Introduction to the work and its composer Dan Forrest
Dan Forrest published his first choral piece, an arrangement of the hymn “Sun of My Soul,” in 2001. He was 23 years old and working on a degree in piano performance at the time. Beckenhorst Press, a major sacred music publisher, accepted the work after several others had rejected it, little knowing that Forrest would end up as an assistant editor for the organization and as the primary accompanist for their demo recordings. While Forrest had done some arranging and composing in his high school and college years, he concentrated on the piano until, as he says, “Eventually I just got kind of tired of the piano, where you press a note and it dies.” (See the J. W. Pepper video below for the full interview.) He became more and more interested in vocal music, eventually earning his doctorate in composition. He’s also studied with a number of prominent American choral composers, among them Alice Parker, whom Forrest considers to be a foremost influence. He’s now much in demand as a composer, arranger, conductor, speaker and clinician and has left full-time teaching so that he can devote more time to his own writing.