IMSLP Forums

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:

• http://www.sbible.boom.ru/slavpdf.htm

Has John Tavener (b. 1944) done anything? I know he's done of number of things in Greek, plus a number Orthodox liturgical works.

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.)