01:00 AM EDT on Tuesday, September 13, 2005

By CHANNING GRAY
Journal Arts Writer

Jazz great Dave Brubeck has been trying to write a choral piece based on the Ten Commandments for almost 60 years. This weekend, in a church in downtown Pawtucket, he got to hear it for the first time.

And he liked what he heard.

"I think it's strong," said Brubeck to his longtime conductor Russell Gloyd.

"It's better than strong," said Gloyd, who had just finished a three-hour rehearsal with the Providence Singers. The Singers will be traveling to New York's Lincoln Center tomorrow to give the world premiere of the six-minute score, which is a big deal for a group of local choristers. The performance is part of the New York Jewish Music & Heritage Festival.

Brubeck first worked with the Singers a little more than a year ago when they sang his Gates of Justice at the JVC Jazz Festival-Newport. When the Jewish Music Festival asked Brubeck for an encore presentation of Gates, the Singers were again called upon. They were also asked to learn The Commandments. The group jumped at the opportunity to be forever tied to the first performance of a Brubeck composition.

Brubeck, who is almost 85, missed the rehearsal of The Commandments. He was tired and slept late. But Gloyd gave a special encore presentation for the composer once he showed up. Brubeck gave the group a big hand.

Brubeck, best known for his famed jazz quartet, is looking a little frail these days. But he has not slowed down all that much. He had to hit the road after rehearsal to make it to the Syracuse Jazz Festival, where he was to perform.

Asked if he were playing a lot, Brubeck shot back, "Do you eat every day?" He gave the same reply when asked about his composing load.

"Even if I had another life to live, I wouldn't catch up with all that's unfinished," he said.

While most people think of Brubeck as a jazz artist, his choral writing is remarkably diverse, demonstrating his background in mainstream academic writing. He studied with Darius Milhaud and Arnold Schoenberg.

Brubeck's Gates of Justice was written in 1969 at the request of three Cincinnati rabbis for a meeting of world Jewish leaders in Miami. The piece set out to draw parallels between the experiences of Jews and African Americans. The text was taken from Jewish writings and the speeches of Martin Luther King Jr.

The Commandments, on the other hand, is less involved. It's an a cappella setting of the Commandments, right out of the Bible. Brubeck said he first got the idea to write the piece during the Battle of the Bulge in World War II. But he never got around to it until about a year ago.

He said the score is difficult and that most of it is a fugue, which means the same tune overlaps itself at different pitches.

Brubeck has even written in the style of Mozart. He was one of four composers picked to complete the composer's great unfinished C Minor Mass. Brubeck said he worked on the Credo section.

In December, when he turns 85, he'll be doing a couple of concerts in London, one with his quartet and then a few days later a performance of his Christmas Cantata.

"You can't believe how busy I am," said Brubeck.