Chant verses with polyphonic refrain?

Egrimm84

Hello experts!

I’m looking for something with chant verses and a short and simple polyphonic refrain. Anything come to mind?

Thank you!

rvisser

Adoremus in aeternum by Allegri

CHGiffen

My MzABar "Gustate et videte" has a rather simple polyphonic (actually, 3-voice canonic) antiphon plus Mode III chant verses, which are harmonized (but just the chant melody can also be sung).

There is also an English version "O taste and see" with the English verses in harmonized Mode III Anglican chant (which evokes a slimmed down version of the Gregorian Mode III chant).

tomjaw

The Issac Communions as the refrain, the chant verses from the relevant psalm.

GerardH

@Xopheros Dalitz's Ubi caritas, Rorate caeli and presumably other works.

Xopheros

You do not write for which time of the church year and what you consider "simple polyphony", so it is difficult to make suitable suggestions. As @GerardH already has suggested two of my pieces (one for Maundy Thursday and one for advent), here are some further suggestions for the coming Lent and Easter season:

The Lenten chant Attende Domine with a two part setting of the refrain and stanzas in the original chant tone (editions with Latin or English text).
The Mandatum Antiphone Mandatum novum do vobis with the antiphone set in four parts and the verse chated to the chant melody from the Graduale (editions with Latin, English, or German text).
The Easter chant O filii et filiae with a three part setting of the alleluja refrain and the stanzas in the original chant tone (editions with Latin, English, or German text).
The Easter sequence Victimae paschali laudes with the first verse used as a three part refrain and the rest sung to the 11th century chant (editions with Latin or Esperanto text).

There are many more on my website like Salve festa dies, Haec dies, or Gaudeamus omnes, but these presumably do not fall in the category "simple polyphonic refrain".

Egrimm84

Thank you! This is for a rag tag group of high school and middle school students to sing in May- so could be Easter or Marian. And simple is best!

CGM

Richard Rice also has a huge collection of polyphonic antiphons with chanted verses, all texts in Latin, that he composed for the Extraordinary Form. There are Easter and Marian pieces in there that would probably work well.

Susdem

Christopher Dalitz has a beautiful but also very doable polyphonic choral setting of the offertory antiphon for Ascension that alternates with chanted psalm verses. And it's available for free on cpdl and he offers it in SSA and SAT settings as well as in English and Latin.

You can hear it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uqj8c7-hiPs&list=RDuqj8c7-hiPs&start_radio=1

Susdem

I'm also going to have my choir sing the Vaughan Williams' setting of O Taste and See - which is the text of an ad libitum Communion antiphon - alternating with the chanted psalm verses for the ad libitum antiphon to lengthen it out.

ServiamScores

As it happens, I wrote a communion motet for the Feast of the Baptism of the Lord just yesterday that alternates between a simple refrain and chant.

https://youtu.be/UzUCwdoY070?si=Z5WvJFo50MzcaNDP

CGM

Also, this edition of the Palestrina "Jesu Rex admirabilis," which incorporates a chant hymn as verses.
(The text of both polyphony and verses comes from the same 48-verse hymn on the Holy Name of Jesus, composed by St. Bernard of Clairvaux.)

rich_enough

Here are two pieces you can use during Lent: a simple choral refrain for SAB (Grancini's O Bone Jesu) with verses from Psalm 50, and a setting of Attende Domine (melody in the bass) with chant verses.

Besides Jesu rex admirabilis, many chant hymns can work alternating verses of polyphony and chant, though some of these involve more complicated polyphony than the examples above. I've attached two such settings of the Veni Creator adapted from Josquin des Prez and Praetorius, and a setting of the Vexilla Regis for Holy Week. You could also alternate the Stabat Mater by Bragers (found in the Pius X Hymnal) with the familiar chant.

Chant_Supremacist

Ravanello composed a number of works that alternate chant verses with 3 voice polyphony verses. It's not verse-refrain, but a similar idea. You can mine this thread.

Allegri's Adoremus in Aeternum is also nice.

rich_enough

Here are two pieces by Ravanello with polyphony alternating with chant: "Te Joseph Celebret" (SSA) and "Crux fidelis" (ATB).

rich_enough

Ravanello's "Jesu Redemptor omnium" arranged for SAB with chant verses.

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