Ola Gjeilo’s ‘Second Eve’

I walked into the kitchen this morning to hear this beautiful piece of music being sung. But who was the composer?I just couldn’t work it out.

The answer, it transpired, was Ola Gjeilo, a Norwegian composer now resident in the USA. And the words he set in ‘Second Eve’ are these:

Sancta Maria, Regina caeli, 

Dulcis et pia, o mater Dei:

Ora pro nobis peccatoribus, 

Ut cum electis videamus.

Ave Maria, gratia plena,

Dominus tecum:

Benedicta tu in mulieribus,

Et benedictus fructus ventris tui,

Iesus Christus. Amen.

A great prayer to hear emerging from the radio in the morning.

If you want to hear more, the performers were Voces8, whose album Eventide (which includes Gjeilo’s ‘Second Eve’) has been receiving rave reviews.