Opus 1339

Plymouth Soundings (2019)

for Organ

Erik Simmons, organ

Duration: 5.5 min.

Dedication: for Clive Jenkins, Richard Line, and Michael Eaton

Commission: Commissioned for the Mayflower 400 celebrations

Publisher: Goodmusic Publishing Ltd.

Performance materials available from the publisher.

Plymouth Soundings (2019) was composed for the Mayflower 400 celebrations (commemorating the voyage of the ship Mayflower in 1620 from Plymouth, England to establish Plymouth Colony in what is now Massachusetts). This festive work is dedicated to Clive Jenkins and Richard Line (originators of this project from Plymouth, England) and to Michael Eaton (organist at Church of the Pilgrimage, Plymouth, Massachusetts). The piece is a free fantasy on motives from psalm tunes found in the Ainsworth Psalter. This psalter, published in Amsterdam in 1612, was brought by the Pilgrims on their voyage. The collection proved seminal in the development of future American psalters and hymnody.