Tallis — O nata lux [SATTB]

SATTB | Duration: approximately 2:00 | Medium difficulty
Transpositions available on request: orders@catchwordmusic.com

This edition makes Tallis's famous setting of the Transfiguration hymn more accessible to today's choirs, with fully realized musica ficta, a new word-by-word translation, syllabic slurring of the syncopated text underlay, and an editorial keyboard reduction. It is presented in 4/2 time, a choice that aligns the conducting pulse with the natural stress of the text and lets the music's own rhythmic character emerge without fighting the notation.

O nata lux de lumine,
Jesu redemptor sæculi,
dignare clemens supplicum
laudes precesque sumere:
Qui carne quondam contegi
dignatus es pro perditis,
nos membra confer effici
tui beati corporis.

O light born of luminance,
Jesu, redeemer of the age:
Deign, merciful one, to receive
The praises and prayers of suppliants.
You, who once deigned
To be clothed in flesh for the sake of the lost,
Grant that we may be made
Members of your blessed body.