An Anglican Eucharist

A setting for priest, intercessor, SATB choir and organ.

Introduction

This is a complete setting of an Anglican Eucharist, based on Rite B of the Alternative Service Book (1980). It was composed between 1999 and 2004. I wrote it because, well, it has never been done before, and I wanted to try my hand at a large scale piece. Apart from the long tradition of English choral music, my inspirations were masses by Bach, Mozart and Haydn, and of course Janacek's wonderful Glagolitic Mass and its architectural equivalent, Gaudi's Sagrada Familia in Barcelona.

The piece is designed so that it could be performed as an actual religious ritual (or piece of performance art, if you prefer), with sufficiently long linking passages for the various processions and other actions to be carried out. Since I started work on the piece the ASB has been superseded by a new prayer book and so it is against church law to perform this as originally intended. This is a pity as I don't think that it will work well in a concert hall. For more details on how the piece is intended to be performed, and comments on the musical structure, see the performance notes.

One thing that composers of the past didn't have to contend with is copyright. Since the ASB text is copyright by the Central Board of Finance of the Church of England (yes really), and I haven't asked their permission, I can only publish the audio and some fragments of the score that don't contain copyright words. So, for what it's worth, here they are. Please ask me if you would like the full score in PDF or musicxml format.

The Movements