On today’s date in 1998 at King’s Chapel in Boston, a new work by the American composer Daniel Pinkham received its first performance. Scored for baritone and organ and titled Three Latin Motets, it was intended as a birthday offering to Pinkham’s  fellow composer and colleague Ned Rorem, with a dedication that read, “For Ned Rorem and a half century of friendship.”

But the premiere occurred on the 75th anniversary of Pinkham’s birth, as a surprise at a concert in his honor. Organist James David Christie and baritone Sanford Sylvan had sneakily persuaded Pinkham to write the motets for Rorem, who was born in 1923 – the same year as Pinkham – but intended all along to premiere the music as a surprise at a concert in Pinkham’s honor.

Pinkham was noted for his church music, and once quipped, “I just like to hear my pieces more than once, and when you write music for the church you have a better chance at that… I [tell people] am available for weddings, funerals, and bar mitzvahs.”

Pinkham died in 2006, and Christie and Sylvan performed his Three Latin Motets once again in January of 2007— at Pinkham’s memorial service.

Daniel Pinkham (1923 - 2006) Three Latin Motets Aaron Engebreth, bar;Heinrich Christensen, o. Florestan FRP-1003