Music Notes for Pentecost 12 — August 11, 2024
Panis angelicus – Alexander L’Estrange (b. 1974)
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The British composer, arranger, jazz musician and choral animateur Alexander L’Estrange began his musical career as a chorister in the choir of New College, Oxford, where, under the direction of Dr Edward Higginbottom, his love for English choral music was fostered. At the same time he discovered a passion for improvising jazz on the piano and infamously once got into a fair amount of trouble for humming an added 9th in the final chord of A spotless rose by Herbert Howells.
L’Estrange’s Panis angelicus, this Sunday’s communion motet in church, is a gorgeous anthem for accompanied upper voices and is featured on L’Estrange’s album On Eagles’ Wings, performed by the award-winning chamber choir Tenebrae. The well-known text is set to an exquisite, soaring melody, showcasing L’Estrange’s gift for warm, jazz-infused harmonies and beautiful, yet accessible melodic lines.
The bread of angels becomes the bread of men,
the heavenly bread
gives an end to earthly forms
O marvellous and wondrous sacrament:
a poor man, a slave, and the humble one
all ingest the Lord.
Gerald Harder