Modern compositions in true Old Church Slavonic?

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Lyle Neff
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Modern compositions in true Old Church Slavonic?

Post by Lyle Neff »

Do any of you know of any modern vocal compositions (solo or choral) which set texts in Old Church Slavonic? -- That is, not one of the modern recensions, like Russian Church Slavonic, but a faithful rendering of the old language as far as we can determine its sounds. (OCS was vocalic -- all syllables ended in vowels.)

Leoš Janá?ek's Glagolitic Mass would not qualify, because it lacks the nasal vowels and the "yers" (weak vowels which over time dropped out or changed into stronger vowels in the modern Slavic languages).

Given the history of South Slavic, perhaps a Bulgarian composer has attempted this?

By the way, in case anyone is interested, someone has edited and uploaded the Bible in OCS, in separate PDF files:
"A libretto, a libretto, my kingdom for a libretto!" -- Cesar Cui (letter to Stasov, Feb. 20, 1877)
Carolus
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Re: Modern compositions in true Old Church Slavonic?

Post by Carolus »

Has John Tavener (b. 1944) done anything? I know he's done of number of things in Greek, plus a number Orthodox liturgical works.
Lyle Neff
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Re: Modern compositions in true Old Church Slavonic?

Post by Lyle Neff »

I just did a quick scan of the Tavener's worklist in Grove Online. Doesn't give specific language information with the vocal works. (The article brings up Church Slavonic, but I assume it's referring to one of the modern recensions rather than the ancient language.)
"A libretto, a libretto, my kingdom for a libretto!" -- Cesar Cui (letter to Stasov, Feb. 20, 1877)
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