Mozart Ave Verum SAB?
  • Claire H
    Posts: 370
    I'd like to get my hands on an SAB arrangement of Mozart's Ave Verum, but CPDL doesn't have that option. :( Anyone?
  • Charles in CenCA
    Posts: 2,416
    Claire, in my four decades of public school/church, I can't recall ever seeing one. With the "esto nobis" section requiring the double duet between SA and TB layered, I can't imagine a SAB having the same effect, maybe S alternating with A/TB and the accompaniment, but still.....
    Happy hunting.
    Sounds like a job for.......LINDA SPEVACEK!
  • WGS
    Posts: 301
    Claire, etc.

    I have a setting for SAB from the Bourne Choral Library - copyright 1957. The arrangement is by the ubiquitous Walter Ehret. I'll put it up here later tonight. It's five pages octavo.
  • Liam
    Posts: 5,117
    I am puzzled by such a request. The tenor part only goes up to an E - it's really a baritone part (well, just the top half of an amateur baritone's range). Considering that most men are baritones (rather than tenors or basses), it would seem a non-issue to divide your bass section (unless you only have one bass). Alternatively, it's also almost entirely within the compass of altos so that you could divide them, too (the low E at the end of sanguine won't project well by many amateur altos, so you might ask the basses to divide on that note to finesse it...).

    In any event, this is one very practical reason this piece is so firmly established in the repertoire: Mozart voiced it in a way that most amateur choirs should be able to do it some measure of justice. (I wonder if Haydn inspired him in this regard; in any event, would that more writers of sacred music kept this practical consideration in mind.)
  • Claire H
    Posts: 370
    It's just that our choir is so small we don't have enough men for both parts. :)

    I figured out a way to do it SATB with cello taking one part, though...however, I'm still interested in seeing your setting, WGS. Thank you!
  • WGS
    Posts: 301
    image

    Something is different now for attaching a .PDF file. Is what I just did - above - something that is usable? It's five pages long. Is that too much for this facility?
    AveVerum001.pdf
    203K
  • Charles in CenCA
    Posts: 2,416
    Thanks, WGS. Ehret wasn't Spevacek, but this "arrangement"....yikes! Even a cello doubling the missing tenor line at "esto" is, prima facie, just plain wrong, choosing the root over the third in the baritone on that (then) well prepared, sweet major seventh. If the hospitale kids could bring it off before Amadeus' last breath, it seems, as Liam sez, just two solid guys could do the same minimally as well. YMMV.

    PS. We gave the Byrd (pardon the pun) a run from Noel's anthology tonight for Corpus Christi with just 8 singers for rehearsal. Felt sooooooo goood! Byrd's is da setting.
  • Claire H
    Posts: 370
    It's just that our choir is so small we don't have enough men for both parts. :)

    I figured out a way to do it SATB with cello taking one part, though...however, I'm still interested in seeing your setting, WGS. Thank you!
  • rmerkel
    Posts: 15
    The problem with using the cello is not just a musical one, its a liturgical one - the composer intended for this part (all parts) to be prayed, not just played.
  • CHGiffenCHGiffen
    Posts: 5,200
    The problem with the Mozart is that it is not a liturgical piece as written - for SATB chorus, strings, and organ continuo. Many arrangements simply transcribe the string parts for organ manuals.

    As for an SAB arrangement, I have (somewhere) an SATB score with pencil markings for singing it SAB (when Tenor takes the Alto part, Bass takes the Tenor part, or Alto takes the Tenor part, etc.). If I can lay my hands on a Finale .mus file of the SATB score, I could probably whip up an SAB arrangement that would be more-or-less like what I recall my previous arrangement was. At any rate, I think it would be better than the Walter Ehret arrangement.
  • Richard MixRichard Mix
    Posts: 2,822
    I remember perusing the Schirmer's Church Choir Book for Three-part Singing with SAB versions of Stainer's God So Loved the World (can you imagine!) and thinking anyone could do as well or better. Penciling is one approach, but to me it would seem better stewardship of rehearsal time as well as paper to learn three voice parts (with organ or organ & cello) as Mozart wrote them, rather than replacing copies and relearning repertoire when you eventually go to SATB.
  • CHGiffenCHGiffen
    Posts: 5,200
    I just cobbled together an SAB arrangement for the Mozart "Ave verum corpus" and am enclosing the PDF score and an MP3 soundfile. I didn't clean up the "organ" part (which is really just a straight reduction of the string parts).
    Mozart-Ave verum-SAB.pdf
    76K
    Mozart-Ave verum-SAB.mp3
    3M
    Thanked by 2lmassery Claire H