“We Are One Voice” – a very flexible choir piece

“We Are One Voice” was commissioned by Beaconsfield Festival of Choirs for their 2018 festival, as a piece that could be sung by all the choirs who were in the festival, both individually, and together at the end of each concert. There is also a more challenging section in the middle, which can be sung by advanced choirs, or omitted if desired (it requires 3 or 4 parts).

“In the end it was very successful – we had 5 choirs in each of the three remaining concerts, and they performed well – huge variety of styles and standards, which is typical of the festival, but everyone is very attentive and gains a lot from singing to each other.  The first concert was the most successful in terms of your song – most of the choirs had learnt the middle section, so we could perform it in its entirety.  The other two concerts we only did the outer sections.  I rehearsed it with them all together (in front of the audience) first, to check over the difficult bits, and then we did a performance.  Lots of people said that they’d really enjoyed singing it together, and at the end the church was really ringing with the sound.” – Jane Smith, director, Beaconsfield Festival of Choirs

The words were commissioned from Euan Tait, who has also written words for pieces by Kim Andre Arnesen, Timothy Tharaldson, Paul Spicer and Janet Wheeler, among other composers.

Now available from MusicSpoke! Click here to order a copy for your choir.

The piece is available for the following choir voicings (all accompanied by piano):

unison (with short optional call-and-response divisi)

2-part flexible: can be S/A, T/B, ST/B, S/AB, etc., no divisi needed beyond 2 parts(this version will soon be published in the Hong Kong Children’s Chorus 50th Anniversary Songbook)

3-part: mixed SABar choir, upper voices SSA or lower voices TBarB (email me if you would like an STB or ATB version), all no divisi

4-part: SATB choir, no divisi

All of these can be performed simultaneously; email me if you’d like a conductor’s score with multiple parts. Several different choirs can be heard singing the piece together below:

Hear the piano part alone below:

Full libretto:

I have a voice,
I have a song,
I have a cry,
and you shall hear me!

I am a heartbeat,
I am a life,
I am a yes,
and you shall sing me!

I am a drum,
I am a rhythm,
I am a choir,
and we shall dance you!

I am the broken tree:
heal me.
We the injured bird,
call me,
we the bird-call forest
you have planted.

We the heartbeats of our song,
we the streets that pulse the city.

My life is a drum,
and I am the drumbeat,
my song is my life,
and we are one voice!

Euan Tait