Sanctus cum Jubilo (2025)

Sanctus cum Jubilo

It’s with great excitement that I present to you the penultimate (but last to be written) movement of a long-held dream (since 2009) to compose an entire mass, just for organ. The mass is inspired by the famous Cum Jubilo Gregorian chant. 

The opening 3 notes of the original plainsong, on the word Sanctus/Holy fall in a pronounced 5/8 rhythm 2 + 2+ 1, so I have composed the whole movement in this time signature. Starting high up in the heavens, angels descend at first mysteriously but becoming more playful as they transpose lower. Dominus Deus Sabbath/Lord God of hosts provides a more solemn chordal accompaniment to this.

In Pleni sunt caeli et terra/Heaven and earth are full of… and …gloria tua/your glory the angels have reached the ground and the tone becomes more celebratory as the chords are fuller, grander and faster. 

The pedals have the plainsong in our first Hosanna in excelsis/Hosanna in the highest, but there is a hint of the slightly crazy exuberance that comes with this text, as it reappears at the end.

The original plainsong for Benedictus qui venit un nomine Domini/Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord contains gentle but excited pealing bells, which slowly crescendo - the playful angels returning as it becomes louder and brighter. 

The ascending scale of the final Hosanna plainsong starts in both manuals and pedals until it in excelsis/in the highest becomes a descending runaway train (I’m envisaging torrents of angels descending rapidly here) and culminating in a Maestoso finish as I imagine those angels saying: “We’re here, we’re staying always by your side, forever!” 

I am hugely grateful to Glasgow Cathedral Festival and Andrew Forbes, who not only commissioned this movement but also brought in Richard Yarr and the Northern Ireland International Organ Competition to the project (NIIOC commissioned the Agnus Dei – beautifully premiered by Andrew in Belfast, on 2nd May 2025).

RP 2nd June, 2025