Ex Multis (2025)

My composition draws inspiration from two liturgical sources of personal fascination: the Byzantine Kyrie (5th grave mode), passed down by Nileos Kamaradou, and the Roman Catholic Exsultet hymn of the Easter Vigil. Both instil in me a deep sense of mysticism and carry spiritual weight within their traditions. They convey common fundamental concepts: forgiveness and resurrection. These are not abstract ideas but shared pillars of East and West, present in penitential and paschal practice, central to the spirituality of both traditions. By letting them sound together, the work seeks to show how the light from distinct traditions could be bundled, as if by a prism, into one voice, building a bridge to the future.

Contemplating the compositional concept, I remembered the biblical passage: “For as the body is one, and hath many members, and all the members of that one body,
being many, are one body: so also is Christ. ” (1 Corinthians 12:12). To me, it represents an essential idea: unity through difference. This concept is at the core of my composition.

Musically, the work is based on a mode that combines essentials from Byzantine and Roman motifs, not hiding their differences but drawing out their continuity and potential for transformation and innovation. Examples are polyphony set against homophony, or drones transformed into ostinatos, taking on a driving force. Innovation comes through reworking these elements in a contemporary idiom, allowing the motifs to meet, resist, and transform into something new. Friction means not battle but is part of a learning process.

My composition aims to let the two worlds enter into dialogue, their voices resonating together until they become one body. This is the bridge between Byzantine and Roman traditions, keeping the character of each while drawing them into conversation and pointing toward unity in diversity.