£10.00 – £29.99
The cantata brings to life the story of Christ’s first miracle when he famously turned water into wine at a wedding feast – a moment full of celebration, wonder and love. It features both intimate, reflective movements and dramatic, energetic storytelling.
| Quantity | Discount | Discounted price |
| 10 - 29 | 10% | - |
| 30 - 49 | 12.5% | - |
| 50 - 9999 | 15% | - |
COMPOSER’S NOTE
The Wedding at Cana was my first ever sizeable composition. Written during the second half of 1989, it was the result of a commission from Joy and Ken Whitehead who were parents of a music scholar at Pangbourne College in Berkshire, where I was a teacher of Music and English. I had written a few solo piano pieces and songs which had been performed at school concerts but never imagined embarking on a large-scale work like this. The commission was for the Pangbourne Choral Society which was flourishing under its director Bob Barsby, and the singers wholeheartedly welcomed the arrival of a new composition (which was originally expected to be ten to fifteen minutes in length but finally emerged as a dramatic cantata lasting about an hour.
My brother Andrew suggested the subject of the Wedding at Cana and skilfully adapted the text of St John’s gospel into ten separate movements, three of which were Andrew’s own poetic reflections. I spent most of the summer of 1989 at the piano of a deserted music school in the College grounds and had a life-changing experience, not only musically but in terms of my Christian faith. Bringing Christ’s first miracle to life – as well as setting the words of Christ and his mother Mary – helped to provide the foundations of a deep faith which has grown and intensified over the years. There is inevitably a youthful innocence about this work. It is totally free of any kind of pretension, and is quite simply the expression of a young man’s faith through a spontaneous and natural grasp of Western musical language. Performers should approach The Wedding at Cana in this light, never trying to analyse or be over-expressive. All that is needed is that the choir and soloists tell this magnificent story with honesty and integrity, reflect on its implications for mankind and help audiences to come to “believe in Him”.
The Waters of Love from The Wedding at Cana :
Hire costs of the Full Score and Orchestral Parts can be provided on request to andyberry@hawesmusic.com.
| Description | Vocal Score (Hardcopy), Vocal Score (PDF), Full Score (Hardcopy, Full Orchestral Version), Full Score (Hardcopy, Reduced Orchestral Version) |
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