany carol, setting a text by the composer. Underpinned by a beautiful cello solo, the vocal lines are rich and flowing, and the organ supports the choir with warm harmonies. The carol was written at the invitation of Red Balloon, a Cambridge-based UK-wide organization dedicated to the recovery of bullied children. The cello part is published separately and an accompaniment for strings is available on sale and on hire.

Let's give ourselves an A for effort. We keep our minds so preoccupied with work projects that we act and think on autopilot. We keep our kids so occupied with activities that they need day planners before grade school. We keep our schedules so full with church meetings and housekeeping and even entertaining that down-time sounds like a mortal sin. When we fail to rest we do more than burn ourselves out. We misunderstand the God who calls us to rest--who created us to be people of rest. Let's face it: our rest needs work. Sabbath recalls our creation, and with it God's satisfaction with us as he made us, without our hurried wrangling and harried worrying. It also recalls God's deliverance of the Israelites from Egypt, and with it God's ability to do completely what we cannot complete in ourselves. Sabbath keeping reminds us that we are free to rest each week. Eighteen months in Tel Aviv, Israel, where a weekly sabbath is built into the culture, began Lynne M. Baab's twenty-five-year embrace of a rhythm of rest--as a stay-at-home mom, as a professional writer working out of her home and as a minister of the gospel. With collected insights from sabbath keepers of all ages and backgrounds, Sabbath Keeping offers a practical and hopeful guidebook that encourages all of us to slow down and enjoy our relationship with the God of the universe.

In Choral Masterpieces: Major and Minor, historian Nicholas Tarling surveys the landscape of choral works, some standard masterpieces that are commonly performed by choruses around the world, others deserving a second, closer look. As noted in the foreword by Uwe Grodd , music director of the Auckland Choral Society, this work "is a collection of essays about a number of outstanding works, including Beethoven's Miss Solemnis and Britten's War Requiem, but he also invites attention to lesser masterpieces. If the choral movement, which includes both singers and listeners, is to survive, new works must be created and repertory expanded. The book is an easy and captivating read even if you are not a chorister." Choral Masterpieces: Major and Minor features short essays on over 28 works, from major masterpieces such as Handel's Messiah and Bach's St. Matthew's Passion to off-the-beaten path choral works such as Samuel Coleridge-Taylor's Hiawatha and Frederick Delius' A Mass of Life. Throughout, Tarling offers assessments that sparkle with unique insights and at the same time ground listener's in the historical contexts of the work's production and performance. Each work is transformed in Tarling's able hands from musical work into a window into the mind and milieu of the composer. Choral Masterpieces: Major and Minor mixes choral mainstays with works that demand revisiting. Choral singers and their audiences, as well as choral societies and their directions and promoters, will find ample food for thoughts in these meditations on the choral tradition.

Singing God's Words is the first in-depth study of the experience and meaning of chanting or "reading" Torah among contemporary American Jews. This experience has been transformed dramatically in recent years by the impact of digital technology, feminism, the empowerment of lay people and a search for self-fulfillment through involvement with community. At a time when worshippers seek deeper spiritual experience, many Jews have found new meaning in the experience of reading Torah, an act that is broadly accessible to Jewish adults even as it requires intensive immersion with the text of the Bible in Hebrew. This book examines why and how growing numbers of American Jews in all denominations see the public chanting of Biblical texts during the synagogue service as one of the most authentic and personal expressions of their religious identity. Drawing on hundreds of interviews with men and women, both professionals and congregants, Jeffrey A. Summit describes how the reading of Torah embodies their understanding of historical religious practice, even as it is shaped by contemporary views of spiritual experience. Through this act, holiness becomes manifest at the intersection of Biblical chant, sacred text, the individual, and the community.

The transition from the valveless natural horn to the modern valved horn in 19th-century Paris was different from similar transitions in other countries. While valve technology was received happily by players of other members of the brass family, strong support for the natural horn, with its varied color palette and virtuoso performance traditions, slowed the reception and application of the valve to the horn. Using primary sources including Conservatoire method books, accounts of performances and technological advances, and other evidence, this book tells the story of the transition from natural horn to valved horn at the Conservatoire, from 1792 to 1903, including close examination of horn teaching before the arrival of valved brass in Paris, the initial reception and application of this technology to the horn, the persistence of the natural horn, and the progression of acceptance, use, controversies, and eventual adoption of the valved instrument in the Parisian community and at the Conservatoire. Active scholars, performers, and students interested in the horn, 19th-century brass instruments, teaching methods associated with the Conservatoire, and the intersection of technology and performing practice will find this book useful in its details and conclusions, including ramifications on historically-informed performance today.

for SATB & piano/orchestra Here John Rutter uses oriental musical influences to create a highly original arrangement of the popular Christmas carol. The verses are dark and mysterious in character, with warmth and joy radiating from the choruses. This setting can also be found in Rutter's Christmas collection Joy to the World. Scores and parts for the orchestral accompaniment are available on sale.

Contemporary worship music shapes the way evangelical Christians understand worship itself. Author Monique M. Ingalls argues that participatory worship music performances have brought into being new religious social constellations, or "modes of congregating". Through exploration of five of these modes-concert, conference, church, public, and networked congregations-Singing the Congregation reinvigorates the analytic categories of "congregation" and "congregational music." Drawing from theoretical models in ethnomusicology and congregational studies, Singing the Congregation reconceives the congregation as a fluid, contingent social constellation that is actively performed into being through communal practice-in this case, the musically-structured participatory activity known as "worship." "Congregational music-making" is thereby recast as a practice capable of weaving together a religious community both inside and outside local institutional churches. Congregational music-making is not only a means of expressing local concerns and constituting the local religious community; it is also a powerful way to identify with far-flung individuals, institutions, and networks that comprise this global religious community. The interactions among the congregations reveal widespread conflicts over religious authority, carrying far-ranging implications for how evangelicals position themselves relative to other groups in North America and beyond.

Strategies, Tips, and Activities for the Effective Band Director: Targeting Student Engagement and Comprehension is a resourceful collection of highly effective teaching strategies, solutions, and activities for band directors. Chapters are aligned to cover common topics, presenting several practical lesson ideas for each topic. In most cases, each pedagogical suggestion is supported by excerpts from standard concert band literature. Topics covered include: score study shortcuts; curriculum development; percussion section management; group and individual intonation; effective rehearsal strategies; and much more! This collection of specific concepts, ideas, and reproducible pedagogical methods-not unlike short lesson plans-can be used easily and immediately. Ideal for band directors of students at all levels, Strategies, Tips, and Activities for the Effective Band Director is the product of more than three decades of experience, presenting innovative approaches, as well as strategies that have been borrowed, revised, and adapted from scores of successful teachers and clinicians.

for SA and piano In this charming piece for upper voices and piano, Ramsey's characterization of the fairy's monologue from Act 2, Scene 1 of A Midsummer Night's Dream is both fun and imaginative. The rhythmic fluidity, driving piano part, and clever accentuation perfectly complement Shakespeare's metre and rhyme scheme and bring the text to life. Over hill, over dale was originally published in the collection Hark, hark, the lark.

A definitive collection of 100 anthems from Tudor times to the present, this book includes favorites as well as lesser-known pieces. The anthems were selected for their practical usefulness for church choirs today, bearing in mind the needs of smaller choirs: the anthems are mostly for SATB with or without keyboard accompaniments.

This book can be used as an accompanying text for the collegiate marching band techniques course and to help build a successful marching band program at a high school. Topics include everything from developing a program handbook to student leadership and adult staffing, budgets, rehearsal techniques, sample forms, and basic information regarding the development process of a marching band show, as well as basic drill design techniques. It also addresses typical mistakes made by young teachers and offers suggestions on how to avoid/handle those mistakes. Finally, workbook-style activities at the end of each chapter help support and reinforce the material presented.

This book traces Dadakuada's history and artistic vision and discusses its vibrancy as the most popular traditional Yoruba oral art form in Islamic Africa. Foregrounding the role of Dadakuada in Ilorin, and of Ilorin in Dadakuada the book covers the history, cultural identity, performance techniques, language, social life and relationship with Islam of the oral genre. The author examines Dadakuada's relationship with Islam and discusses how the Dadakuada singers, through their songs and performances, are able to accommodate Islam in ways that have ensured their continued survival as a traditional African genre in a predominantly Muslim community. This book will be of interest to scholars of traditional African culture, African art history, performance studies and Islam in Africa.

for SATB unaccompanied This gentle, lilting anthem sets verses from the psalms that speak of devotion to and delight in the Lord. Bednall's sophisticated and appealing musical language gives colour and expression to the text and creates a devotional atmosphere perfectly suited to the psalmists' words.