Choral
Vanessa McClintock
Easter Trilogy // For Where Your Treasure Is // In the Beginning
It's Chrismas Time // Lamb of God // Nativity // In Troubled Moments
How Great Thou Art // Emmaus // It Is Well
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Easter Trilogy is a work based on three of the major components in the Atonement of Jesus Christ. This piece begins with His crucifixion, followed by His resurrection, and concludes with His ascension.
The initial intent was to compose a choral work that a relatively competent small church choir could perform. It provides some challenges musically, while the complex part I assigned to the piano accompaniment. There are some interesting harmonies that might challenge an amateur choir, but by no means are they insurmountable. The piano part contributes to a bigger sound and a greater sense of depth. As such, a very talented pianist is required to make it work. Easter Trilogy is designed to fit within a typical church service timeframe and to be appropriate for any church setting, both musically and by content.
In addition to the piano and SATB choir, a narrator plays a key role in setting up the scenarios for each section and for bringing the work to a close.
I composed the work in the early spring of 1981 and conducted the first performance for Easter service that year with my church choir. It since has found performances in other church services and choral concerts, including a performance with Dr. Robert Kuzminsky conducting. In 2020 I had begun to enter my collected works into digital computer notation software, whereas before then I had notated all my works by hand. During that process of conversion, I revised some portions by supplementing and augmenting some of the choral parts with enhanced and expanded harmony and polyphony.
The second portion, Resurrection, became a catalyst for creation of the dramatic song Mary, at the Tomb, which is in the vocal solo portion of this online catalog.
As a side note of trivia, in the late fall of the previous year I was in an accident in which I suffered a broken bone in my right hand. The healing cast immobilized my right thumb, leaving four fingers to play piano, but not to hold a pencil. Thus, I composed the entire work writing pencil to paper with my left hand.
What physical or tangible things we most value in life tend to indicate where we place our priorities which, in turn, contribute to our actions. This was the core of a message delivered in my church one Sunday and one that particularly influenced me three years later with the birth of my daughter.
As choir director I had the opportunity to compose works custom-made for the limits of our church choir. This one I had composed in 1981. It was not well-received initially for sundry reasons, but mainly because it was not fully conceived and executed from a compositional point of view. I liked the basic melody and the message, but it fell flat.
This version (June 2022) is more of an “enhancement” rather than a “revision,” as I changed very little—just a few tweaks in rhythm and harmony in a few key places.
It is amazing how just a few tweaks can have such a great effect.
Sometimes less is more, and a little can be a lot.
In the Beginning is a complex and challenging four-part choral work in cyclic form. It is scriptural in nature, drawing from the very beginning of the Christian "Old Testament" (Genesis) for Part I, then the "New Testament" for the remainder. It begins with "In the beginning God created the heavens..." and concludes with "In the beginning was the Word..."
The work's genesis stems from just Part III, which had the original title "Vocalise," and was premiered by Dr. Robert Kuzminski and the California State University, Sacramento (CSUS) a Capella choir in 1984. Parts III and IV call for a double choir, SS-AA-TT-BB. Dr. Kuzminski had asked me to compose a work for a “Festival of American Music” concert at CSUS that would function as a bridge between a dissonant contemporary work and Dr. Daniel Kingman’s more conservative “Hammersmith” string quartet.
Parts II and III are the more accessible of the four from both the performers’ and listeners’ perspective; the former is the more lyrical and the latter more tonal.
The end pieces, Parts I and IV are thematically strongly related, as well as tonally. The share melodic lines, a similarity in texts, and delve into dense chordal structures.
This work is not for the faint-hearted, and is not intended to follow the more common vocal practices in the choral idioms. In many ways, parts of the work are more instrumental in nature and texture. Should the music director/conductor wish, they might consider using a string orchestra as accompaniment to this otherwise a Capella endeavor; this might be more suitable for Parts I and IV than for the two interior movements.
It’s Christmas Time was composed in its original form in 1981.
As with other short choral works from this period, this piece was composed for my church choir. And, as with many such ensembles, there were very good, and some very nice, singers. Well, all were nice, but some were less experienced and not trained (if at all) as much as some of the others.
For the most part, my intent at that time and place was to compose melodies that were hummable, and harmonies that were doable with amateur choirs, and then enhance the work with a robust piano accompaniment.
The piece was met with warm enthusiasm, but far less that a warm cup of cocoa on a wintry day. In 2022 I enhanced the piano part with more complicated and syncopated rhythms, and further developed and expanded the harmonies.
My attitude and response to the piece as it was in 1981 matched the choir’s and the congregation. This newer version captures the joyous electricity of the kind found at Christmas Time.
When I began to put into digital format my collective works from the past fifty years, I found in my storage boxes a few works that had disappeared from my memory. They were a brief encounter, if performed, but more than likely not and summarily dismissed. I do not remember the year, but Lamb of God likely is from the late 1980s or early 1990s.
This is one of those little imperfect jewels that did not have any lasting attachment to me or (if any) my choirs.
As with all the other works from the past, a little tweaking of notes and rhythms brought this to fulfillment. This version is in English, whereas the text more commonly used is in Latin.
It is a short piece, this, and with a bit of crystalized a Capella sunshine
This is a catching piece from the mid-1970s that audiences always enjoy. The text is based on three words: joy, peace, and love. My good friend Pixie J. Bean co-authored the text and added one word that (to me) sealed the intent and intrinsic meaning of the title; that simple word was "time." The fourth verse reads, "And time will prove His Word, the truth, and light." In truth, Pixie authored most of the text.
The piece is relatively short and progresses through four key changes, but then it repeats and eventually transverses through another four keys, for a total of eight.
One of my mentors, composer Dr. Daniel Kingman, liked the piece and commented on the rhythmic interest in the melodic line. At the time, this seemingly little insight was a revelation to me, and has helped govern all my compositions since.
A good friend, Loren Wright, premiered the work with his high school choir, and it was performed a few times shortly thereafter. Loren's bizarre and tragic death a few years later inspired me to compose my most major work, August Requiem (for expanded orchestra and large chorus), memorializing my friend and the month of his untimely and devasting demise.
In its original form, music and text was completed in January 1980.
Just over 40 years later here is essentially the same work, but slightly tweaked. In this version there is a slight modification of the wording, some of the harmonies have been altered, and some of the time signatures have been modified and manipulated.
This is another short work, just over three minutes that fits into a realm somewhere between a hymn and a choral work. The theme is religious or, if the listener prefers, "spiritual" in that it is an encouragement to not despair, but "in troubled" times to turn not away from God, but to Him.
How Great Thou Art -- Arranged
The bulk of this arrangement came in like a gust of wind. All that was left was to refine a couple of spots. The piano accompaniment is rather sparse, making this nearly an a cappella piece.
Words and music© 1949 and 1953 by the Stuart Hine Trust. All rights in the USA except print rights administered by EMI CMG. USA print rights administered by Hope Publishing Company, Carol Stream, IL 60188. All rights reserved. Used by permission.
Psalm 8:3-9; 9:1-2
Very shortly after the resurrection of the LORD Jesus Christ, two of His disciples travelled to a city named Emmaus. Along the way they happened upon a stranger, who joined them on their journey. They discussed the news of the day, and the “stranger” tutored them on the scriptures.
As evening approached, the two disciples invited the stranger to stay and join them for dinner. It was then that the resurrected LORD Jesus Christ revealed himself to them.
The disciples commented after the Saviour left, “Did not our heart burn within us, while he talked with us by the way, and while he opened to us the scriptures?”
The poet of Hymn #157, Thy Spirit, Lord, Has Stirred Our Souls, rephrased that to “Did not our hearts within us burn?”
Each of these three hymns are in the key of “Eb,” and the melodies all begin on “G,” and each, in their own way tell us this story.
Words and music listed in printable score: Thy Spirit, Lord, Has Stirred Our Souls; Abide with Me; 'Tis Eventide; Abide with Me!
Luke 24
Tune: Ville du Havre. Text: Horatio G. Spafford, 1876. Music: Philip P. Bliss, 1876.
Arranged for amateur/church choir by Vanessa McClintock.