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Getting ready for "Living In A Holy City" with over five hundred voices: the combined Hopewell Valley H.S. and Timberlane Middle School choirs of New Jersey, directed by Ken and Rebecca Elpus. See bottom of page for an action shot.  Photo by Mike Schwartz, www.mssphoto.com
Ann and Séamus SSA chorus, SA soloists plus bass solo and tenor solo. Scored for five musicians: violin, string bass, accordion, bodhrán (Irish frame drum) and flute doubling on tin whistle.  See Lola Kovanic for opera rental and licensing:Lola.Kovanic@boosey.com	For Shallaway: Newfoundland and Labrador Youth in Chorus. More information on this hour-long chamber opera can be found on the Ann and Séamus page. There will also be some passages released for choir and piano, details to be listed on this page when they are confirmed. top
Café de Chinitas SAB voices and piano  Cypress CP 1135 Recording Available Hopewell  Kingswood-Oxford	For Cantabile of Kingwood-Oxford Middle School, West Hartford, CT. Based on a traditional Peteñeras melody that I dance around the room to my own drummer, this Flamenco-drenched story of two brothers who fight over who is the best gypsy and the best bullfighter comes with a folk text collected in Granada by the great Federico Lorca. Starting in slow, moody rubato and building full-speed-ahead, this piece gives the choir the option of two different endings, one more advanced with divisi in every vocal part. Although an advanced choir would find plenty to challenge their styling and energy, the piece is meant to lie within the vocal ranges and the capabilities of a good middle school choir. The pianist gets to burn slowly and then spit fire. top
Carillon Triple Treble Choir (unison/SA/SSAA) and percussion  M-051-47725-8 Recording Available Ottawa	For the Central Children’s Choir of Ottawa for their 45th anniversary. "Carillon" is a celebratory anthem especially useful when the beginner, intermediate and senior choirs within an organization wish to combine in a commemorative concert. The text is the inscription on an old bell: twelve words in Latin that translate as, "I mourn death; I disperse the lightning; I announce the Sabbath; I rouse the lazy; I scatter the winds; I appease the bloodthirsty." The central metaphor established by the title "Carillon", or a play of bells, is that a choir of young voices preserves the traditions and rings the changes of a culture. The score calls for one drum - something along the lines of a djembe - but more percussion can be added to taste. The SSAA choir sings mostly in two and three parts, although there are two sections of four part texture in the style of a motet that feature the SSAA choir alone, in contrast to the triple choir sections which are driving yet dignified. The piece builds to the chanting of "Pax!" in big block chords while the drummer roars out triumphant thunder. Lots and lots of antiphony, and a chance for every choir to shine. top
Construction Ahead (SATB and SSA choirs, or SATB choir with treble divisi, and percussion)  M-051-47451-6 Recording Available Hopewell	For the choirs of Hopewell Valley Central H.S. and Timberlane Middle School, Pennington, NJ. A Celtic-flavoured piece that merges with martial percussion, this chart is not driven by harmony, but by an involved and briskly moving melodic line often sung in mass unison or in two part texture. So even though the piece was scored for double choir, it could easily be rethought for single choir with passages of SA divisi. Themes drawn from Irish and British folk music (most particularly "The Rocky Road To Dublin" and "Royal Forester", both of which deal with the weary journey en route to justice) are fused with original text that examines the strange, distancing effects of modern journalism, where footage of human suffering is surrounded by computer graphics, network logos and pumped up theme music, so that human history becomes not a reality, but a virtual reality. The overall effect is meant to be a challenge, but not a downer. I wanted to write something inspiring and uplifting, but which stares the difficulties of this world straight in the face. The number of percussionists is flexible. At the premiere we had a smokin' snare drum with a floor tom and a djembe holding down the low beat. top
Andrew Dunsmore sings and plays 'Metal and Wood', a piece for solo voice and percussion he commissioned as part of his research into the value of choral training for instrumentalists. The audio clip gives five minutes from the piece, starting when Andrew moves from chant to song by means of the 'A' from a silver tuning fork. ('Make the metal give its note away.') Dunsmore
Game of Cards, The (TTBB)  M-051-47809-5 Newman Sound	You might call this style "Celtic Barbershop". From the salons of Jane Austen to the saloons of the wild west, how a man and a woman relate while playing cards is a metaphor for how they would relate in romance. This lilting, swinging chart, designed for sweet and warm vocal tone, tells the tale of a confident young man whose Jack is no match for his charming partner's trumps. Based on the British folk song, "The Game of Cards", my version becomes a suite of fiddle tunes from such traditions as Cumbria and Atlantic Canada, with the words of the original song adapted to fit the flow of gorgeous folk melodies. Commissioned by Newman Sound, the men's choir from my adopted city of St. John's, the soundfile is from their premiere at Festival 500 and features the middle section where the fiddle tunes flow most richly. top
Job, Job (SATB with some divisi) (SATB) M-051-47806-4 (SSA) M-051-47572-8 Partners In Praise	For Partners in Praise Girls’ Choir for their 10th anniversary. Best suited for the more mature sound of high-school singers or older, this piece comes from the bluesy, moaning, deep-souled traditions of the field yell and the gospel holler. According to the choirs who've sung it there is an electricity in the air from the first notes on. There is some soprano divisi, although it's simple and homophonic in nature. Centered around the famous story of Job, the piece contains both the darkness and the uplift we associate with that harrowing tale. It starts out as a groan of grief and ends like a blazing chariot, soaring and victorious. The soundfile features Partners In Praise Girls' Choir, directed by Julia Fahey, performing the treble version of the piece. top
Mayn Rue Platz (SA (with divisi), violin and percussion) M-051-47811-8 (SATB, violin and percussion) M-051-47810-1 Recording Available ACDA  Hopewell	I've taken a Yiddish lament, usually sung slowly, and set it to Arabic-flavoured dance grooves which are both ecstatic and edgy, aggressive and smouldering. The piece evokes the MIddle East without being culturally specific, as I want this arrangement to suggest a lament for all the people of that part of the world. The violin is strongly featured and combines rhythmic chops with a wailing cantabile. At least two percussionists are needed on tambourine and doumbek but the performance notes give various options for different numbers of players and different styles of drums. The vocal lines are passionate and undulating, like a silk ribbon on their breeze, like tendrils of perfumed smoke. The cantabile vocal lines combine with the driving percussion to create a piece which could equally open or close a concert con fuoco. My thanks to the Virginia ACDA for asking me to write them something. top
On The Horizon (unison with piano)  M-051-47820-0 Recording Available Hopewell	For Timberlane Middle School, Pennington, NJ, adapted from Ann & Séamus: A Chamber Opera for Shallaway: Newfoundland and Labrador Youth in Chorus. I have reworked parts of Scene 3 of Ann and Séamus for unison voices. (A soundfile of part of Scene 3 from the original opera score can be heard on this website by going to the page for Ann and Séamus and clicking the soundfile beside "Ann has a premonition".) The lilting melody is one of the strongest in the opera, and though designed for young choirs, such are the opportunities for phrasing and word-painting that the chart could be rewardingly done by more advanced groups. top
Ower The Hills (See "Amazing Grace" for a soundfile of the suite's finale.) (treble) M-051-46942-0 (SATB) M-051-47807 (instrumental parts - bagpipes, C and Bflat instruments, percussion) M-051-10460-4 Recording Available Amabile	For the Amabile Youth Singers of London, Ontario. If you have a big choir and the right acoustics, the bagpipes are a possibility, but this suite of traditional Scottish melodies works beautifully if the pipes part is taken by any combination of oboe, violin, flute, clarinet - unison instrumental playing is very much in the Scottish tradition. The suite ends with "Amazing Grace ." Do we need yet another version of this famous song? I didn't think so, and yet it turned out to be one of my best inspirations. The instruments take the melody, and the choir sings slowly-building counter melodies that produce, if I do say so, quite a gorgeous and powerful effect. Many choirs have performed this coda on its own, and since it is a very fast learn, it's proved to be a useful way to start the fall rehearsal schedule. The melodies in the suite proper are fabulous, with lots of back-and-forth between choir and instrumentalists. Medium difficulty. The score contains the bagpipes part written out for C and Bflat instruments. The soundfile is from the treble version of the piece. top
Si Tu Veux (high voice and low voice with piano)  M-051-47817-0 Oriana	The Oriana Women's Choir of Toronto has commissioned a series of Canadian choral composers to set poems by children from the Toronto District School Board, and the accompanying soundfile is from the concert where they premiered the results. I chose a French poem by Ben Sprenger, a grade one student who, like myself, is interested in synaesthesia, where the senses cross boundaries and sound suggests colours and colours suggest sound, to give just one possible cross-connection. Sprenger's poem, an exploration of where the colours orange and yellow take his thoughts, is set in slow-motion languor as every piece of sensory detail is savoured, like licking the roof of your mouth for the honey that Ben places in his poem. The piano part combines that languor with the tick of a steady, inescapable pulse: Satie's dream of Lully, or vice versa. The two slowly undulating vocal lines, which can be sung by any combination of voices (for example, S/A, T/B or ST/AB), drift apart, melt back into each other, and drift apart again, in a showcase for the choir's tone and phrasing. Sprenger's poem is very short, so choirs and audiences unused to French will not have much of the language to tackle. top
Vus Vet Zayn (SATB) (Colla Voce, three-part treble) 21-20231 (Colla Voce, SATB) 21-20110 Recording Available Hopewell  Amabile	For the Indianapolis Children’s Choir, IN. A passionate Chassidic song, sung in Yiddish, about the coming of the Messiah. Starts dark, rapt and moody, and graaaadually speeds up until it's a high-kicking jubilation. Not too much music to learn, and a crowd pleaser. Massed choirs have liked this. My Yiddish pronunciation guide is a guide only - there are so many variants, and my attempts to find a middle ground are OK, but not ideal. Try to bring in somebody who knows the language to do some coaching. The SATB revoicing was done for Hopewell Valley Central H.S., Pennington, N.J. I asked Max Orland, one of the Hopewell choristers, to come up with an accompaniment for klezmer band, which can be heard on the Hopewell soundfile. top
Willie Taylor (SATB) (SAB) M-051-47655-8 (SSA) M-051-47656-5 Kokopelli	For Kokopelli of Edmonton, Alberta. A British folk song with a twist to the old plot where "girl dresses like sailor to follow her true love over the foam". Instead of the tender reconciliation one expects, our heroine settles her affair of the heart with a brace of pistols and is made a ship's commander in honour of her pluck. It's one of those great old folk tunes that moves between major and modal minor, with lots of role playing, lots of antiphony between male and female voices and lots of melodic counterpoint in the choruses. top
Worth Fighting For (SA with piano and percussion, with options for solos or choral divisi)  M-051-47832-7	For Shallaway: Newfoundland and Labrador Youth in Chorus. I have reworked parts of Scenes 2, 4 and 5 of Ann and Séamus to create a self-enclosed suite. (Soundfiles of some of the relevant parts from the original opera score can be heard on this website by going to the page for Ann and Séamus and clicking the soundfile beside "Early morning at Isle aux Morts" and "On the Derry docks".) There are optional parts for four soloists (Ann, Séamus, Father George and Mother Jane) which have the option of being taken by sections of the choir. All solo parts are scored for treble voices, but Séamus and Father George can be sung by a tenor and bass. The suite can be performed in choral concert formation, or it can be turned into a piece of theatre through various degrees of blocking and/or costume. The percussion part is scored for a frame drum, but could easily be transferred to the floor tom of a drum set. top
"Living In A Holy City" with over five hundred voices: the combined Hopewell Valley H.S. and Timberlane Middle School choirs of New Jersey, directed by Ken and Rebecca Elpus. Accompanist Elizabeth Hartnett can be seen sitting at the piano, singing along in her head. Photo by Matt Schwartz, www.mssphoto.com