Choir Sacred Childrens
Choir & Piano Reduction
SKU: PE.EP72785A
For Children's Voices
and Orchestra.
Composed by Jonathan
Dove. Choral Works (inc.
Oratorios). Edition
Peters. Book. 92 pages.
Duration 00:45:00.
Edition Peters
#98-EP72785A. Published
by Edition Peters
(PE.EP72785A).
ISBN
9790577011349. 210 x
297mm inches.
English.
From
the composer:
How
did it all begin? And
what happened
next?
I found
myself pondering these
questions in an art
gallery in Bremen, in a
James Turrell
installation that carved
through three storeys of
the gallery.
Looking down from the top
floor through great
circles of
colour-changing light to
the distant sparkling
points in a dark ellipse
on the ground floor, I
felt that I was looking
back in time to the
origins of the universe
– and I started to
hear children’s
voices in my mind’s
ear, accompanied by
twinkling metal
percussion.
It
occurred to me that the
beginning of our world
was a good story to be
sung by children,
especially the unique
Hallé Children’s
Choir, and accompanied by
the magnificent Hallé
Orchestra.
Haydn&rs
quo;s Creation&n
bsp;immediately
comes to mind as a
precedent, but that is a
setting and elaboration
of the Book of
Genesis. I thought
we should tell the modern
version of our story, and
be as scientifically
accurate as
possible.
That&rsqu
o;s easier said than
done! For a start,
it’s hard to find a
modern account of
creation that is anything
like as compact as the
one in Genesis. I
talked about it with my
regular collaborator,
Alasdair Middleton.
Neither of us could
remember being taught
anything about the Big
Bang or Evolution at
school, although I had
certainly spent many
happy hours making
papier-mâché
dinosaurs. So the
first thing we had to do
was a lot of research
– reading books for
grown-ups, books for
children, looking at
charts and diagrams and
watching films.
There was a wonderful
moment, reading Adam
Rutherford’s <
em>The Origin of
Life, when I
had the glorious feeling
I understood everything
– but that quickly
evaporated as soon as I
put the book
down.
Scientific
ideas seem to date very
quickly, so this account
of the beginning of our
world is necessarily
provisional.
It&rs.
