Ode for St. Cecilia's Day, HWV 76, is a cantata composed by George Frideric Handel in 1739.

Handel sets a poem which the English poet John Dryden wrote in 1687.

The main theme of the text is the Pythagorean theory of harmonia mundi, that music was a central force in the Earth's creation.

When nature, underneath a heap Of jarring atoms lay, And could not heave her head.

TENOR: The trumpet's loud clangour excites us to arms, With shrill notes of anger and mortal alarms, The double-double-double beat, Of the thund'ring drum, Cries hark!

SOPRANO: The soft complaining flute In dying notes discovers The woes of hopeless lovers, Whose dirge is whispered by the warbling lute.

SOPRANO: Orpheus could lead the savage race, And trees uprooted left their place Sequacious of the lyre: But bright Cecilia raised the wonder higher: When to her Organ vocal breath was given An Angel heard, and straight appeared – Mistaking Earth for Heaven.

SOPRANO: As from the power of sacred lays The spheres began to move, And sung the great Creator's praise To all the blest above; So when the last and dreadful hour This crumbling pageant shall devour, The trumpet shall be heard on high,