Updated 21 July 2005

Contents of this page

• Some background
• Performance plans
• Prefatory comments
• Latest updates
• Summary of each movement

Some background

"Pesukei d'Zimrah" is a 100-minute, 24-movement oratorio for mixed chorus, soloists, and small orchestra (4 winds, 5 brass, 2 percussion, and 12 strings). The text is taken from the introductory section of the Jewish morning liturgy, known as Pesukei d'Zimrah (Verses of Song). Consisting mostly of entire chapters from Psalms, it explores the various aspects of God and our relationships with the Divine: as individuals, as Israel, as humanity, as the matter of the Universe.

While traditional synagogue music is a cappella, there is a long tradition within Judaism of setting Psalm texts (as well as liturgical excerpts) as art music for performance outside of liturgical contexts. Inspired in equal parts by Ernest Bloch's "Sacred Service" and by Felix Mendelssohn's "Elijah," I decided ten years ago to begin exploring the text of Pesukei d'Zimrah by setting each chapter as a movement of an oratorio.

I have spent over 1,000 hours during the past decade composing the music, preparing the orchestration, and typesetting the conductor's score. In February 2004, I held a sing-through with twelve singers and a professional pianist to workshop the entire piece and identify rough spots. One participant later wrote, "There is a lot of music here that I find intellectually and spiritually inspiring," while another wrote, "This is a gorgeous piece of music and lots of fun to sing. Many thanks for the opportunity to share the work in progress. I eagerly look forward to the next installment."

Performance plans

The premiere is planned for autumn 2006 with rehearsals probably on Tuesday nights over the preceding summer. Additionally, I'm hoping to do three or four "pre" rehearsals on Sunday afternoons during 2005 to get a core group of singers familiar with the music, so that once the "real" rehearsals start they will go more smoothly. (Attending the "pre" rehearsals would not commit a singer to doing the piece over the summer, nor would skipping the "pre" rehearsals prevent a singer from joining us later on. They're just a chance to start learning the piece early if you want to.)

(Those of you who have been following my progress will note that this is a year later than I had originally hoped. My request for funding from the Newton Cultural Concil for 2005 was declined because my plans were not yet firm enough; I decided to take that as a warning and postpone everything for a year so that I can make sure that everything really is ready.)

I have set up a "Yahoo! Group" for people who are interested in singing the piece. Joining this group is not a commitment, merely an expression of interest. I will use this list to send out periodic updates, including when and where the "pre" rehearsals and "real" rehearsals will be held. This list is located at:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/PDZ-Singers

I have set up a second "Yahoo! Group" for people who are willing to help with the myriad tasks needed to bring this project to fruition. These tasks include personnel management and recruitment (for singers and orchestra), selecting rehearsal and performance venues, organizing and executing a publicity plan, etc. If you would like to help with any such tasks, or if you want to help brainstorm, I invite you to join this list. (Again, you're not committing to anything by joining the list.) This list is located at:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/PDZ-Production

If you would like to contact me, please send an e-mail message to andrew@greenehouse.com with the letters PDZ in the subject line (to ensure that your message gets through my spam filter).

Prefatory remarks to Pesukei d'Zimrah

Pesukei d'Zimrah is the introduction to our daily prayers. Consisting mostly of entire chapters from Psalms, it explores the various aspects of God and our relationships with the Divine: as individuals, as Israel, as humanity, as the matter of the Universe. Recited early in the morning (frankly, often while still half-asleep), these texts help set our perspective for the day and act as a "spiritual stretch" to limber our minds and mouths for the prayers of praise and supplication of the shacharit (morning) service proper.

Although P'sukei d'Zimrah is filled with incomparable poetry and powerful imagery, it is one of the most difficult liturgies to approach with kavannah. We tend to rush through it, with barely enough time to get the words out -- forget about contemplating their meaning! And we (especially the Orthodox) tend to recite it privately rather than sing it -- it's all p'sukim, and no zimrah!

In an attempt to better understand these texts, and then to serve as an emotional aide-memoire, I asked myself how I would interpret each of these psalms as song. Over ten years, I accumulated my answers. The result is this "choraltorio".

The full text of P'sukei d'Zimrah is recited only on the holiday of Hoshannah Rabbah; on weekdays the central portion is omitted, and on Shabbat and holidays Psalm 100 is omitted. I have chosen to set the entire text, partly in honor of an old tradition to spend the night of Hoshannah Rabbah in a vigil of song.

Most of these settings are adaptable to liturgical use, even for those who do not use instruments on Shabbat, who do not repeat words in their tefillot, and who do not permit women as sh'lichot tzibbur. (On the matter of repeating words, I have found that the Psalmist uses word repetition sparsely and effectively; for me to repeat phrases where he did not would diminish the text which I am trying to honor and to understand. In a few places, I fudged this point by having different voices sing the same word or phrase one after another; in a few spots the repetition serves a specific liturgical purpose.)

A remark on the current translation: It is geared toward enabling performers to understand the meaning of the Hebrew text; it is my intent to evolve it into a singable translation which can be used when a Hebrew performance would be too difficult for the singers or audience, or liturgically inappropriate. At the moment it's more of a "follow-along-able" translation.

Latest version and Change Log

• 21 July 2005: So a bunch of us are going to get togther to rehearse several movements from Part IV with the goal of recording a demo tape later this summer. Here are some files relating to that:

  Psalm 146	»PDF, 260KB	»MP3, 1.0MB	»MIDI, 12KB
  Psalm 147	»PDF, 660KB <==preliminary
  Psalm 148	»PDF, 406KB	»MP3, 1.2MB	»MIDI, 20KB
  Psalm 149	»PDF, 544KB		»MIDI, 28KB
  Psalm 150	»PDF, 491KB	»MP3, 950KB	»MIDI, 36KB

• 1-2 Mar 2005: OK, change of plans! We're going to do a sing-along at the Zamir party, and I'm a little worried that movements 18 and 19 will be a train wreck if they're not rehearsed. So we're going to switch to 21: Psalm 148 (Hallelu et Hashem min ha-Shamayim) »MP3, 1.2MB »PDF, 430KB and 23: Psalm 150 (Hallelu El b'Kawdsho) »MP3, 950KB »PDF, 430KB which have a piano reduction and which are more likely to succeed under the circumstances.
• 21 Feb 2005: Since I decided to postpone the premiere for a year, I'm relaxing my schedule and not rushing to get the PV score done ASAP; instead, I'm taking the time to get all the details right. In the meantime, I'm planning to have a small group sing movements 18 and 19 at an upcoming Zamir party, and to help the singers learn their parts here are part-prominent MP3s (each at 1.7MB and 3:47) of movement 18 for »Soprano, »Alto, »Tenor, and »Bass; also, »movement 19 for everyone (973KB and 2:04).
• 26 Dec 2004: Going over everything with a fine-toothed comb while working on the piano reductions. This means they're taking a little longer than I expected; new ETA on the PV score is Jan 15. I owe a great debt of thanks to Bruce Creditor for taking the time to review the score and for giving me some wonderfully thorough feedback!
• 1 Dec 2004: DONE! Conductor's score is finished, and the next step is the piano reductions. The goal is to have the piano-vocal score ready for printing by the end of this month.
• 23 Nov 2004: Two movements to go on the proofreading! And I've set up two Yahoo! Groups (see above) to start gathering people who are interested in performing the piece.
• 11 Oct 2004: I've completed integrating the feedback from last February's singthrough. After one more pass of proofreading the entire score, it should be ready for performance!
• 31 Aug 2004: I've entered edits through movement 11. More importantly, I've decided that the version from the singthrough is sufficiently out-of-date that I've removed the downloadable files from the website. If you want a snapshot of the latest version, e-mail me.
• 19 Aug 2004: Just a quick note so people don't think I've abandoned the project. Over the last few weeks I've been entering the edits from last winter's singthrough, as well as making the appearance of each movement consistent and bringing everything onto legal-sized pages. So far I've done through movement 6. I'm not planning to post revised files until the entire second draft is complete.
• 12 Feb 2004: While on vacation, I proofread for voice-leading errors. And I found them! I've fixed (almost) every movement and updated the Finale native and Enigma ZIP archives. This will (probably) be the version for next Sunday's singthrough.

Summary of each movement