The (Song of Mary) and the (Song of Simeon) are biblical
canticles.
Mary sings the Magnificat ("My soul doth magnify the Lord") on the occasion of her
visit to
Elizabeth, as narrated in the
Gospel of Luke (). Simeon sings the Nunc dimittis ("Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace") when
Jesus is presented in the temple (). The canticles are part of the daily service of
Evening Prayer in the Anglican church and have been set to music frequently. Howells set the combination of Magnificat and Nunc dimittis 20 times, taking the words from the
Book of Common Prayer. The ''St Paul's Service'' is scored for a
four-part choir and
organ. He finished it at his home in
Barnes, London, on 26 December 1950. He later wrote that this was "the most extended in scale" of the canticle settings he wrote, and that the "great spaces" of St Paul's influenced the music, since the cathedral's long
echo meant that changes of harmony and tonality had to take place in "more spacious ways" than if it was a less reverberant building. While this meant that "climaxes are built more slowly", he said that it led to a "heightened volume of sound, and a tonal opulence commensurate with a vast church." The composer's biographer,
Christopher Palmer, described the ''St Paul's Service'' as being one of the three Howells canticle settings that "tower above the rest" – the others being his settings for
King's College, Cambridge (
Collegium Regale) and the
Gloucester Service – where the music "burns through the words' patina of familiarity into a dramatic and purposeful entity", while reflecting their "constantly varying nuances and inflections". == Recordings ==