English Settings of Orthodox Chant
  • Adam WoodAdam Wood
    Posts: 6,451
    I love orthodox chant, and have spent many (mostly fruitless) hours trying to find modern transcriptions of it in English.
    So I'm thrilled to share with everyone here this recent find, a real treasure trove it seems:

    http://www.monasteryofstjohn.org/?p=music
  • Adam WoodAdam Wood
    Posts: 6,451
    And another!
    http://orthodoxtwopartmusic.org/
  • Charles in CenCA
    Posts: 2,416
    Outstanding find, Adam, thank you.
  • GavinGavin
    Posts: 2,799
    Somewhere on the website of the Antiochian Orthodox Archdiocese of North America is all the music of the year, as well.

    Crazy people, those Orthodox: they make freely available all the music one could need at any parish. What are they thinking???
  • CharlesW
    Posts: 11,934
    I had to contact the OCA archdiocese a few years ago about copyrights before using some of their chants. They e-mailed back that I was free to print and use them if I gave proper credit.
  • Chris_McAvoyChris_McAvoy
    Posts: 389
    How lovely Adam, what you are discovering are the same very good and well known links used to help many Orthodox (and a few Eastern Catholic) Churches have beutiful music.

    My personal favourite, from the original mediterranean constantinoplitan tradition.. the original byzantine chant that is..

    http://www.stanthonysmonastery.org/music/Apolytikia.htm

    That book constain beautiful propers for throughout the year for almost all important saints of their calendar.
    They have a faint resemblence to certain Antiphons for the Magnificat of the Roman rite..
  • JamJam
    Posts: 636
    was it copyrights in 19th century Russia?? no it was not!

    let's see, let's see... there is also this cool tutorial on how to read Byzantine chant notation if you're into that kind of thing (I know I've posted this before...).

    Also here is the Sacred Music Library of the Antiochian Orthodox archdiocese of North America (mentioned by Gavin).

    The only trouble I've ever had in finding Orthodox music is looking for a specific transcription of a specific hymn I've heard from a specific feast day which usually turns out to be handwritten in someone's beeswax-stained liturgy book somewhere in Alaska surely and you have to know who to ask in order to obtain a copy. Haha, in Steubenville we were still singing from music handwritten in, like, the 40s on lined music paper with the lyrics typed in underneath. It was Serbian polyphony, a lot of which was written by parishioners, iirc. So to find that kind of stuff, you have to know where to look.

    The common stuff? it's everywhere. And certainly if you just need something for a feast day or whatever you'll find it.

    btw, Orthodoxy in America is a very small world. And since I've moved several times in my life I have connections--with Antiochians, OCA, Serbians, Greeks, and here in Ireland I know a lot of Georgians. If you ever needed anything more, I may be able to help you find it.
Add a Comment