Small Ensemble - Level 3 - Digital Download SKU: A0.835423 Composed by Stuart Brown. Christian,Contemporary,Sacred. Score and parts. 1 pages. Stuart Brown Music #9851. Published by Stuart Brown Music (A0.835423). Possibly unique: an Easter (or more properly Good Friday) hymn for six-part choir, in which the choir is actually the accompaniment for a piano solo of almost hyponotic dissonance in comparison. The result of superimposing these elements is strangely beautiful. The composer offers the following commentary: I guess most people seeing a piece with a choir and a piano would think of it – not unreasonably – as a choir accompanied by a piano. This piece is subtly different: the way in which I can best explain what was in my mind when I composed it would be to describe it as a piano solo accompanied by choir. While the choir sings music that feels like a slow pavane the pianist plays a series of arpeggios and cluster chords around another relatively simple but unlinked melody. The combined effect is almost hypnotic and if the singers think of the pianist as their accompanist they will almost certainly lose the plot of what they are singing! On first hearing it may appear that the piano and the choir have little in common but the concept is simple enough. Both choir and pianist are meditating on the same theme, but coming at it from totally different directions. There is no formula to the way in which we approach the cross of Christ. We come as we are, seeking forgiveness and reconciliation, meeting at the foot of the cross. The juxtaposition of choir and piano represents that meeting and the cluster chords that the pianist plays reinforce a sense of brokenness that is essential to a proper understanding of the music. I have dedicated this to Canon Andrew White and the Christians of Iraq, knowing that their situation seems impossible in the face of the evil that walks that land, but trusting in the God and Father of the Lord Jesus Christ to do right even if from our earthly perspective we are unable to discern what right is.
