John Tavener (b. 1944) represents a generation of British composers who, as composer Benjamin Britten noticed, ceased subscribing to the avant garde insistent on rejecting the past and, instead, embraced it in their art. Tavener converted to Russian Orthodoxy in 1977. This is one of his many works having a direct origin in Orthodox hymns and rituals.

Tavener's mother died in 1985. Grief affected him so much that he was unable to compose for some time. He then found his inspiration in two Orthodox Hymns to the Mother of God.

Tavener achieves, as he often has, a timeless sense in this music. The melodic forms and harmonies derive from renaissance practice and from Russian and Byzantine religious music. The first hymn comes from a text of St. Basil in praise of the Mother of God. Tavener sets it for double chorus. The work is a strict canon, with the second chorus repeating the material of the first chorus exactly, but three beats behind. This results in a mystical and lovely texture where the harmonies are blurred.

The second text is from the vigil service called the Dormition (Falling Asleep) of the Mother of God, a very important observance in the Orthodox faith. Here the main melody is given to the tenor voices while the remaining voices since sustained triads or, at the end, a succession of parallel consonant chords. The effect is pure and timeless

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