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Taken at a slow processional tempo this work has a predominantly canonic texture. The syncopated passages are at once sombre and sensual, and the balancing homphonic phrases achieve real power. A shor...

This is one of Clarke's many pieces on love, and one of the best. It combines the English modality of earlier times with foretastes of the adventurous chromaticism of her later work. It is a lovely pi...

This is a lilting take on the Elizabethan lute-song full of smooth Stanford-like nineteenth-century harmonies, exquisitely tempered with modal effects.

This is an appropriately aching setting of Sir Philip Sidney's poem of unending desire and longing. There are gorgeous chromatics and enharmonics and a masterful use of a triplet pattern which becomes...

Weep you no more, sad fountains is a modern take on the Elizabethan lute-song, integrating the characteristic alternations of minor and major, fondness for cross-relations, and vivid word-painting. Th...

Music, when soft voices die combines aspects of nineteenth-century English pastoral style with some of the tonal adventurousness of Vaughan Williams's Shakespeare settings. This is an exceptionally be...

Dona nobis pacem combines two lines about peace from the Ordinary of the Latin Mass. A slow tempo lends grace and poise to the gentle, sustained vocal lines, and the composer juxtaposes homophonic and...

A Birthday sets a poem of the same title by Christina Rossetti. Chydenius reflects the vivid imagery in the text of the verses through beautiful vocal lines with swirling countermelodies. The choruses...

Becky McGlade has set this well-known Christmas hymn with textures both rich and restrained. The original English language hymn was based on a 19th-century English translation of Prudentius's 4th-cent...

Stuart Beatch's a boy & a boy sets a romantic and ultimately tragic text by poet Matthew Stepanic. Written as a response to Eric Whitacre's well-known work A Boy and a Girl, Beatch describes this piec...

Hazzard's enchanting Sanctus, setting text from the Latin Mass, captures the feeling of a rushing current throughout. Suitable for concert use, this piece features imaginative text-setting and driving...

Skempton's After Rain sets an evocative text by Edward Thomas with a contemplative choral part over a rich and slow-moving cello line. Skempton alternates between contrasting upper-voice duets and ful...

This setting of the traditional hymn to 'Mary, the star of the sea' contrasts two moods and styles: the flowing simplicity of the 'Ave maris stella' refrain and the slightly faster and more homophonic...

This motet is the fifth of a set of seven relating the life story of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Finnissy's aim was to hint at technical and expressive continuity with the music of the 11th and 12th cent...

This setting of this popular text was composed in 1997; choir directors should feel free to put a few sopranos on the alto line in the two polyphonic sections. Offprinted from the collection Cantica N...

This setting was commissioned by Choir and Organ magazine in 2003 and first performed by St Alban's Cathedral Choir under the direction of Andrew Lucas. Offprinted from the collection Cantica Nova.

This version of a familiar and frequently set text is predominantly hushed and awestruck in tone rather than jubilatory. Offprinted from the collection Cantica Nova.

This Introit is the first of four Latin motets commissioned for the 1976 Edington Festival and first performed in Edington Priory. The Introit firsty pays tribute to Augustine, and then, in a more liv...

Aiming for weightless flexibility of expression, this setting employs an idiom detectably in keeping with aspects of medieval practise. Offprinted from the collection Cantica Nova.

At only one point in the piece (bars 37-9) does the the level rise above piano. Despite occassional tuning demands, it should be well within the reach of many choirs. Offprinted from the collection Ca...

A short, eloquant piece commissioned by Winchester College reflecting the spirit of Advent. Offprinted from the collection Cantica Nova.

Bob Chilcott wrote this piece at the request of a friend and colleague Michael Emery, the Producer of the BBC Singers, who wanted a new piece to sing at Mass in Notre Dame, Paris, while touring with t...

This motet was written to celebrate the golden jubilee of Canon Francis Bartlett's priesthood and first performed at the Church of St Anselm and St Cecilia, Kingsway on 29 June 1985. Offprinted from t...

This motet features text painting throughout the piece, with the music opening outwards from a unison F to reflect a flower slowly unfolding when exposed to sunlight, as well as a chill wind sweeping...