Choral, Instrumental and Chamber Music Compositions and Arrangements

Welcome to this portfolio of musical compositions and arrangements, and thank you for your interest!
In the right-hand column beneath here you should see an alphabetical list of works. You can also choose a list of works with a particular label. Alternatively, you can search for a keyword. (Transcriptions and unpublishable works are listed in a page linked at the bottom, if you are interested.) The files here are all freely available. They do carry copyright, but feel free to adapt and/or perform them as you wish, as long as you print/acknowledge the originator (me!) It is always nice to hear from you if you use any of these compositions and arrangements (my email: philiplebas@gmail.com), but this is not a requirement. My main hope, as for many composers, is simply that the works are performed and appreciated. Happy music-making!
Philip

Key to linked files:
pdf = printed score or parts
mp3 = sound file
midi = midi sound file
mxl = compressed MusicXML source file
sib = Sibelius source file, mostly in Sibelius 8 or Sibelius Ultimate format
sib 6 = Sibelius version 6 source file

For access to many of these works via a commercial publisher, go to SheetMusicPlus/published-by-Philip-Le Bas.

Rorate Coeli

Scoring: SATB choir and organ
Date: 2017
This setting of the traditional Advent plainchant is based around a harmonized refrain using the original Latin words: "Rorate coeli de super et nubes pluant justum" ("Drop down, O heavens, from above and let the skies pour down *justice".) The music and the words express the Advent theme of a cry for justice and salvation in the midst of despair. The traditional verses making up the Advent Prose, based on various parts of scripture, are sung in English unison plainchant, and they express the feelings of one living through a disaster (specifically the fall of Jerusalem in the sixth century BC.) The third and fourth stanzas become more hopeful in their words, especially the famous words (from Isaiah 40) "Comfort, O comfort my people," Here the setting introduces some gentle harmonization, leading to a final return of the "Rorate" chorus in unison and a harmonized hope-filled coda. 
Links: pdf mp3 midi mxl sib

Words:
Rorate coeli de super et nubes pluant justum
1.
Turn your fierce anger from us, O Lord,
and remember not our sins for ever.
Your holy cities have become a desert,
Zion a wilderness,
Jerusalem a desolation;
our holy and beautiful house,
where our ancestors praised you.

2.
We have sinned and become like one who is unclean;
we have all withered like a leaf,
and our iniquities like the wind have swept us away.
You have hidden your face from us,
and abandoned us to our iniquities.

3.
You are my witnesses, says the Lord,
and my servant whom I have chosen,
that you may know me and believe me.
I myself am the Lord,
and none but I can deliver;
what my hand holds, none can snatch away.

4.
Comfort, O comfort my people,
my salvation shall not be delayed.
I have swept your offences away like a cloud;
fear not for I will save you.
I am the Lord your God,
the Holy One of Israel,your redeemer.

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