Compline during Lent
  • jefe
    Posts: 200
    We are closing in on 100 offices of Compline by one or another of our four Compline choirs since I started our program in 2009. We tried chanting Compline every fortnight, but it was too time consuming for the meager forces I have at hand. In a small California Gold Rush town on the west slope of the Sierra Nevada, the pickin's are slim. Those that can read music and chant with a straight tone are in very high demand elsewhere. After a year of chasing counter tenors around, so to speak, I bailed back to once a month with the groups alternating. When my Compline comrade in arms, Kevin Siegfried announced his intention to chant the office only on Sundays in Lent, he struck this verse deep within me: Ps. 51:7. "7. For behold, you look for truth deep within me, and will make me understand wisdom secretly." This may be the absolute best time to offer a string of simple Complines. So, this Lenten season we are meeting at the office (Loft) and doing Compline on five consecutive Sundays. The music was chosen to reflect both http://www.lectionarypage.net and some of the greatest music directly applicable for the season. Below is our flyer:
    jefe
    2Compline during lent flyer..pdf
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    Thanked by 2M. Jackson Osborn veromary
  • veromaryveromary
    Posts: 160
    Sounds great!
  • jefe
    Posts: 200
    Thanks for reading. So intent was I to offer the best I can do, I fiddled around with one of the Penitential Psalms, Ps. 130 (the Lectionary assigned Psalm to be sung on our April 2nd Compline), and kept pulling on that string and came up with these, hot off Sibelius 7.5:
    Now I just need to decide which one to use.
    Psalm 130 harm. C.H. Stewart SSAA - Full Score.pdf
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    Psalm 130 for AATB men Davies - Full Score.pdf
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    4Psalm 130 Farrant SSAA - Full Score.pdf
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    Psalm 130 De profundis SSAA JR - Full Score.pdf
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    Thanked by 1CHGiffen
  • M. Jackson Osborn
    Posts: 8,367

    Jefe -
    Beautifully done!
    Your pointing is flawless.

    The Davies chant, of all chants, lends itself most excruciatingly to penitential or meditative texts. Really nice work!
    Also, I do like the Reynolds harmonisation.
    Thanked by 3CHGiffen jefe dboothe
  • M. Jackson Osborn
    Posts: 8,367
    Another wrenchingly penitential and grave chant is one by J. Turle, adapted from Henry Purcell, and may be found at no. 697 in The Hymnal 1940 amongst the funerary chants. It has a character most fitting for Lent or Holy Week, especially Good Friday.
    Thanked by 1jefe
  • jefe
    Posts: 200
    Osborn, below is a realization of the Turle/Purcell connection. The Hymnal 1940 has the Burial of the Dead Psalm tune in the unaccepted, 1928 BCP language. I tried updating this fine harmonization to BCP 1979 text but it just didn't sound as grounded and didn't fit the tune nearly as well as the 1928 text. It was round pegs in square holes by comparison. So, I think some things should be just left alone in the original pointing. I took some liberty using the minor 3rd at the final cadence on some of the verses as a major chord sounds too Hollywood for me. Maybe on the last verse giving some sonic hope for the departed.
    Turle Purcell Psalm 130 - Full Score.pdf
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    Thanked by 2M. Jackson Osborn CHGiffen
  • jefe
    Posts: 200
    Osborn, thanks for liking my setting of Ps. 130 in Russian Orthodoxy. This one does have a story behind it. After playing the Russian Easter Overture by Rimsky Korsakov many times, I wanted to get to the origin of the chant he used on the 2nd trombone solo. I found it and appropriated its use as a basis for my setting of Psalm 130. In the meantime, we put together an all Russian Compline including Ave Maria and Pater Noster by Igor Strawinsky. Even though I'm not Russian, I needed a companion Psalm setting and the setting below fits with his acerbic musical style. I dredged up the old AATB men's version and made an SATB version this morning, both appearing below.
    Psalm 130 after Korsakov JR for men - Full Score.pdf
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    Psalm 130 JR SATB edition in f minor - Full Score.pdf
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    Thanked by 2M. Jackson Osborn CHGiffen
  • M. Jackson Osborn
    Posts: 8,367
    Jefe -

    I'm so glad that you liked the Purcell-Turle chant. I do understand your reaction to that final major chord at the end. I must say, though, that it doesn't strike me as it strikes you. Fundamental to the yin and yang of that chant is the tension betwixt major and minor modalities. This, to me, is the secret of its power. (Oh, and by the way: you left out the 'be' in 'Glory be to the Father...'. I wouldn't have mentioned this except that you were following the BCP language, most of which is now, thanks to the Ordinariate, quite Catholic.

    As for Korsakov - you have redeemed him (a little bit) for me. I've never been the slightest bit attracted to his music. As I read your chant, though, I could hear it anew as Korsakov adapted it. Brilliant!

    Ha! You should compile The Jefe Psalter and publish it!
    Thanked by 2jefe CHGiffen
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