Katharine Parton (b. 1982)
Conductor; Composer
Works published by MoV
Gaudebat et Ridebat! (SSATB & snare drum)
Gaudebat et Ridebat! (SSATB & snare drum)
Gaudebat et Ridebat! was composed for Fitzwilliam College Chapel Choir and was premièred in November 2015. The text is taken from the Stabat Mater speciosa, attributed to Jacopone da Todi (1230 – 1306), which celebrates the Nativity. The stanza from which the principle lyrics are taken is often translated as ‘O how happy and laughing, and exultant did she watch, the birth of her divine son’. Gaudebat et Ridebat! is a celebration, in which the joyous momentum of the melodic material is juxtaposed with a shifting and uncertain rhythmic footing.
Gaudebat et Ridebat! (SSATB & snare drum)
This work is published in our anthology Volume 3 and as a licenced digital pdf
To order the sheet music click on the buttons below.
Perusal score coming soon
(August 2025)
Katharine Parton (b. 1982)
Katharine Parton is an Australian conductor and composer who champions opportunities for young women conductors. She is currently completing a PhD on conductor gesture and orchestral interaction at the University of Melbourne, having spent three years as Director of Music and Bye-Fellow at Fitzwilliam College, University of Cambridge. She has received national and international awards recognising the innovative nature of her work on cognition, music and gesture. Her own composition centres on the juxtaposition of the natural world and technology. Her works have been workshopped and performed in England, Scotland and Australia by groups including Voces8 and the Fitzwilliam College Chapel Choir.
Katherine comments on her composition
'Gaudebat et Ridebat! is an advent carol, written about Mary as an expectant mother. My intent in writing this piece was to take Mary’s perspective on the Nativity; understanding Mary as a symbol for all expectant mothers, this piece reinterprets Mary’s story through the lived experience of pregnancy and birth. Mary, like all mothers, would have felt tremendous joy and love about and for her child, and yet this last moment of pregnancy is one fraught with uncertainty and the unknown – and even more so in the context of the Nativity and the birth of the Son of God.'