Pärt: And I Heard a Voice… Vox Clamantis & Jaan-Eik Tulve

• Arvo Pärt (b. 1935): Nunc dimittis:
• 1 Pärt: Nunc dimittis 06:12
• O Holy Father Nicholas:
• 2 Pärt: O Holy Father Nicholas 10:50
• 7 Magnificat-Antiphons:
• 3 Pärt: 7 Magnificat-Antiphons: No. 1, O Weisheit 01:19
• 4 Pärt: 7 Magnificat-Antiphons: No. 2, O Adonai 02:21
• 5 Pärt: 7 Magnificat-Antiphons: No. 3, O Spross aus Isais Wurzel 00:59
• 6 Pärt: 7 Magnificat-Antiphons: No. 4, O Schlüssel Davids 02:09
• 7 Pärt: 7 Magnificat-Antiphons: No. 5, O Morgenstern 02:21
• 8 Pärt: 7 Magnificat-Antiphons: No. 6, O König aller Völker 01:28
• 9 Pärt: 7 Magnificat-Antiphons: No. 7, O Immanuel 02:52
• Für Jan van Eyck:
• 10 Pärt: Für Jan van Eyck 04:45
• Kleine Litanei:
• 11 Pärt: Kleine Litanei 03:59
• And I Heard a Voice…:
• 12 Pärt: And I Heard a Voice… 05:01
• Total Runtime 44:16

Info for Pärt: And I Heard a Voice…

Estonian vocal ensemble Vox Clamantis and their leader Jaan-Eik Tulve have established themselves among the leading interpreters of Arvo Pärt’s music over a quarter-century of close collaboration with the composer – a relationship that builds on the almost half a century long artistic partnership between Pärt and producer Manfred Eicher. Of their ECM recording The Deer’s Cry, the BBC Music Magazine wrote that “the level of artistry necessary to achieve the kind of living, breathing performance given here by Vox Clamantis is a rarity ... This grippingly authentic and superbly sung collection may now be the finest single-disc introduction to Pärt’s music.” And I heard a voice, recorded in Haapsalu Cathedral, Estonia, and released as Arvo Pärt turns 90, shows that the rapport between choir and composer, rooted in a shared feeling for both ancient plainchant and contemporary music, continues to deepen.

The new album, focusing primarily on recent compositions by Pärt, also reaches back to embrace the Sieben Magnificat-Antiphonen, written in 1988, and based upon the scriptural verses intoned in the Roman Catholic liturgy during evening prayers in the week before Christmas. In the liner notes, Kristina Kõrver indicates how Pärt allows the character of each text to influence his settings of it. Thus, reference to the Laws of Moses in O Adonai are expressed in a “more archaic sound and ascetic expression”, while Jesse (O Sproß aus Isais Wurzel) incorporates dissonance “like a little flower pushing its way through the pavement”, as Pärt once said.

On Für Jan van Eyck (composed in 2019), Vox Clamantis are joined by organist Ene Salumäe in this dedication to the great Flemish painter. Inspired by the altarpiece Adoration of a Mystic Lamb in St Bavo’s Cathedral Ghent, the composition is based upon the Agnus Dei section of Pärt’s Berliner Messe (refer to the New Series album Te Deum).

O Holy Father Nicholas (2021) was written for the opening of the new St Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church and National Shrine at Ground Zero in New York. The original church was destroyed in the terrorist attack of September 11, 2001. Pärt’s choral work is based on the English text of a prayer from the Orthodox liturgy, a text he had previously set in its Russian version on the Alleluia-Tropus, and which was sung by Vox Clamantis on Adam’s Lament and The Deer’s Cry.

Title piece And I heard a voice (2017) is, to date, the only work of Pärt’s set to sacred text in his mother tongue, with words based on a passage from upon the 1938 Estonian translation of the Book of Revelation, where the phrase “they rest from their labours” is expressed as “they breathe from their labours [nad hingavad oma vaevadest]”. As the booklet essay notes, “the incessant repetition of these words becomes the most important image of the work, the symbol of eternal life.”

The Kleine Litanei (2015) pays homage to the Irish Benedictine monk, theologian, and philosopher St Virgil (c. 700-784). Nunc dimittis (2001) sets text from the Gospel of St Luke; here Pärt makes freer use of his tintinnabuli technique, emphasising the meaning of the words through the deployment of variated texture, and underlining the word lumen (light).

Ene Salumäe, organ
Vox Clamantis
Jaan-Eik Tulve, conductor

Vox Clamantis is an Estonian ensemble which was formed in 1996. It brings together singers, composers, instrumentalists and choir­ masters who share an interest in Gregorian chant as the basis of all European art music. The group often sings this repertoire, but also performs contemporary music. Many Estonian composers, including Arvo Pärt, Erkki_Sven Tüür and Helena Tulve, have written pieces for them. Their interpretation of medieval music is never purely historical; while always remaining true to the spirit of this repertoire, the ensem­ ble tries to engage in a dialogue with contemporary music; even programmes consisting entirely of medieval music are contemporary in their selection of pieces. The ensemble has worked with numerous musicians of international standing, such as the organists Jean Boyer, Werner Jacob, Jon Laukvik, the Catalan soprano Arianna Savall, the French pianists Brigitte Engerer and Jean_Claude Pennetier, The Cello Octet Amsterdam, the early music group Hortus Musicus, the con­ temporary ensemble NYYD Ensemble and the Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir. Their artistic director and choirmaster is Jaan_Eik Tulve.

Booklet for Pärt: And I Heard a Voice…