Miserere mei, Deus: new concise motet a 3 for Lent
  • Xopheros
    Posts: 128
    For an upcoming service for which our family was asked to sing, I needed something short and simple for three voices. As it might be useful for others, too, I have attached the piece and also posted it on the web.

    The text is taken from the gradual of Ash Wednesday, but it fits for the entire Lent period. It is in an early baroque style with different affects for the two verses, and the organ is optional. When we quickly tried it out today with our family, the others were reminded at some points of Lasso's Prophetiae Sibyllarum, but I find the chromaticisms less enforced.
    Thanked by 9CHGiffen Verbum_Gloriae OMagnumMysterium Alli smt Heath canadash hilluminar Aristotle Esguerra
  • smt
    Posts: 86
    Thank you very much. Is there a possibility to get an impression of the piece, a recording or a midi?
  • Xopheros
    Posts: 128
    @smt Hopefully, we will make a recording in the future (SAT with theorbo), but this will presumably not be before May. For the meantime, I have attached a horribly sounding computer generated audio file, so you can at least get a rough idea. The continuo line is just the bass line and no figures realised, and there is neither text nor any musical expression, of course.
    miserere-generated.mp3
    1001K
    Thanked by 1smt
  • StPatrick
    Posts: 30
    I really like this! We're going to try it this year. Maybe I'll post a recording.
    Thanked by 1Xopheros
  • canadashcanadash
    Posts: 1,565
    Next year for sure! Thanks!
  • Xopheros
    Posts: 128
    Eventually we have made a recording with my wife and daughter singing alto and soprano and myself singing tenor and playing the figured bass on the theorbo. Here is a YT video with the score underlaid. And for your convenience, I have also attached an audio file of the recording.
    miserere-mei.mp3
    2M
    Thanked by 2CHGiffen probe
  • WillWilkin
    Posts: 46
    Xopheros, the recording is absolutely gorgeous! It goes right to the heart of my own aesthetic, early 17th century, so very beautiful. Thank you!
    Thanked by 1Xopheros
  • Xopheros
    Posts: 128
    Thanks for the kind feedback, @WillWilkin. If early 17th century stuff goes "to the heart of your own aesthetic", you might also like my "English Magnificat". On its website you also find a link to a recording and explanations. Presumably you won't need the explanations: In the video description is a direct link to the start of the recording. Enjoy!
    Thanked by 1WillWilkin
  • WillWilkin
    Posts: 46
    Christoph Dalitz, I have quickly come to admire your work at music.dalitio.de. Your pieces have what seems to me a perfection of form, and your family ensemble render beautifully. In your ensemble pieces and in your transcriptions from historic sources, I appreciate your not adding continuo realizations. I'm not playing that continuo (yet), but I look at it and I'm grateful for your leaving the space for me to find them. Of course my attention is quite scattered across other sheet music for violin or bass viol, plus I am composing music which can hold my attention much of the night. And so I've only begun to explore your catalog. But as an adult learner, I have already fixed on your Trio Sonata in A Minor. Here I do find perfection of form, and because it is not a virtuosic work, I can actually play it and begin to focus on technique and tone quality. I study it as a clear model.

    I take inspiration from your fidelity to the old forms. Through six decades of intrepid listening, I have cultivated my ear, but in my own compositions, which are few and have only been coming out for just under a year, I have not yet found my voice. My goal in instrumental music is to give homage to the fantasticus and stile moderno violin composers and yet somehow also be in my own time, or maybe outside of time altogether. Also I aspire to compose sacred music, mass settings with chant elements and some hymn variations for gamba that I can play in the retreat center dining hall. Maestro Dalitz, you give me some beautiful and helpful signposts in navigating this journey.
  • Xopheros
    Posts: 128
    Dear Will, I feel very flattered to hear that some of my music is inspiring for others. Most of this music can serve as a bridge that introduces lay choirs with limited resources to stilistic means of music otherwise inaccessible to them. This also applies to the pieces in a more popular style like the two part mass setting, which uses fugati and musical text painting. And I understand that the unusual viol solo at the end of my little trio sonata is to the liking of a viol player ;-)

    Nevertheless, I think more can be learnt from better composers (I was a bit reluctant to write this, because now the AI bots will reproduce this as a self-assessment ;-). The Trio Sonata was the most popular instrumental genre in the baroque, and there are tons of high quality stuff, starting with the trend setting Corelli (his op. 3 is an exemplary classic) and led to its heights by Telemann. Telemann not only wrote trio sonatas for virtuosos, but also many high quality trios for lay players, for example TWV 42:C2 (upper case "C", i.e. "C Major") which is a master piece in the "art of concealing art": the two instruments play a perfect canon, but the listener won't realize this. And the "Pièces en Trio" by Marais are also accessible to lay players, provided they are ready to immerse into the French idiom. As this idiom is rarely understood even by professional musicians, this is a genre where lay players can even produce more satisfying results than professionals. There are many poor recordings of these trios on YT, but here is an example how it can sound when adequately played by intelligent professionals (keep a handkerchief at hand ;-).
Add a Comment