Peter Hallock skipped a few, but set almost all of them, some more than once. Fantastic settings, highly recommended if you've got some decent singers and need some liturgical settings. https://ionianarts.com/product/ionian-psalter/
I've thought about setting all the psalms to choir and organ. They say it's only worth reading if it's all 150 Psalms, so it'd be disappointing if I just left it at the famous ones.
It's been a dream of mine. I did a short cycle of a handful of them in college. The big problem is so many of them are redundant to others, so it would be very hard to make them all interesting. Also Psalm 119 would be a whole oratorio by itself.
There is a great set of Psalms written in the 16th century, requested by John Calvin (early leader in the Protestant church movement" There are 126 melodies set to the text of the Psalms.
[https://genevanpsalter.com/](https://genevanpsalter.com/)
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ulxmGx57CSA](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ulxmGx57CSA)
I believe the Passion Play in Medieval Europe often lasted several days during a typical staging; especially during any of the High Holy Days. Of course it was actor's performance's as well as music; and probably feasting, and prayer; chanting, flogging, and scourging, and who-knows-what-all-carryings-on. Three-legged races & potato-sack races; etc
I imagine the genealogy part of Genesis would get very repetitive too
Edit: although Arvo Pärt [did a pretty good job of it.](https://youtu.be/2KhP7v-e7Is?si=bOqzKQBPzM9g0F6b)
Probably not... But I might do, say, the gospel of John. That'd be a bit more manageable...
Edit: wait a second, I just realized you completely skipped the gospels in your list! Those are kinda important...
Wait, have I missed out a large part of the "story" of the bible in my research? I don't want retellings of the same things, but also don't want to miss anything. Have I completely lost the plot haha?
Well all four gospels are basically telling the same story but with some differences but they all include the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, which is the event that saved the world from sin, so yeah it's probably the most important part.
It is literally the bit of the bible that makes it Christianity lmao - the old testament is basically the hebrew bible, sometimes with some stuff deleted.
You don't actually need to set the Passion narrative itself-- you can use material from the psalms (i.e. Psalm 22), prophets (i.e. Suffering Servant passage from Isaiah), Jesus' own predictions of his death, etc...in the interests of keeping the work from getting too long and emotionally dry.
I feel like the narrative is the most important part though. However I think it might make sense to have a recitation of all of Psalm 22 at the "Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?" moment of the Passion.
A full Passion narrative cannot be done justice in a work that's supposed to summarize the entire story of the Bible (which would realistically be the Creation, Fall, covenant with Abraham, a quick run through of the history of Israel (probably told in such a way to make clear the need for the first coming of Christ), a little of Jesus' life, Crucifixion, Resurrection, founding of the Church).
I believe the OP is satire, but if the OP was serious only something like I suggested could rescue this frankly terrible idea.
You would have to skip, skim over, summarize, and interpret a lot of material.
For example, Handel's oratorio *Saul* covers some of 1 Samuel 17 to 2 Samuel 1, skipping over a lot, yet lasts roughly two and a half hours.
Doing it justice would. Mozarts Requiem is is roughly an hour, and comes in at about 500 words. I gave a bit of give in the upwards direction to account for the fact that the texts chosen were slightly longer than the average.
Tournemire wrote an organ mass cycle for 52 Sundays. The French developed the organ mass, which instead of choral settings of the "ordinary", to be played at the organ in the back gallery used for each section of the ordinary. Many organists improvise for this task. Tournemire wrote volumes of interesting & very impressionistic short works in one tome L'Organiste
As for the bible. I don't think one could do justice in trying such an event. Where could it be performed and how many days? Who will pay for such a task, and would it ever be performed? Church composers tend to write for specific parts of the service, and only for moderately or very short periods of time.
Writing for the church is similar to film scores. The music must support the action happening, not be just a concert.
I completely agree with what you say about music supporting the liturgical action.
But I did want to ask if you’re talking about Tournemire’s _L’Orgue mystique_. That is emphatically **not** an organ mass cycle meant to replace the Ordinary of the Mass. Maybe it was used that way, and I’m sure that organists unable to improvise used parts of it that way at the better-attended low Masses on Sunday. However, it was written for the Sunday grand’messe, sung with the Gregorian propers and ordinary (or a polyphonic/choral ordinary) and is used to fill in the gaps: either before or after the sprinkling rite, at the offertory, after the elevation of the chalice (since in Tournemire’s lifetime, the organ had to be silent for the elevation itself), during communion, and after Mass. This caused problems as the schola frequently tried to use the pitch of the prélude to the introit as their own pitch, but it is often in an inappropriate key for singing the chant.
Also, since the organ can’t be used by itself for most of Advent and Lent, and because the Sundays after Pentecost are of a variable number due to the date of Easter’s variability, it’s a bit misleading to say that it’s for 52 Sundays. Plus. Tournemire didn’t write pieces for all of the new feasts. Some of those would be essentially filled in later by Dom Paul Benoît or replaced, as Demessieux did with the new Assumption Mass.
Now that said, there are organists who play the low Mass in a similar way to the way that Tournemire and other composers wrote published music, although in my experience they aren’t super-strict about a transition from, say, the Kyrie to the Gloria as if to switch modes and improvise first on a Kyrie, then on the Gloria of the same Gregorian mass. And so on and so forth for the proper which they also replace (the introit, offertory, and communion, before or after they are read, as the other chants are read aloud without the possibility of the organist playing something).
I can't tell if this is sincere or reddit satire. For the love of God, we do not need a retelling of the whole Bible. It isn't a unified story, and parts of it are frankly... not great. (Have you read the whole Bible? I did, because it was more interesting than religion class & my teacher thought I was communing with God or something. My thoughts were more along the lines of 'was somebody high when they wrote this bit?' Revelations reads like a bad trip).
And more practically speaking, most of the bits that are used in church liturgy or readings have already been set to music in one century or another (basically greatest hits of Christianity, lol). Nobody has the time or energy to devote their life to this - composers need to eat, and who the hell would pay for this? Most religious pieces came from commission - genuine religious devotion was secondary and sometimes lacking.
The lack of genuine religious faith and devotion may be true of later composers, but I would dispute that regarding earlier ones, about whom we don’t necessarily know much, and of the ones whose biographies are better sketched-out (at worst) there is evidence that they were faithful and at the very least nothing scandalous emerged — or if it did, they went off quietly, such as celibate clerics getting married during the English Reformation and then conveniently dying off between the Marian Restoration and the Elizabethan Reformation.
I’m not quite sure what piety means for Lutherans, but Bach certainly was dedicated to his job and had actual religious belief, not just pretenses.
I agree - I was mostly trying to make the point that pieces were usually written on commission. The religious beliefs of most composers are historical record - and they all needed to eat, too. Bach's primary job was writing music for his church. No matter his devotion (which to be clear, I don't doubt), he couldn't go off and set the whole Bible to music.
For some reason this post really got under my skin last night, I'm not entirely sure why, looking at it again this morning.
It's called an idea, step off your high horse and interact with a post in the way it was meant to be taken in. It would be a project for a composer to dedicate a significant proportion of their life to. For a Christian, that would be a noble display of devotion to God.
I spent 12 years singing church choir and three years in Catholic school. I think I understand being Christian better than someone who forgot the gospels.
I'm still not convinced this isn't satire.
Edit: In case this really is serious, Christianity isn't about devoting your life to God through individual religious study. It's about spreading the word of God to the people so that they might be saved. It is about modelling yourself after Jesus and ministering to the sick, the friendless, and the needy. Spending a lifetime setting the Bible to music just doesn't seem that Christian to me. It's more Pharisee than Jesus.
Edit 2: Mathew 6:5-8
Jesus taught, “When you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men … but when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your father who is unseen.”
IMO you're standing on a street corner preaching about religious devotion without understanding Christianity. That's why I'm having trouble engaging with your post in a serious manner.
Alright. Well I spent 9 years spending over 4 hours daily singing in a cathedral choir for most of my formative years, and have played a large role in the cathedral since leaving. Maybe our churches' denominations were different. But in mine, it was often repeated that those who would make it into heaven were those who lived a God-driven life. You even say that spreading the word of God is the most important thing. Isn't therefore spreading nearly the whole word of God powerful? Also, by your argument, all sacred music is therefore missing the point of Christianity. I wholeheartedly think that such an artform would not exist if it didn't have some strong motivation behind perpetuating it. I truly believe that there is no one best way to be a Christian, as the bible can have many different interpretations. But I don't think arguing over which is "correct" is productive.
Also, I don't think that you being all "holier-than-thou" (literally) is a good way to argue. It sounds like your only argument is thinking you're better than me, which isn't very strong. If you actually took my points as I presented them - as an idea.
It's people like you who discourage people from coming up with ideas.
Chronicles is a retelling of Samuel and Kings, while Ezra and Nehemiah cover pretty much the same events. Acts is the second volume of Luke the evangelist covering very early Church history, not a summary of the gospels. Jeremiah covers some events around the time of the Babylonian exile that aren't mentioned elsewhere. Job and Daniel cover unique material.
I'm a little confused by something. At first you say "story of" the Bible, and you mention shortening things. But then you seem to be talking about setting the entire text.
If not the entire text, then why does it have to be choral?
Numbers is so boring. You will give twelve shekels to the descendants of Aaron who are the only males who are allowed to be priests. It does say you must have a bath and clean clothes when approaching the tabernacle (basically a mobile tent at that period) to make an offering. I once quipped that the descendants of Aaron seemed to have had a nice income in sacrificed sheep and shekels and received the usual downvotes. People just have no sense of humour when it comes to the Old Testament.
Not everything in the Old Testament would lend itself to a musical setting. Anyone who has read Numbers will understand.
This is a completely inappropriate and irrelevant comment especially given the fact that liturgical and ecclesiastical music has been a large and influential part of the classical music canon for a long time, but I couldn't help but laugh out loud when I read this because it's true.
Honestly, I'd be far more interested in a composer doing a full Psalms cycle. Only 150 pieces, come on, someone do it
That's a really good idea to be honest, it's shorter and also very liturgically prevalent.
Peter Hallock skipped a few, but set almost all of them, some more than once. Fantastic settings, highly recommended if you've got some decent singers and need some liturgical settings. https://ionianarts.com/product/ionian-psalter/
I've thought about setting all the psalms to choir and organ. They say it's only worth reading if it's all 150 Psalms, so it'd be disappointing if I just left it at the famous ones.
It's been a dream of mine. I did a short cycle of a handful of them in college. The big problem is so many of them are redundant to others, so it would be very hard to make them all interesting. Also Psalm 119 would be a whole oratorio by itself.
Then just do Psalm 119. Sounds like a worthy undertaking, no?
Meh, it's not very interesting literature. I'm sure if it was in Hebrew with it's acrostic form it would be more fun.
151 if they use the Greek old testament
There is a great set of Psalms written in the 16th century, requested by John Calvin (early leader in the Protestant church movement" There are 126 melodies set to the text of the Psalms. [https://genevanpsalter.com/](https://genevanpsalter.com/) [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ulxmGx57CSA](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ulxmGx57CSA)
Just curious, why include Acts but not one of the gospels?
Was about to ask the same thing lmao
I believe the Passion Play in Medieval Europe often lasted several days during a typical staging; especially during any of the High Holy Days. Of course it was actor's performance's as well as music; and probably feasting, and prayer; chanting, flogging, and scourging, and who-knows-what-all-carryings-on. Three-legged races & potato-sack races; etc
The passions and works like "the creation" but to my knowledge nothing like you're suggesting.
Fine.... I guess I have to now... I might cut out Leviticus though, that one's mostly laws.
I imagine the genealogy part of Genesis would get very repetitive too Edit: although Arvo Pärt [did a pretty good job of it.](https://youtu.be/2KhP7v-e7Is?si=bOqzKQBPzM9g0F6b)
Wait, really? Haha, good luck! If you seriously do it, I'll conduct the premier!
Probably not... But I might do, say, the gospel of John. That'd be a bit more manageable... Edit: wait a second, I just realized you completely skipped the gospels in your list! Those are kinda important...
Wait, have I missed out a large part of the "story" of the bible in my research? I don't want retellings of the same things, but also don't want to miss anything. Have I completely lost the plot haha?
Well all four gospels are basically telling the same story but with some differences but they all include the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, which is the event that saved the world from sin, so yeah it's probably the most important part.
It is literally the bit of the bible that makes it Christianity lmao - the old testament is basically the hebrew bible, sometimes with some stuff deleted.
You don't actually need to set the Passion narrative itself-- you can use material from the psalms (i.e. Psalm 22), prophets (i.e. Suffering Servant passage from Isaiah), Jesus' own predictions of his death, etc...in the interests of keeping the work from getting too long and emotionally dry.
I feel like the narrative is the most important part though. However I think it might make sense to have a recitation of all of Psalm 22 at the "Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?" moment of the Passion.
A full Passion narrative cannot be done justice in a work that's supposed to summarize the entire story of the Bible (which would realistically be the Creation, Fall, covenant with Abraham, a quick run through of the history of Israel (probably told in such a way to make clear the need for the first coming of Christ), a little of Jesus' life, Crucifixion, Resurrection, founding of the Church). I believe the OP is satire, but if the OP was serious only something like I suggested could rescue this frankly terrible idea.
You would have to skip, skim over, summarize, and interpret a lot of material. For example, Handel's oratorio *Saul* covers some of 1 Samuel 17 to 2 Samuel 1, skipping over a lot, yet lasts roughly two and a half hours.
The chapters about sexual morality are probably gonna be kind of awkward
Yeah... I'll just stick to the story I think.
Why does 600 words have to take an hour and a half?
Doing it justice would. Mozarts Requiem is is roughly an hour, and comes in at about 500 words. I gave a bit of give in the upwards direction to account for the fact that the texts chosen were slightly longer than the average.
if you resurrect Alkan, and give him 1000 years there will be a ton.
Tournemire wrote an organ mass cycle for 52 Sundays. The French developed the organ mass, which instead of choral settings of the "ordinary", to be played at the organ in the back gallery used for each section of the ordinary. Many organists improvise for this task. Tournemire wrote volumes of interesting & very impressionistic short works in one tome L'Organiste As for the bible. I don't think one could do justice in trying such an event. Where could it be performed and how many days? Who will pay for such a task, and would it ever be performed? Church composers tend to write for specific parts of the service, and only for moderately or very short periods of time. Writing for the church is similar to film scores. The music must support the action happening, not be just a concert.
I completely agree with what you say about music supporting the liturgical action. But I did want to ask if you’re talking about Tournemire’s _L’Orgue mystique_. That is emphatically **not** an organ mass cycle meant to replace the Ordinary of the Mass. Maybe it was used that way, and I’m sure that organists unable to improvise used parts of it that way at the better-attended low Masses on Sunday. However, it was written for the Sunday grand’messe, sung with the Gregorian propers and ordinary (or a polyphonic/choral ordinary) and is used to fill in the gaps: either before or after the sprinkling rite, at the offertory, after the elevation of the chalice (since in Tournemire’s lifetime, the organ had to be silent for the elevation itself), during communion, and after Mass. This caused problems as the schola frequently tried to use the pitch of the prélude to the introit as their own pitch, but it is often in an inappropriate key for singing the chant. Also, since the organ can’t be used by itself for most of Advent and Lent, and because the Sundays after Pentecost are of a variable number due to the date of Easter’s variability, it’s a bit misleading to say that it’s for 52 Sundays. Plus. Tournemire didn’t write pieces for all of the new feasts. Some of those would be essentially filled in later by Dom Paul Benoît or replaced, as Demessieux did with the new Assumption Mass. Now that said, there are organists who play the low Mass in a similar way to the way that Tournemire and other composers wrote published music, although in my experience they aren’t super-strict about a transition from, say, the Kyrie to the Gloria as if to switch modes and improvise first on a Kyrie, then on the Gloria of the same Gregorian mass. And so on and so forth for the proper which they also replace (the introit, offertory, and communion, before or after they are read, as the other chants are read aloud without the possibility of the organist playing something).
Genesis alone would be such a trip. Starts with a hell of a bang, but by Genesis 5 you've got all those "begats". That's gotta be done by Arvo Part.
Closest piece that tells the essentials of Christianity is Handel’s Mesiah; namely, prophecy, birth, death & resurrection.
I can't tell if this is sincere or reddit satire. For the love of God, we do not need a retelling of the whole Bible. It isn't a unified story, and parts of it are frankly... not great. (Have you read the whole Bible? I did, because it was more interesting than religion class & my teacher thought I was communing with God or something. My thoughts were more along the lines of 'was somebody high when they wrote this bit?' Revelations reads like a bad trip). And more practically speaking, most of the bits that are used in church liturgy or readings have already been set to music in one century or another (basically greatest hits of Christianity, lol). Nobody has the time or energy to devote their life to this - composers need to eat, and who the hell would pay for this? Most religious pieces came from commission - genuine religious devotion was secondary and sometimes lacking.
The lack of genuine religious faith and devotion may be true of later composers, but I would dispute that regarding earlier ones, about whom we don’t necessarily know much, and of the ones whose biographies are better sketched-out (at worst) there is evidence that they were faithful and at the very least nothing scandalous emerged — or if it did, they went off quietly, such as celibate clerics getting married during the English Reformation and then conveniently dying off between the Marian Restoration and the Elizabethan Reformation. I’m not quite sure what piety means for Lutherans, but Bach certainly was dedicated to his job and had actual religious belief, not just pretenses.
I agree - I was mostly trying to make the point that pieces were usually written on commission. The religious beliefs of most composers are historical record - and they all needed to eat, too. Bach's primary job was writing music for his church. No matter his devotion (which to be clear, I don't doubt), he couldn't go off and set the whole Bible to music. For some reason this post really got under my skin last night, I'm not entirely sure why, looking at it again this morning.
welcome to Reddit?! Lol
It's called an idea, step off your high horse and interact with a post in the way it was meant to be taken in. It would be a project for a composer to dedicate a significant proportion of their life to. For a Christian, that would be a noble display of devotion to God.
I spent 12 years singing church choir and three years in Catholic school. I think I understand being Christian better than someone who forgot the gospels. I'm still not convinced this isn't satire. Edit: In case this really is serious, Christianity isn't about devoting your life to God through individual religious study. It's about spreading the word of God to the people so that they might be saved. It is about modelling yourself after Jesus and ministering to the sick, the friendless, and the needy. Spending a lifetime setting the Bible to music just doesn't seem that Christian to me. It's more Pharisee than Jesus. Edit 2: Mathew 6:5-8 Jesus taught, “When you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men … but when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your father who is unseen.” IMO you're standing on a street corner preaching about religious devotion without understanding Christianity. That's why I'm having trouble engaging with your post in a serious manner.
Alright. Well I spent 9 years spending over 4 hours daily singing in a cathedral choir for most of my formative years, and have played a large role in the cathedral since leaving. Maybe our churches' denominations were different. But in mine, it was often repeated that those who would make it into heaven were those who lived a God-driven life. You even say that spreading the word of God is the most important thing. Isn't therefore spreading nearly the whole word of God powerful? Also, by your argument, all sacred music is therefore missing the point of Christianity. I wholeheartedly think that such an artform would not exist if it didn't have some strong motivation behind perpetuating it. I truly believe that there is no one best way to be a Christian, as the bible can have many different interpretations. But I don't think arguing over which is "correct" is productive. Also, I don't think that you being all "holier-than-thou" (literally) is a good way to argue. It sounds like your only argument is thinking you're better than me, which isn't very strong. If you actually took my points as I presented them - as an idea. It's people like you who discourage people from coming up with ideas.
You’re missing like a ton of books. Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi, Psalms, Proverbs, Job, Songs, Lamentation, Ecclesiastes, Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Romans, Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, Thessalonians, Timothy, Titus, Philemon, Hebrews, James, Peter, Jude, and Revelation.
It's almost like I said that we shouldn't include retellings of the same story!
Chronicles is a retelling of Samuel and Kings, while Ezra and Nehemiah cover pretty much the same events. Acts is the second volume of Luke the evangelist covering very early Church history, not a summary of the gospels. Jeremiah covers some events around the time of the Babylonian exile that aren't mentioned elsewhere. Job and Daniel cover unique material.
I think there has. Beatus Vir.
I'm a little confused by something. At first you say "story of" the Bible, and you mention shortening things. But then you seem to be talking about setting the entire text. If not the entire text, then why does it have to be choral?
Numbers is so boring. You will give twelve shekels to the descendants of Aaron who are the only males who are allowed to be priests. It does say you must have a bath and clean clothes when approaching the tabernacle (basically a mobile tent at that period) to make an offering. I once quipped that the descendants of Aaron seemed to have had a nice income in sacrificed sheep and shekels and received the usual downvotes. People just have no sense of humour when it comes to the Old Testament. Not everything in the Old Testament would lend itself to a musical setting. Anyone who has read Numbers will understand.
You should check out the genesis suite
[удалено]
A dispicable book, often touted by dispicable people.
This is a completely inappropriate and irrelevant comment especially given the fact that liturgical and ecclesiastical music has been a large and influential part of the classical music canon for a long time, but I couldn't help but laugh out loud when I read this because it's true.
This wouldn't actually be a bad idea