‘Do not turn away your face’ (sung by Matthaios Tsamkiranis)
18 March 2019
In Great Lent, the Orthodox Church, through its long, penitential services, seeks the mystical experience and approach of the Passion and the Resurrection. With this in mind, the hymns of this period are of an appropriate content, and present the events of our salvation to us the faithful. The joyful sorrow of Great Lent is introduced into the liturgical cycle of services by Penitential Vespers which is celebrated every Sunday evening. At this service the Great Prokeimenon is sung:
‘Do not turn away your face from your servant, for I am afflicted. Hear me speedily; attend to my soul and deliver it’. (Ps. 68, 18).
Sung here, in tone plagial 4, by the late master of the art of church chant, Matthaios Tsamkiranis
