Exsultet - Praeconium Paschale for SSA Choir, Trumpet, Trombone and Piano: Contemporary Choral Music

Wuorinen's setting of the Easter Exsultet moves beyond reverent recitation into something genuinely exultant. The interplay between the SSA choir and the brass colors (trumpet and trombone) creates moments of radiance that feel earned rather than imposed, and the instrumental writing never overshadows the text but instead amplifies its proclamatory power. A choir that takes on this work gains direct access to one of America's most sophisticated contemporary composers at his most liturgically engaged.

Exsultet radiates intellectual clarity wrapped around genuine liturgical solemnity. The music feels both intricate and purposeful, with moments where the choir and instruments achieve an almost luminous clarity that reflects the text's celebration of resurrection and light. There's an architectural quality to the unfolding, as though the piece is building something substantial, section by section.

This work suits advanced choral programs with access to capable brass players and singers comfortable with contemporary harmonic language. It fits programs seeking serious contemporary sacred music that honors tradition without retreating into pastiche, and it pairs naturally with liturgical contexts, concert settings, or festivals that program twentieth and twenty-first century choral repertoire.

• Approach the choral parts with the same rhythmic precision you would bring to any contemporary score; Wuorinen's part-writing rewards exact ensemble balance and clear attacks
• Coordinate closely with your brass players in early rehearsals to establish how instrumental entries relate to harmonic tension points in the choir; transparency here prevents muddiness
• Use the text's natural phrasing and liturgical function as your emotional guide; let the Latin prosody inform your shaping rather than fighting against it
• Explore the full dynamic range available to SSA voices in this piece; Wuorinen writes passages of real delicacy alongside moments of corporate power

This substantial work (18 pages) makes an ideal centerpiece for a concert pairing contemporary sacred music with earlier liturgical settings, or it can anchor a program focused on twentieth-century American composers. Its Easter subject matter and proclamatory character suit a spring concert or liturgical celebration, while its intellectual weight makes it equally at home in a university or professional ensemble concert context.

• Reading and performing contemporary harmonic language
• Ensemble coordination between choir and small brass group
• Shaping phrases within complex, non-functional harmonic contexts
• Sustaining focused tone and clarity in SSA voicing across 18 pages
• Understanding liturgical text and its relationship to music form
• Responding to composer-specified articulation and dynamic markings in modernist scores