related works

Three Romances : for orchestra / Clara Schumann; orchestrated by Benjamin de Murashkin

Genre: Orchestra
Subgenre: Orchestra
Scoring: 2fl ob eh 2cl 2fg 2h etpt str

Hear the voice of the bard : for mixed choir and organ, 1989 / Kees Schoonenbeek

Genre: Vocal music
Subgenre: Mixed choir and organ
Scoring: GK4 org

Choros VII : lijdensmuziek, op een harmonie van teksten uit: Jesaja 53 en Mattheüs 27 met een proloog uit Joh. 11. en een epiloog op tekst van Guillaume van der Graft, - opus 80 -, voor gemengd koor, bariton solo en orgel / Anton van der Horst

Genre: Vocal music
Subgenre: Mixed choir and organ
Scoring: bar GK4 org

Monde du sommeil : voor gemengd koor en orgel, 1985 / Huub Kerstens

Genre: Vocal music
Subgenre: Mixed choir and organ
Scoring: GK4 org

composition

Kyrie : for mixed choir with optional organ / Benjamin de Murashkin

Other authors:
Murashkin, Benjamin de (Composer)
Description:
Coming off a year of studying Palestrina’s style, I took the commission to compose choir music for services at Trinitatis Church in Copenhagen as an opportunity to take what had been a purely technical exercise and process it more creatively through my own compositional work. The conflict of having centuries past looking over my shoulders while wanting to break free of those stylistic rules resulted in music that straddles a fine line somewhere between pastiche and my own individual style.
In medieval Paris, composers started playing with the idea of singing multiple lines, giving birth to what we know as polyphony. Originally this took the shape of singing enormously embellished melismas on top of extremely elongated Gregorian chants. By the time of the Renaissance this practice was still in use by composers such as Palestrina, the chants now subtly hiding in plain sight in one of many voices, structurally and harmonically anchoring the music. I decided to take the challenge on myself, having altos and tenors take the original chant in the Kyrie and Christe sections respectively, while the rest of the choir weaves their lines around them.
Framing the music and giving it an other-worldly quality is the addition of a barely audible organ hanging onto harmonies in the background. This added layer sets the scene and at once emphasises the slow harmonic changes underlying the swifter movement of the many melodies, while also adding to the sense of space and peace in the music.
Benjamin de Murashkin