Evening Service in G (The Tulsa Service)

* This setting is reminiscent of the Howell's setting for Gloucester Cathedral
* Each voice part is well suited to its particular vocal strengths and colors
* Organ part is a voice unto itself, elaborating upon the choral writing and punctuating certain portions of the text

I regret having let these fine canticles languish for some time since their publication.  The subtitle refers to Trinity Church, Tulsa, and they are dated 2004, the year the composer left that parish for St. John’s Cathedral in Denver.  They are quite a valediction!  The publisher’s blurb says they recall the Howells Gloucester Service, and you may well hear that, especially early in the Magnificat—but you’ll likely also be glad that they present somewhat less difficulty (and run to rather less length) than those canticles.  Unison trebles open the Magnificat, in G minor; they are answered by the lower three voices, in G major.  After another trebles-only verse and a brief organ build-up, the voices unite to show “the strength of his arm,” and to scatter the proud convincingly, now back in G minor.  The trebles return for the last verse of the canticle proper, and then the full choir presents the Gloria patri.  There is a structural scaffold of treble-tenor vs. alto-bass duets here, and the music transfigures the earlier “he hath showed strength” material into a triumphant G major, before fading away to a pianissimo close.  Picking up on the treble-tenor alliance in the Gloria, the Nunc Dimittis is cast entirely as a sectional duet between these voices.  (I wondered if it might be an evocation of an unrecorded duet between Simeon and the neglected prophetess, Anna, or indeed between Simeon and Mary; no matter—it’s lovely!)  After this shimmers away, the Gloria is a straight reprise of its earlier incarnation.  As I said, it’s quite a valediction, and a welcome addition to the growing American repertory of evening canticles.

THE JOURNAL of the ASSOCIATION OF ANGLICAN MUSICIANS Volume 20, Number 10, December, 2011