TE DEUM OPUS 62. (ORIGINAL COMPOSITION).

Abstract

This work is a setting of the hymn of Thanksgiving written by St. Nicetius in the sixth century, the TE DEUM. In the Roman Catholic liturgy it replaces the last responsory of Matins on Feast Days and Sundays and in the Anglican liturgy it is one of the canticles of Morning Prayer. The text is one of the few surviving examples of Latin "Psalmus Idioticus" which were, along with the GLORIA of the Ordinary of the Mass and the EXULTET, early Latin texts written in imitation of the Psalms. This TE DEUM was written to continue a tradition of choral settings of this text, in Latin, English, and German, beginning with Palestrina and Handel, and continuing with Haydn, Mozart, Berlioz, Bruckner, Dvorak, Verdi, Britten, Walton, Kodaly, Persichetti, and Vaughan Williams to the present. The quotes from the Metamorphoses for 23 strings of Richard Strauss are used in honor of Strauss' quote of Beethoven's EROICA Funeral March at the end of the Metamorphoses. Strauss was acknowledging the "Master" and his compositional tradition and in the same way I humbly respect the artistic legacy I have inherited. The text and the music have symbiotically wended their way through the centuries out of the pens of the masters. The work is set using the English translation of the Anglican Church, is in one movement and is scored for the following forces: double woodwind with alto saxophone, four horns, 2 trumpets, 2 trombones, tuba, timpani, suspended cymbal, tam tam, tubular chimes, vibraphone, triangle, crash cymbals, SATB soli, SSAATTBB chorus, and strings.