Tuesday, July 24th Evensong

By the way - all the text that appears in a different color (the Psalm, and selected other words) indicate a link you may click for more information about that item.

Tonight's Service:

Preces/Responses: Phillips
Psalm 144
Service: Harper - Washington Service
Anthem: Bertalot Amazing Grace

Craig Phillips was born in Louisville, Kentucky in 1961. He is the Music Associate at All Saints' Episcopal Church in Beverly Hills, Calif. He maintains an active concert schedule, and is a noted composer, having received numerous commissions. He received a B.M. from Oklahoma Baptist University, and a M.M. and D.M.A. and the Performers Certificate from the Eastman School of Music, Rochester, N.Y., where he studied with the late Russell Saunders. (N.B. St. Mark's own Ed Rieke and Kristin Roach also hold graduate degrees from the Eastman School of Music!)

Published in 2002, this setting of the Preces and Responses is the only accompanied setting St. Mark's Choir will present during its 2007 residency. It features an extended Lord's Prayer where the 4-part chorus dialogues with the organ in sumptuous harmonies and clean, open voice leading. Phillips compositional style is beautifully tonal with gently shifting meters that highlight his chant-like settings of our most beloved texts.

In honor of St. Mark's upcoming 150th anniversary celebration, the Parish Choir has commissioned Dr. Phillips to write a new setting of Psalm 150, to be presented at the Sunday morning worship services on April 27, 2008.

In 1998, John Harper (b.1948) took over the leadership of the Royal School of Church Music. The Royal School of Church Music (RSCM) is an educational charity promoting the best use of music in worship, church life, and the wider community. It is an open, life-long learning organization, offering training programmes, published resources, courses, and activities. With over 8,500 affiliates, members and friends in over 40 countries it is an international network, encouraged by over 750 volunteers, and supported by a small staff based in the UK.

Harper has had a life-long career in church and choral music, starting as a chorister at King’s College Chapel, Cambridge under the direction of Boris Ord and Sir David Willcocks. (Read more of his fascinating and extensive biography here!)

Today's service was written for the RSCM training course for singers in the National Cathedral, Washington, July 2001. It was made for a resonant building, with slow-moving harmonic material, and choral emphases on unison lines and block chords.

John Bertalot's (b. 1931 in Kent) more than 40 years of professional music-making include posts at Westminster Choir College and leadership of the most ambitious Episcopal Church music programs anywhere in the world. His 5-verse setting of Amazing Grace features an ambitious organ part that literally "pulls out all the stops" and displays the full vocal range of the large choral forces required.

This year all of Britain is celebrating the 200th anniversary of the abolition of slavery (almost 80 years before the U.S.!). The cathedral staff was especially enthusiastic about our choice of anthem today, whose text was written by John Newton, a British slave trader, upon his repentence and conversion.