Saturday 20 June 2020

Psalm 145, a new setting

The work of Haïk-Vantoura is very useful. I wonder what it might have been like to be taught by her or her teacher. I expect they would have had little patience with me as a youngster. Il n'a pas assez de diligence, or worse. But in my late years I am making up for lost time.

Composers, if I can do this, so can you. This is the fifth post in the last two weeks that I have done on composing and arranging based on the deciphering key of Suzanne Haïk-Vantoura. There are over 20,000 verses out there waiting to be heard. It is plain we have not yet paid the right sort of attention to them, or we wouldn't be in the mess we are in.

Save the world, composers. Write the music. Let us learn by hearing.

Psalm 145 is an acrostic. So I introduced each verse. This is basically simple recitation with a few bits of harmony. Enjoy - It is the psalm for July 5th. There is time to learn it and sing it properly. This mechanical reproduction is not revealing the words.

Read between the lines. It is not all praise. It is realism. That's why the Masoretes left out the Nun verse. Notice the Samech verse that follows. Support in Hebrew is, by the way, the name of the letter. smc סמך. The verse I repeat at the end is taken from Exodus 34:6. Several Psalms use this verse.
(Note - I have made some minor changes - notably a c-natural in bar 65 - continuing the variation in major-minor mode.) PDF is available here.


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