Choose the Light 6: JUDGEMENT DAY

Instrumentation

as above

Score, download - 13.85MB

Other Information

THE WORDS OF CHOOSE THE LIGHT

Choose The Light´ is a phrase culled from the young people´s writing. It perfectly expresses the complex moral choices that face all of us, and the importance of seeking peace and reconciliation. Choose the Light begins with words of the medieval hymn, Dies Iræ, the Day of Wrath, and ends with a setting of lines based on the Coventry Litany of Reconciliation written after the Cathedral was bombed in 1940, which we use with the permission of the Cathedral. The shift from the aggressive and forceful music of the Dies Iræ to the tender and merciful Litany maps the move from anger to reconciliation and peace. Between them come the songs of the individual schools. The piece begins with the appeal to ´Choose the Light´ almost overwhelmed by the Dies Iræ, the thirteenth-century Latin hymn describing the Day of Judgement, when the last trumpet will summon souls before the throne of God, the saved will be delivered and the doomed cast into eternal flames.

The School Songs: Wyken Croft Primary School – Judgement Day

Ask yourself: are you going to Heaven,

Or are you going to Hell?

The ancient painting of the world, when it ends,

Glares from above, high and proud,

Looks down like a judge in a courtroom

Straight through me and into my soul.

Ancient and aged, painted years ago,

Staring, intimidating, convincing people to be good.

The earth tremor was a warning from God.

Ask yourself: are you going to Heaven,

Or are you going to Hell?

The legendary painting looks into my heart

Judging me already before I know,

Staring eagerly down at us, like a vicar from the pulpit.

I stand, look up; sorry, small, frightened, helpless,

Thinking – should I behave better?

Take this as a warning:

I have a choice – be good, be bad.

Will I go up the stairs to Heaven or down to the mouth of Hell?

This living painting has a purpose;

This very painting will burn through my soul.

Ask yourself: are you going to Heaven,

Or are you going to Hell?

Waking from their graves,

People rise from their old coffins, bodies from their shrouds:

Mary and John pleading,

Jesus, sitting majestically in peace, scars on hands and feet,

Would decide their final fate.

Jesus gave His life for us,

Now we do the same.

Life flows into death, and death is part of life.

Ask yourself: are you going to Heaven,

Or are you going to Hell?

This magnificent art painted six centuries ago,

Lost then found again, preserved, invincible,

Brought back from the dead

Like Jesus, life after death.

Since then it stands, restored in glory,

Warning Judgement is near, here on Earth,

A lesson for us all.

Will I rest in peace?

Ask yourself: are you going to Heaven,

Or are you going to Hell?