Most English-language church music in the Russian tradition is written in 4 parts and often doesn’t sound good without four parts. However, a common problem in Orthodox parishes is that there are not enough singers to fill all four parts. It’s one thing in a congregation of 200 to find the people, but in a congregation of, say, 20-50 regular attendees, things can get hairy. This volume attempts to fill that gap by providing two-part arrangements of some traditional Russian music (with instructions for how to create a third part where possible for those who can manage one) and usually trying to make the music sound good even with only one of the parts.
The prefatory materials, a foreword by Vlad Morosan discussing some historical aspects of the development of Russian chant and an instructional introduction by the author on how to use the book, are very useful. The first provides some context and understanding for how the music came about. The second not only tells the reader how to use the book, but also helps the reader understand better how music is arranged in general and particularly how 4-part Russian music is arranged as typically performed in a parish setting. This knowledge is helpful for singers even if not singing out of this book.
A lot of the musical content of the book should already be familiar to people who have sung a wide variety of Russian liturgical music, which is a good thing. Much of the melodic material is “standard”, so one does not have to learn dozens and dozens of new melodies. The pieces are also almost universally carried by the melody rather than relying on chordal movement (because how can you do that with two voices?). Some of the options presented can be rather demanding, but there are always feasible options presented.
The litanies, antiphons, troparia/kontakia, Trisagion, and prokeimena are about what one would expect. Several of the pieces are standards with two parts knocked out, so this material is not terribly essential if you already have that music and know how to do it, but it is useful and nice. The real value of the book, to my mind, at least, is the liturgy of the faithful.
The Cherubikon is often a place where it is hard to find an adequate setting for a small choir. The melody is often passed between parts or, if it stays in one part, the harmonization often doesn’t work without a full complement, or sometimes the piece relies on harmonic movement rather than melody. However, the pieces are often working off of standard, memorable chant melodies (eg, Sophronievskaya, Staro-Simonovskaya). This volume takes a number of commonly used chant melodies, at least a couple of which are bound to be familiar, and provides reasonable bass lines for them. To my mind, this alone justifies the book, as it is very common to have a couple voices who know a number of traditional melodies, but the 4-part versions on hand don’t reduce well to melody + bass. This volume, with only a few minutes of practice, will add several Cherubika to our repertoire.
The same is true of the “It is truly meet”. For instance, there is the Bulgarian melody which should be familiar from Yaichkov’s arrangement – the melody is quite memorable, but pulling it out of the piece is nontrivial. The arrangement provided in the book is very singable and memorable.
There is some redundancy in the Anaphora section, since the first two pieces are apparently a one-voice and two-voice version of the same melody (a standard Znamenny melody that others have harmonized before) – one can surely recognize that the bass line can be left off the second one? But it is otherwise very good – there are some standard pieces and some are rather difficult, but one can find something that fits one’s level.
I would strongly recommend the book for any parish that is interested in performing Russian-style music but does not always have all four parts, especially if they only have two parts or even only one part. There are several pieces even choirs that usually have four parts may be interested in if they want some additional variety. A larger and more consistent choir, however, would probably be better off, eg, with the SVS Press Divine Liturgy book and not find much of use beyond a couple pieces that could be interesting for, say, a smaller ensemble to do. I believe the draft edition is sold out, but when the final edition comes out, you should be on the lookout for it.
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