Amen

Finzi’s festival anthem, Lo, the full, final sacrifice (1946), commissioned for the choir of St Matthew’s Church, Northampton, UK, is a work adored by singers, especially those in the British choral tradition. It contains some of the composer’s finest music, and in particular the closing Amen is one of the most remarkable and poignant pieces of choral writing of its period. The original eight-part scoring is here reduced to four, thus making this exquisite excerpt available for separate performance, especially in choral church services where a closing Amen is customarily sung after the Blessing.