The Choir of the Church of St. Ignatius Loyola performs the US Premiere of Gavin Bryars' On Photography on February 11 under the direction of St. Ignatius Music Director Kent Tritle. The first choral work by Gavin Bryars, On Photography was written as part of the composer's collaboration with Robert Wilson on his large-scale operatic project the CIVIL WarS. Bryars comments further:

The choice of text and subject matter was mine and is loosely connected to my love of the work of Jules Verne. I knew that Verne had met Pope Leo XIII in 1884 (a hundred years before our work was due to reach fruition) and that Leo XIII had written a poem Ars Photographica in praise of photography (a modern subject using an archaic language, Latin) when he was still Cardinal Pecci in Perugia in 1867. As it happened, the writer Susan Sontag was considering joining the project and we spoke together several times. I knew, of course, that one of her first major books was on photography, and this led me to set Leo's text almost as a way of welcoming her on to the team. The final section consists of a brief Latin epitaph. The instrumental accompaniment of the longer central section (piano and harmonium) reflected the fact that I had then recently played the harmonium part in Rossini's Petite Messe Solennelle.

The Choir of the Church of St. Ignatius Loyola also performs Beatitudes by Arvo Pärt, and Song of Cherubim by Krzysztof Penderecki on the evening's program.

The commercial recording of On Photography by the Latvian Radio Choir is available on GB Records, to order your copy click here.

For more information on Gavin Bryars, please visit www.gavinbryars.com and www.schott-music.com.

For more information about the Choir of the Church of St. Ignatius Loyola, visit www.smssconcerts.org.

Gavin Bryars
On Photography (1983)
SATB Chorus, harmonium and piano
24'

Arvo Pärt
The Beatitudes (1990/1991)
SATB Chorus and organ
7'

Krzysztof Penderecki
Song of Cherubim (1987)
SATB Chorus
6'