Hmm.

[artsyhonker]

"A text in Latin shall be used", I read, of a choral composition competition.

It turns out they are a bit more picky than that:

Only texts by the following Latin Authors will be accepted: Ovidio (Publius Ovidius Naso), Orazio (Quintus Horatius Flaccus), Virgilio (Publius Vergilius Maro), Catullo (Gaius Valerius Catullus), Marziale (Marcus Valerius Martialis), Lucrezio (Titus Lucretius Carus).

Being more a Christian sacred composer than anything else, and lacking a Classics background, I'm utterly unfamiliar with most of these. I understand Catullus is rather rude.

I suspect the pronunciation varies considerably from church Latin, too, though probably not so much that I can't set it well.

I feel a bit like this is a veiled attempt to filter out people who aren't posh enough, or haven't had the "right" educational background. I dislike those kinds of barriers to participation.

So: does anyone have any suggestions for me from those authors? Any passages you'd particularly like to hear me set to music?

Comments

[the_lady_lily]

Hi! Tell me more about this choral competition and the sort of things it is after! How much text are they/you after, in terms of lines? What would be the length of something you'd normally set? What kind of texts do you usually like setting?

[turkeyplucker]

Can't suggest any texts, I'm afraid, but I will say don't worry about the pronunciation. I see it's an Italian choir, so I wouldn't be surprised if they sing it Italianate anyway, and even if they do go for the classicists' "New Pronunciation" it's entirely interchangeable for singing purposes, just like Byrd, Tallis, Fauré &c. didn't set Italianate but work fine when sung that way.

[emperor]

At the risk of being very cheesy, one thing that stuck with me from GCSE Latin(!) was Catullus' poem to his late brother - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catullus_101

[cmcmck]

Marziale also has his moments of ahem! :o)

[siderea]

Warning! There's this whole thing about metrical feet in classical Latin poetry, based on vowel sounds, not (IIUC) emphasis. It works differently than the poetry we're used to. I'm assuming that if they want classical poets set, they're expecting familiarity/facility with the conventions of classical poetics.