David's Kyrie

David's Kyrie is a mixture of ancient and modern. The text is taken from selected verses of Psalm 51 in which David makes his great confession and petition for mercy for his adultery with Bathsheba. As the first half of the psalm is much like the traditional Kyrie in the Christian mass, the form, melody, and title of the piece are all inspired by medieval chant. The form employs antiphonal discourse between cantor and choir in three stanzas. The cantor role, intoned in the tenor solos, uses a tune derived from the medieval Kyrie Cunctipotens Genitor (being, roughly, "Lord, all powerful father") and is harmonized over a bass line liberally employing perfect fourths, fifths and octaves as would be found in medieval chant. The cantor is answered by choir using late Twentieth-Century styled chord clusters which resolve into a cadence on extended tertian chords. In the third stanza, the cantor is replaced by the chorus, typically building from a single voice into dense clusters shimmering between dissonance and consonance. David's Kyrie is suited to the advanced high school or higher level choir for the concert stage, or would make a wonderful addition to the sacred repertoire of the adventurous church ensemble.