Sacred – Page 4 – WheatMyer Music

Love Lifted Me

$2.25

For SATB Chorus and Piano

This is a completely new choral-anthem setting of the popular gospel hymn text. The colorful melodies and harmonies are a world apart from the incessant lilting cheerfulness of the original tune to better depict the range and depth of emotions expressed in the text’s story of redemption. The music leads listeners on a emotional journey from the despair of sin’s eternal ruin to the joy of Christ’s saving grace. The chorus concludes with a passionate testimony and witness for Christ.

The music is written for SATB chorus with piano accompaniment and is suitable for most amateur church ensembles as well as more advanced groups. The opening stanza may be sung as a bass/tenor duet or with full men’s sections.

Duration: ~4’30”

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Twelve

$65.00

Live Recording:

Simulated Instruments and Voices:

For SATB Chorus, Piano, Bb Clarinet, and Cello

There are 150 psalms in the Bible, each one originally meant to be sung; and so they were for most of the last 3,000 years, beginning at the Jerusalem Temple. They were adopted as the primary song text of the early church as evidenced by Col. 3:16 and maintained in the Western church throughout medieval times. Psalms were the featured texts of most of the Reformers and were the sole mode of sacred singing among the first American settlers. Of late, hymns and choruses and popular songs with human texts have almost entirely replaced the singing of God’s word in many churches. This scarcity of Psalms in the Church’s song is a great loss which frequently compels me to do what I can to promote their increase.

The brief twelfth Psalm is a lament painting a bleak scenario of engulfing depravity and vanishing righteousness in ancient Israel. It could just as well have been commentary on the decline of morality in contemporary Western society. Further, rather than offering resolution or relief for the psalmist’s desperate plea for help, the Psalm asserts that “the words of the LORD are pure words,” to say in effect that hope stands only in the Word of God.

TWELVE attempts to capture this chaos and despair of the twelfth Psalm through pointillistic phrasing, dissonant harmonies, cross rhythms, and extended choral and instrumental techniques. The psalm’s slender ray of hope is portrayed in a contrasting section of subdued peacefulness painted with flowing themes in conventional harmonies.

Duration: ~8’40”

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Ponder Anew

$75.00

a tone poem on LOBE DEN HERREN

For Orchestra

Ponder: to think about carefully, especially before making a decision or reaching a conclusion.

Anew: In a new or different and typically more positive way.

These two words come from the third stanza of Joachim Neander’s perennially popular hymn, “Praise to the Lord, the Almighty.” And just as this stanza invites us to “Ponder anew what the Almighty can do,” this orchestral hymn invites us to consider afresh the attributes and works of Almighty God. Ponder Anew is purely an instrumental work but the text and tune are so familiar that the words will spontaneously spring to mind as the theme unwinds. Thereby, the new harmonies, rhythms, and phrasings in Ponder Anew will likely elicit from the listener a new and different way of thinking about the text. So, as this new setting of the tune melds together peace, majesty, mystery, power, beauty, and grace it stirs the listener to “think carefully, in a new and more positive way, about what the Almighty can do.”

The music in not particularly difficult and should be readily playable by high school or higher level musicians. Yet, both musicians and audience will find the power and intimacy of the work interesting and enjoyable with music that reflects the majesty and mystery of its subject.

Duration: ~4’20”

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Pathos Chorodia

$19.99

PASSION CHORALE

For Pierrot Ensemble

Although the familiar melody is ever-present in this setting of “O, Sacred Head Now Wounded” it will sound very foreign to most ears. In acknowledgment of the atonal origins of the pierrot ensemble, this arrangement embraces dissonance and chromaticism and avoids clear statements of conventional harmony without, however, being altogether atonal. Thus, it is a most unusual setting of the tune, but one that poignantly paints the deep anguish expressed in the hymn text, which is the anguish of the crucifixion’s witnesses. The music is simultaneously shocking and familiar, which seems a fitting way to present this familiar story in all its appalling horror.

The music may be successfully performed with advanced high school or later musicians. It is not excessively demanding technically but will require artistic taste and expressiveness and good counting skills. It is well suited for recital or chamber ensemble concert in either secular or sacred venue.

Duration: ~4’05”

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Wheatmyer Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silent 8×11

Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silence

$10.99

PICARDY for Mixed Skill Levels

For STRING ENSEMBLE

Plenty of music is available for advanced ensembles, and some music is available for beginning and early music students. But what is available for a mixture of the two? This arrangement of Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silence aims to provide that solution.

As originally written for an actual church ensemble with a mixture of professional, advanced amateur, and student string players, this piece can fit many different ensemble mixtures of a septet or larger. It features solo parts for violin and cello that will interest advanced players mixed with simple accompaniment by the ensemble at large. Whether you have a studio of mixed ability students, a faculty/student ensemble, or just a real-world church ensemble, this piece can work for you.

Duration: ~3’24”

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