The purpose of this website to provide free, high quality resources for Orthodox choir directors, church members, or whomever might find them useful. These resources were created for use in the context of an OCA parish in the Diocese of the South (which primarily draws from the Slavic tradition), but they may be found useful to many others.
Contact us via email for any questions, comments, or concerns.
The majority of our resources are compiled in a Google Drive folder (accessible by the tab in the navigation menu) that is loosely organized by the liturgical text from which it is taken. These resources include sheet music with editable Lilypond (.ly) source files, "pointed" text, service outlines, rubrical notes and directions, etc... This library is constantly growing and being updated, so please reach out if there is something you need or would like to see added.
Additionally, OrthodoxMusicResource.com offers music notation services free of charge. If there is a piece of music that you need recreated or rehabilitated using our software, please reach out so we can work together. Please note that, due to the volunteer nature of our contributors, there is not a timeliness guarantee to this service.
OrthodoxMusicResource.com contributors are also available for questions, consultations, requests, or good chats.
This project began in an attempt to find music for my local parish choir. In 2017, when our parish priest retired and relocated after many years of dedicated service, he took our dedicated choir director (his wife) with him. With no directing experience, training, or network, and only 2 years of Orthodox life under my belt (my wife and I had been baptized on Holy Saturday of 2015), I was somehow convinced to take over leadership of our choir. I was woefully unprepared. In my struggle to find resources (mostly sheet music) to support the services at our parish, I discovered that there was shockingly few online sources of quality sheet music fit for our parish use. The things I could find were copies of copies of copies of... or were a slightly different arrangement, or slightly different translation, or only two parts, or two expensive for our (non-existent) budget to afford, etc...
With the help of a friend, I began to learn how to generate my own sheet music using a free program called Lilypond. I'm still learning, and I am by no means a "master" of anything. You can see the progress I've made as you compare some of the older files in the library to the newer ones! Through this process, I have learned way more than just a coding language. I've learned about music theory, liturgics, human psychology, and most importantly, that I still have lots to learn (more on that in the "Disclaimers" section below).
Our parish, music program, and leadership team have grown in these last few years. My music library has grown exponentially as well. At a certain point, I realized that I had a collection that others might find useful as well. I decided to open up my library to any who may seek or find it in the hope that I can help at least 1 person who was in the same position as me a few years ago. Through the power of our Lord Jesus Christ, may this resource be a blessing to you and those around you!
Trey Lewis
Operator at OrthodoxMusicResource.com
OrthodoxMusicResource.com is completely independent and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or supported by any church or organization. Contributors to this site are members of local parishes, and many of the resources on this site have been prepared for use in those parishes.
All resources on this site are free for liturgical use (unless marked otherwise). Most of the material on this site was created by the site operators, though some has been taken from other available resources. All material created for this site (things that look like this, for example) is expressly free for liturgical use or otherwise. Please be mindful and respectful of the unique usage conditions for other material found on this site. If you have any questions, please reach out.
Documents in the Menaion are "pointed" for usage in the Obikhod Eight-Tone system. Translations are are a mixture from OCA.org, Holy Transfiguration Monastery, St. Tikhon's Monastery, St. John of Kronstadt Press, St-Sergius.org, and others. No translation work has been performed by OrthodoxMusicResources.com.
All material on this website has been created or otherwise compiled by volunteer lay-people with no formal training in either music or liturgics. These volunteers are faithful Orthodox christians simply seeking to help their brothers and sisters in Christ. Much of the material on this site was created for "common" usage in a parish and reflects the often messy/iterative/very-human nature of that practice. Any and all errors (and there are surely some) are not intentional. You can help improve this resource by notifying us of errors as you find them.