Cantique de Jean Racine (Op. 11) is a work for mixed chorus and piano or organ by Gabriel Fauré. Written by the nineteen-year-old composer in 1864-5, the piece won Fauré the first prize when he graduated from the École Niedermeyer and was first performed the following year on August 4,

1866, with accompaniment of strings and organ. It was first published around 1875 or 1876 (Schoen, Paris, as part of the series Echo des Maîtrises) and appeared in a version for orchestra (possibly by the composer) in 1906. The accompaniment has also been arranged for strings and harp by Flavio Regis Cunha.

With French and English Texts.

Mascagni?s draws on church music in this masterful and intense evocation of a small community and one guilt-ridden woman?s position outside of it.

The grand Easter Hymn, scored for pretty much the whole cast of the opera, starts with just a solo organ playing from inside the church nearby. Then we hear an unaccompanied choir singing (in Latin) the beginning of the service ? ?Regina coeli, laetare? ? with the voices of the congregation responding ?Alleluja!?. The choir sings two more phrases and the congregation responds. All this is out of sight.