Tenebrae Service – New music for ancient prayers

Tenebrae is an ancient monastic service of light and darkness, taken from the midnight prayers chanted by monks and nuns in the days leading up to Easter. Finn Buckley, Director of Music at St. David of Wales, has composed a new plainchant setting for this service, which will be debuted on Tuesday in Holy Week. Says Buckley, “Rather than try to get our English-language prayers to fit into Latin melodies as so many composers have beautifully done, I wanted to allow these beautiful, sacred, visceral texts to impact the singer and listener in new ways. My prayer is that this setting invites us to encounter Holy Week in a fresh, perhaps deeper way.”

St. David’s invites you to sing and pray with us on April 4th, Tuesday evening of Holy Week, beginning at 7pm.