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Elegy, with its warmly expressive tenor-range melodies, is highly suitable for use at funerals, while the cascading joy of Festive Bells makes it perfect as a wedding recessional. The finely wrought sonorities will sound to maximum effect on a large organ in a spacious acoustic, but will nonetheless be convincing on even the most modest of instruments. Both pieces have that warm sense of Englishness that makes them very accessible to the first-time listener.
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Toccata in Seven
With exuberantly rhythmic textures skilfully wrought within a septuple metre, John Rutter’s Toccata in Seven offers a lively new take on the toccata. The music moves from a jubilant opening to a more sustained central section before the initial sprightliness returns in a final flourish.
Jesus Child – two-part
An arrangement for upper voices (SS or SA), with a simplified piano part, of John Rutter’s popular Jesus Child, an upbeat carol with a clear Caribbean influence. Also available in SATB and unison arrangements.
Past three a clock
Past three a clock is written for SATB (with divisions) and piano or small orchestra.
Originally published in Carols for Choirs 2, Rutter’s arrangement of this well-known carol is energetic and joyful. The memorable and buoyant melody is supported and driven by lively piano accompaniment, making it well-suited for Christmas concerts and services. Orchestral material is available on hire.
Orchestration: 2 fl, 2 ob, bn, 2 hn, perc (glock, SD), hp (opt), str
Anthems and Choral Songs for upper-voice choirs
This collection of nine of John Rutter’s most popular anthems, scored for upper-voices, has been carefully compiled to cover a variety of texts and styles. Embracing both sacred and secular material, the collection provides an eminently useful body of repertoire for upper-voice choirs (sopranos and altos, and/or boys’ unchanged voices)
A Clare Benediction
A flower remembered
A Gaelic Blessing
All things bright and beautiful
For the beauty of the earth
God be in my head
Look at the world
The Lord bless you and keep you
The Music’s Always There With You
The Jolly Shepherd
This sprightly setting of a sixteenth-century English text tells the tale of a jolly shepherd named Wat. With an upbeat triple metre and a joyful swing feel, this carol has imaginative, contrasting textures, a memorable refrain, and a rousing finish.
Scored for SATB and piano or organ or orchestra, two versions of the vocal score are available: one with piano accompaniment and one with organ accompaniment. Full scores and parts are available for purchase or hire.
Orchestration: picc, fl, 2ob, 2cl, 2bsn, 2hn, perc, hp, str
Listen to The Jolly Shepherd on Spotify
London Town
London Town was commissioned and written to be performed by the combined forces of unison children’s choir and SATB mixed voices, with piano. The vividly communicative six-movement work, which is accompanied throughout, is full of musical contrasts from the jaunty London Zoo to the solemn Lines written in the Tower of London. The work celebrates London through its six songs and contains texts by Rudyard Kipling, Walter Raleigh, and William Wordsworth alongside new material by Delphine Chalmers and the composer. It has sections for adult voices alone and sections for children’s voices alone alongside passages for the two forces to combine as a full choir.
Here is the first movement: Prologue: The bells of London
When music sounds
Set to a popular text by Walter de la Mare, this secular work is an expressive homage to J. S. Bach, combining lyrical vocal lines with a contrapuntal accompaniment.
John Rutter Carols for SA and Men
This collection includes nine of John Rutter’s most popular Christmas carols, re-scored by the composer into three parts: for sopranos, altos, and unison men. From ‘Star Carol’ to ‘All bells in paradise’, these festive favourites continue to delight choirs and audiences across the world.
All bells in paradise
Angels’ Carol
Candlelight Carol
Donkey Carol
Love came down at Christmas
Mary’s Lullaby
Star Carol
The Very Best Time of Year
What sweeter music
Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?
This secular work by John Rutter is set to the text of Shakespeare’s famous Sonnet No. 18. Throughout the work, Rutter skillfully weaves the figurative language of the sonnet within the lyrical melodic lines of the music. Shakespeare’s expressive text is passed between the voices, with the warm, verdant harmonies enveloping the sonnet’s use of imagery and the work’s central metaphor of comparing love to a summer’s day.