In Sideribus Domi - by Paul Halley
At Home In The Stars
Publication Details

 

or Orchestra:
flute I&II
oboe I&II
clarinet I&II in Bb
bassoon
trumpet I, II, III
horn I&II in F
trombone I&II
tuba
percussion
harp
piano
violin I
violin II
viola
violoncello
contrabass

Level of Difficulty - Difficult

Uses/Season - Festival, Concert,
 

SATB/piano reduction choral octavo


Copyright Year - 2003

Archival recording for Choir and Orchestra:

Live 2004 performance at Ozawa Hall,
Tanglewood, Lenox, MA

featuring Chorus Angelicus, Gaudeamus,
and The Battell Chamber Orchestra,
directed by Paul Halley 

A broad reflection on the themes of discovery, creativity, the arts and sciences, centering on the night sky. Five movements. Gorgeous melody lines and inventive jazz harmonies abound, with rhythmic complexity for singers and instrumentalists.  A new poem by David Densmore forms the core of the work, beginning, "Discovery belongs to those who are willing to be lost", and concluding, "The goal of the arts and sciences? To make us better dancers."  

Click for Composer's Notes
__________________________________________________

Commissioned by The Clay Center of Science and Art
for the dedication of the new museum building in Charleston, WV. Commission made possible through the Continental Harmony Project of American Composers Forum.

Text excerpt:
We are stepping on music, friends,
All our discoveries bring us closer
to the unveiling of this theme.
The turbulence of the heart
A strange attractor.
The goal of the arts and sciences?
To make us better dancers.

- David Densmore,  from “Text on the Arts and Sciences”

 

I   Prelude – The Science of Man
At the creation of light the heavens sing and dance the Sanctus. As the night changes to day the choir sings a succession of chords consisting of piled up perfect fourths.  Most of this movement is in 7/8, one of the happiest of dance meters.

Darkness sat brooding o'er the infant world,
That in chaotic gloom and silence lay,
Till from the throne of Light the sun was hurled;
Then that eternal night was changed to day,
 
Even thus, oh! Science, hath thy glorious light
Rolled the dark clouds of Ignorance away,
Dispelled the darkness of a deeper night,
Than that which once o'er chaos thickly lay --
The darkness of the mind; and thy mid-day
Is still far distant -- yet nor time nor space
Is unillumined with thy heavenly ray:
The clouds are rent that shrouded Nature's face,
And now she stands unveiled in all her loveliness.

- Anne C. Lynch (1815-1891);  from “To Science”

_________________________

Sanctus, Sanctus, Sanctus
Dominus Deus Sabaoth  

Holy, Holy, Holy Lord God of Hosts

- from The Ordinary of the Mass – Roman Rite

_________________________
 

II  The Art of The Divine
The movement begins with the “star bridge”- chords of piled up perfect fifths. The ancient hymn “Conditor Alme Siderum” is interwoven with the main theme.

The spacious firmament on high,
With all the blue ethereal sky,
And spangled heavens, a shining frame,
Their great Original proclaim.
The unwearied sun from day to day
Does his Creator’s power display;
And publishes to every land
The work of an almighty hand.

Soon as the evening shades prevail,
The moon takes up the wondrous tale,
And nightly to the listening earth
Repeats the story of her birth:
Whilst all the stars that round her burn,
And all the planets in their turn,
Confirm the tidings, as they roll
And spread the truth from pole to pole. 

What though in solemn silence all
Move round the dark terrestrial ball?
What though no real voice nor sound
Amid their radiant orbs be found?
In reason’s ear they all rejoice,
And utter forth a glorious voice;
For ever singing as they shine,
“The hand that made us is divine.”

- Joseph Addison (1672-1719); para. of Psalm 19:1-6

_________________________

Conditor alme siderum, 
Aeterna lux credentium, 
Virtus, honor, laus, Gloria,
In saeculorum, saecula.  

Founder of the nourishing stars,
Your people’s everlasting light,                       
Virtue, honor, praise and glory
Be yours through all the ages.

- 7^th cent. Latin      

_______________________________

III   Discovery
The central movement of the piece is a “samba” whose harmonies consist of the “star bridge” chords compressed. The ending affords all the instrumentalists an opportunity to improvise over the choir’s repeated figure.

Discovery belongs to those who are willing to be lost, and lost, stumble on the footing of the foundation of the new. Discovery belongs to those who see the real as it is, often overlooked, errors and intermittency, that hold the key to the patterns of the operation as a whole.

______

(This section omitted from musical composition.)
The Cantor's Dust* peppers our lives
signal error, random noise,
that cracks our choral perfection with hum.
Hour, by minute, by second inevitably
(if not predictably) with cosmic regularity.
Error, which cannot be overcome by struggle
or overpowered by signal strength
is tempered only by the redundancy of the choir itself, by acceptance of the lost and the new
by fresh discovery of the whole pressed into the  myriad palms reaching toward the door.    

______

Celebrate those who realize they hold the key.
That marvelous error that planted foot
in outsider soil, seeded with a heart unafraid
to reach into the fluid maze. 

We who look back can say
"that day a solid discovery was made".
Those certain poles now lit for easy entry,
once hid the spiral equation of dragon’s breath.
Step lightly over the fissures God has woven
into the atomic sidewalk; the light
is pouring through the concrete, into the shimmering world. 

We are stepping on music, friends,
All our discoveries bring us closer
to the unveiling of this theme.
The turbulence of the heart
A strange attractor.
The goal of the arts and sciences?

To make us better dancers.

- David Densmore
 from “Text on the Arts and Sciences”

___________________________

IV   Creativity
A personal testament of the need to strive in living and creating. The “Conditor Alme” theme is heard in the instruments, and the movement ends with an a cappella setting of a text by a living astronomer.

Tell me not, in mournful numbers,
Life is but an empty dream!
For the soul is dead that slumbers,
And things are not what they seem.

Life is real! Life is earnest!
And the grave is not its goal;
Dust thou art, to dust returnest,
Was not spoken of the soul.

Not enjoyment, and not sorrow,
Is our destined end or way;
But to act, that each tomorrow
Find us farther than today.

Trust no Future, howe'er pleasant!
Let the dead Past bury its dead!
Act, - act in the living Present!
Heart within, and God o'erhead!

Lives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime,
And, departing, leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time;

Let us, then, be up and doing,
With a heart for any fate;
Still achieving, still pursuing,
Learn to labor and to wait.

- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882)

Conditor alme siderum,                                                                                                                 Aeterna lux credentium,                                                                   
Virtus, honor, laus, Gloria,                                                                                                  
In saeculorum, saecula.

Founder of the nourishing stars…                                        

- 7^th cent. Latin

_________________________

Ah, this universe of light –
such colors, such harmonies
and my mind alive with visions
as I go traveling through all times
past the inscrutable galaxies
floating fire
through the great cities seething with activity
or the dazzling landscapes of summer:
and at my inner ear music
too subtle for air to bear
this life of the mind, mirror of all earth    

- Michael Rowan-Robinson
 from Our Universe: An Armchair Guide

 _________________________________

V   Finale/Reprise
The last movement begins with an instrumental anthem over which the choir eventually sings the “Sanctus”. The “samba” theme from the third movement reappears and the piece ends with an explosive “Hosanna in excelsis”.

Sanctus, Sanctus, Sanctus
Dominus Deus Sabaoth.                                                                 
Pleni sunt coeli et terra gloria tua.
Hosanna in excelsis.                                                                    

Holy, Holy, Holy Lord God of Hosts.                           
Heaven and earth are full of thy glory.
Hosanna in the highest.

- from The Ordinary of the Mass – Roman Rite

_________________________

We are stepping on music, friends,
All our discoveries bring us closer
to the unveiling of this theme.
The turbulence of the heart
A strange attractor.
The goal of the arts and sciences?

To make us better dancers.

- David Densmore
 from “Text on the Arts and Sciences”

 

*Cantor's Dust (Georg Cantor (1845-1918)  Mathematician, born in St. Petersburg. Cantor worked out a highly original arithmetic of the infinite which resulted in a theory of infinite sets of different sizes.)