Written for The Tallis Scholars

  • SSAATTBB - 2 antiphonal choirs
  • 5 min

Programme Note

The text of this motet, written especially for the Tallis Scholars, consists of the one word 'Doxa', meaning 'glory'. The composer writes that the Greeks have a natural inclination towards the luminous, hence the centrality of the transfiguration of the notions of 'phos' (light) and 'doxa' in the mysticism of the Orthodox church. The music is in five sections and for two choirs, the second choir being roughly canonic with the first. The bass parts in each section consists of five different notes, one to each section, which are of central importance to the much faster-moving canonic parts above. These notes are G, E flat, A flat, F and D. This amount of constructional planning is very rare in Tavener's recent works.