I Saw You Under the Fig Tree
A simple four-part setting under one long countertenor glissando.
Premiere — Gallicantus · Trigonale Festival, Klagenfurt, Austria · 2016-09-04
I wrote this for Gallicantus, a men’s vocal quintet. The text is Jesus’s words to Nathanael — “I saw you under the fig tree” (John 1:48). It’s a plain four-part setting underneath a long countertenor glissando.
It premiered at the Trigonale Festival in Klagenfurt, Austria in 2016. Gallicantus recorded it as the epilogue to their album Sibylla (Signum Classics, 2018), an album built around Lassus’s Prophetiae Sibyllarum. Choir & Organ gave the record five stars.
Ending the programme with Elliot Cole's I saw you under the fig tree, the words which assert and confirm Christ's omniscience, was a masterstroke. Brian Morton , Choir & Organ , 2018
Performances
2 performances since 2016
- 2024-05-11 Logan J Henke, conducting Northwestern University, Evanston IL
- 2016-09-04 Gallicantus Trigonale Festival, Klagenfurt, Austria