When the muse (angelic beings) bring something to us, it behooves us to write it down asap. I still remember the day and the setting just before my family attended a private Mass in a private chapel, my sons as altar servers and I sitting at a piano waiting for Father to vest... it hit me like a ton of bricks... I grabbed whatever was near - I guess the Mass should actually be titled "Missa Legalis"?
Sitting at the piano just moments before Mass began, I started playing this piece in its realization and it kept playing over and over in my mind and heart. (Notice how it is idiomatic for piano with the syncopation which I have now adjusted to be a choral idiom)
NOTE: This was of course, composed for a NO... 2, 2 and 2 instead of 3, 3, 3. Only now, it really bothers me. (if you are a numbers person, tell me why)
Every once in a while, I have a piece come to me and I have to feverishly work it all out in 24 hours. Once or twice a year I will have a little manic episode where my brain just cannot quiet itself down until it all comes out, very quickly. The rest of the time, it’s a slog.
I had a lot more of those feverish episodes in my younger years... in fact, composing an entire Mass from midnight till morning. Not so much these days.
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