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A Letter From Giocondo - by Paul Halley |
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Catalogue Number - PEL2022 SATB Voicing/Instrumentation - SATB choir and orchestra Level of Difficulty - Difficult Uses/Season - Festival, Concert, Christmas |
Duration -
20:00 mins Three Movements Pages Music - 56 pages SATB - 64 page booklet |
Format -
SATB choral octavo with piano reduction Copyright Year - 1998  Movement I - pages 1-5 of 22 vocal/piano reduction Movement II - pages 1-5 of 15 vocal/piano reduction Movement III - pages 1-5 of 19 vocal/piano reduction |
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Description/Remarks In PEL2022 A Letter From Giocondo, the letter from a 15th century Italian monk, Fra Giovanni Giocondo c. 1513 to his students serves as the basis for a gorgeous work in three movements for choir and orchestra or wind ensemble. Melodic interplay, rich choral textures and exciting rhythmic accompaniment perfectly reflect the gracefulness and uplifting beauty of the text. A beautiful concert piece for Christmas, for Commencement Exercises, or any time of the year where a longer, orchestrated work is desired. __________________________________________________ Commissioned by Juniata College, Huntington, PA in honor of President Robert W. Neff upon his retirement. |
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Text
I salute you. No heaven can come to us unless our hearts find rest in it today. Take heaven! No peace lies in the future which is not hidden in this present little instant. Take peace! The gloom of the world is but a shadow. Behind it yet within our reach, is joy. There is radiance and glory in the darkness could we but see; and to see, we have only to look. I beseech you to look. Life is so generous a giver, but we, judging its gifts by their covering, cast them away as ugly or heavy or hard. Remove the covering and you will find beneath it a living splendour, woven of love, by wisdom, with power. Welcome it, grasp it, and you touch the Angel’s hand that brings it to you. Everything we call a trial, a sorrow, or a duty; believe me, that Angel’s hand is there; the gift is there, and the wonder of an overshadowing Presence. Our joys, too; be not content with them as joys. They, too, conceal diviner gifts. Life is so full of meaning and purpose, so full of beauty – beneath its covering – that you will find earth but cloaks your heaven. Courage then, to claim it; that is all! But courage you have: and the knowledge that we are pilgrims together, wending through unknown country – home.
And so, at this time, I greet
you: not quite as the world sends greetings, but with profound esteem,
and with the prayer that for you, now and forever, the days breaks, and
the shadows flee away.
A letter by Fra Giovanni
Giocondo, c. 1513
Giocondo, Fra Giovanni Fra Giovanni Giocondo, born c.1433, died July 1, 1515, was an Italian scholar and engineer whose writings, especially a 1511 edition of Vitruvius, were frequently consulted by contemporary architects. As an engineer he worked all over Italy and in France for Charles VIII and Louis XII, mostly as an advisor. He is known to have been engaged (1476-88) in Verona on the Loggia del Consiglio, at Poggioreale in Naples (c. 1490), on the defenses of Venice (c. 1506), and in Paris (1500-08) on the Pont-de-Notre-Dame. In 1514 he was appointed by Pope Leo X to assist Raphael at Saint Peter’s Basilica in Rome. David Cast Bibliography: Heydenreich, Ludwig H., and Lotz, Wolfgang, Architecture in Italy: 1400-1600 (1974).
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Orchestra
Flute I & II Clarinet I & II Bassoon Horn I & II Trumpet I, II, III Trombone I, II, III Timpani Percussion I & II Piano Violin I Violin II Viola Cello Bass
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