WINGATE: NUPTIAL ANTHEM TRIPTYCH
for Mixed Chorus a cappella

Instrumentation:
SATB a cappella

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Date:

2023  

Notes:

The three festive wedding choruses of Wingate’s Nuptial Anthem Triptych marry bright text settings to musical bouquets, creating fresh possibilities for celebratory and ceremonial use. This trio of chorales was written at the request of a friend of the composer who was engaged to a choral conductor known for being ‘inordinately annoyed’ by the ubiquitous use of Wagner’s Bridal Chorus and Mendelssohn’s Wedding March at routine nuptial gatherings (the composer’s own arrangements for solo cello of these wedding warhorses notwithstanding). This challenge inspired the composer to take a fresh look at the possibilities of what often used to be disparagingly referred to as ‘occasional music’, and the result was this set of three efflorescent choral pieces intended to serve variously as processionals, mid-service anthems, or recessionals at traditional occidental wedding ceremonies. The order of performance may also be rearranged as taste prescribes.

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Using texts by E. E. Cummings, Rumi, and Hafiz (the last two in translation), the music surrounds the transcendent energies and ecstatic pathos of these poems with a gentleness and nobility of tone, tempered by a touch of dignified gravitas and contrapuntal complexity. These texts also do not happen to contain any specific reference to gender, instead focusing on love (capital ‘L’) and its sublime effects—rendering this trio of choral pieces appropriate for contemporary LGBTQ+ and feminist/egalitarian/non-patriarchal/non-religious wedding ceremonies. The pieces’ vocal lines bravely commit themselves to a union of ambitious voice leading and tessitura challenges, as the numinous music meanders amongst Wingate’s signature chromatic harmonies. The Nuptial Anthem Triptych was intended to receive its premiere at a private ceremony in New York’s Conservatory Garden on the 23rd September, 2023.

Texts:
 

I. [‘love is a place’ by E. E. Cummings]
 

   love is a place
   & through this place of
   love move
   (with brightness of peace)
   all places

   

   yes is a world
   & in this world of
   yes live
   (skilfully curled)
   all worlds

 

II. [‘The Privileged Lovers’ by Rumi]

 

   The moon has become a dancer

   at this festival of love.

   This dance of light,

 

   This sacred blessing,

   This divine love,

   beckons us

   to a world beyond

   only lovers can see

   with their eyes of fiery passion.

 

   They are the chosen ones

   who have surrendered.

   Once they were particles of light

   now they are radiant sun.

 

   They have left behind

   the world of deceitful games.

   They are the privileged lovers

   who create a new world

   with their eyes of fiery passion.

 

III. [‘The Day Sky’ by Hafiz]

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   Let us be like

   Two falling stars in the day sky.

   Let no one know of our sublime beauty

   As we hold hands with the God

   And burn

 

   Into a sacred existence that defies—

   That surpasses

 

   Every description of ecstasy

   And love.