This work is a setting of the traditional Common Table Prayer (“Come, Lord Jesus, be our guest”). I wrote two versions and packaged them together: an accompanied chorale for SATB choir with piano or organ, and a four-part round for children’s voices. Kristi Vaiden commissioned this work, as a winner of fundraiser auction for Princeton Pro Musica. She requested the Norwegian tempo-character markings that head each piece, and provided the dedications.

The chorale (Med takknemlighet, “thankfully”), dedicated “thankful for John and Marjorie’s table,” is a lilting 6/8 in G major. Its moving eighth notes and simple harmonies carry the prayer’s first two lines. At “Blessed be God who is our bread” the harmony turns suddenly to E-flat major, setting the heavenly against the earthly, the gift of God against the gift of food. The music then returns home to G major for the closing blessing, “May all the world be clothed and fed.” It is suggested to sing the chorale through twice, the first time in unison and the second in parts.

The round (Gledesfylt, “joyously”), dedicated “thankful for Caroline, Joanne, and Nancy’s joyful voices,” sets the prayer’s opening couplet as a straightforward four-part round for young singers. It features a steady quarter-note rhythm, plain consonant harmony, and a single statement, easy to learn quickly and to sing with gusto. Together, the two settings give a congregation and its children a shared table grace, each in a form suited to its singers.

The text is the traditional Common Table Prayer: