''The Little Match Girl Passion'' is a choral work by David Lang, based on the 1845 Hans Christian Andersen story, "

The Little Match Girl "The Little Match Girl" ( da, Den Lille Pige med Svovlstikkerne, meaning "The little girl with the sulphur-sticks", i.e. matches) is a literary fairy tale by Danish poet and author Hans Christian Andersen. The story, about a dying child's dre ...

". It is influenced by

Johann Sebastian Bach Johann Sebastian Bach (28 July 1750) was a German composer and musician of the late Baroque period. He is known for his orchestral music such as the '' Brandenburg Concertos''; instrumental compositions such as the Cello Suites; keyboard wo ...

’s '' St Matthew Passion'' (1727) and won the Pulitzer Prize for Music in 2008. The first performance was given at Carnegie Hall on 27 October 2007 with the Theatre of Voices conducted by

Paul Hillier Paul Douglas Hillier OBE (born 9 February 1949) is an English conductor, music director and baritone. He specializes in both early and contemporary classical music, especially that by composers Steve Reich and Arvo Pärt. He was a co-foun ...

. It is scored for chamber choir and four solo singers (SATB) who also play simple percussion. A recording was issued by French record label

Harmonia Mundi Harmonia Mundi is an independent record label which specializes in classical music, jazz, and world music (on the World Village label). It was founded in France in 1958 and is now a subsidiary of PIAS Entertainment Group. Its Latin name ''harm ...

in August 2009.

Program note

In his program note, David Lang writes:

Reception

In 2019, writers of ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

'' ranked ''The Little Match Girl Passion'' the 15th greatest work of art music since 2000, with Andrew Clements calling it "one of the most original vocal works of recent times. Extracts from Andersen’s story and from St Matthew’s gospel are interleaved with closely woven vocal writing, that is ..often comfortingly tonal and hauntingly affecting." ''The Little Match Girl Passion'' has been described as "a 21st century classic".

References

Compositions by David Lang 2009 compositions Pulitzer Prize for Music-winning works Music based on works by Hans Christian Andersen Works based on The Little Match Girl {{Classical-composition-stub