Cantate Domino

This setting of Psalm 96 was commissioned by the saxophonist Christian Forshaw.  It makes use of the lines of the original Gregorian plainsong for the psalm and the haunting sound of the baritone saxophone and organ create an atmosphere of England’s distant monastic past.  Writing this, I kept in mind the images of the great religious foundations destroyed during the Reformation, particularly Fountains and Rievaulx Abbeys.