Canon Press is pleased to announce . . . well, I don’t know what to call it exactly. It is kind of a contest and kind of an opportunity and kind of something else. Let me explain it then, shall I?
This is a call to musicians who are up for something a little unusual. Let me explain it then, shall I?
Here’s the deal. We would like to ask for quality recordings of contemporary arrangements, with contemporary instrumentation, of Reformation era psalms out of the Cantus Christi. Note that this is not a call for “anything whatever” out of the Cantus, but rather for Reformation era psalms. This would include Goudimel psalms from Geneva (e.g. Psalm 6), Schutz psalms from Germany (e.g. Psalms 1,5, or 15), or the Scottish psalter (e.g. Psalm 136).
We will have a panel of worthy judges listen to the entries. If we have enough good ones (and we will be exacting critics), we will make an album out of them that we can sell through Canon Press, and perhaps other outlets. We will make some equitable arrangement with the performers whose work is chosen, but one that doesn’t create a rat’s nest for our bookkeeping.
The deadline is Friday, July 15, 2011. CDs can be sent to Christ Church (PO Box 8741, Moscow, Idaho 83843) or submit a downloadable file emailed to office@christkirk.com
The entry fee is the money it will take you to download the two songs that provide the best examples of the kind of thing we have in mind. And even that, while recommended, is not absolutely necessary. You can go into this thing deaf and blind if you want. The first here is an arrangement of Psalm 2 by the Everlasting Word Band, and the second is an arrangement of Psalm 10 by Jamie Soles.
Don’t get antsy. If this project is a success, there will be other opportunities in which we branch out a little more — Benedictine chants on a Strat, or maybe not.