O Saviour of the World (John Goss) arr for Clarinet Quartet

O Saviour of the World by Sir John Goss
Transcribed for Clarinet Quartet by Hugh Levey

This quartet is a transcription of an emotional choral anthem by Sir John Goss (1800 to 1881) who was a professor of harmony at the Royal Academy of Music in London for over 50 years and was also the organist at St. Paul's Cathedral. It uses words from the Anglican Book of Common Prayer and the Catholic Missal.

O Saviour of the World  was written in 1869 and is very much of the 19th century Victorian era with its powerful words and emotive harmonies. John Goss was organist at St Paul's Cathedral in London where he also wrote Praise my Soul the King of Heaven (1868) and See Amidst the Winter Snow (1871), which are more commonly performed today than O Saviour of the World.

Goss was a professor of harmony and composition at the Royal Academic of Music in London for more than fifty years, where his pupils included the young Sir Arthur Sullivan who would go on to enjoy much success as a composer in his own right. I think we can hear the influence of Goss's choral writing in the choruses of Gilbert and Sullivan light operas, even though the subject matter and context is very different. Goss was also a huge influence on the composer John Stainer who was a choral scholar under his tutelage at St Paul's Cathedral.

An instrumental transcription such as this loses the emotional impact provided by the text, but we can still hear the emotion through the musical techniques employed by the composer; such as sequences of overlapping lines, unexpected harmonies, the contrast between smooth legato passages and declamation, and the sudden change to unison for emphasis, all with carefully thought out dynamics.

Duration - 2’ 45” to 3' depending on tempo.