All-Night Vigil | |
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Sacred choral music by Sergei Rachmaninoff | |
Opus | 37 |
Text | All-night vigil |
Language | Church Slavonic |
Dedication | Stepan Smolensky |
Performed | 23 March 1915 Moscow : |
Movements | 15 |
Scoring | SATB choir |
The All-Night Vigil (Pre-reform Russian: Всенощное бдѣніе, Vsénoshchnoye bdéniye; Modern Russian: Всенощное бдение) is an a cappella choral composition by Sergei Rachmaninoff, his Op. 37, premiered on 10/23 March 1915 in Moscow.
The piece consists of settings of texts taken from the Russian Orthodox All-night vigil ceremony. It has been praised as Rachmaninoff's finest achievement[1] and "the greatest musical achievement of the Russian Orthodox Church".[2] It was one of Rachmaninoff's two favorite compositions[3] along with The Bells, and the composer requested that its fifth movement (Нынѣ отпущаеши, Nunc dimittis) be sung at his funeral.[3]
The title of the work is often mis-translated as Vespers. This is both literally and conceptually incorrect as applied to the entire work; only the first six of its fifteen movements set texts from the Russian Orthodox canonical hour of Vespers.