January 29, 2012 - Epiphany 4

Symphonie VI: "Cantabile" - Charles-Marie Widor

Cantique de Jean Racine - Gabriel Faure

Ubi Caritas - Maurice Durufle

Hymns: #536 TORAH SONG, #339 SCHMUCKE DICH, #538 LUCINA LAUDONIAE
The music for Sunday comes to us from the rich French Romantic tradition of the late 19th century. Charles-Marie Widor was born in Lyons to a family of organ builders. He began his career as an organist at age 11 and soon sparked the interest of Cavaillé-Coll, the famous organ builder. Cavaillé-Coll made arrangements for Widor to study at the Brussels Conservatory with the renowned organist Nicolas-Jacques Lemmens. Upon completion of his studies he moved to Paris where he was appointed organist of the five manual, 100 stop organ at St. Sulpice in 1870 where he remained for 64 years. Influenced by the organs of Cavaillé-Coll, Widor created a new medium that he called the “organ symphony,” a multi-movement work for organ that borrows its forms from the traditional orchestral symphony which allowed Widor to explore the orchestral capabilities of the Caviellé-Coll organs. Symphonie VI in g minor was composed in 1878 for the inauguration of the organ at the Trocadéro and was premiered there on August 24 by the composer. The overall structure of the symphony alternates slow and fast movements as well as alternating tonal centers. The first and third movements are in g minor while the fifth is in G major. The Cantabile is the most melodically driven of the five movements. It has been suggested that this movement is a “tip of the hat” to Franck whose Trois Pièces were premiered at the same concert series. This movement varies the melody and accompaniment in such a way that what starts as an accompaniment becomes more of a countermelody than an accompanimental figure. This piece is more evocative of orchestral writing than organ writing lending credibility to Widor’s idea of the “organ symphony.”

The gradual anthem is by Gabriel Faure who, for a breif time (1871-1874), served as the choirmaster under Widor at St. Sulpice. There are stories of the two trading improvisations during the service each trying to outdo the other. The Cantique de Jean Racine Op. 11 garnered Faure the first prize for composition in 1865. Faure continued in church positions and in 1874 was appointed the organist at the Madeleineas choirmaster to Theodore Dubois and in 1896 become titular organist. In 1896 he also was appointed as a professor of composition at the Paris Conservatoire and in 1905 became the director of the Paris Conservatoire. Faure was well loved by his students and colleagues and greatly appreciated for his forward thinking approach to composition. The Cantique is one of Faure's earliest compositions.

The voices sing the hymn accompanied by flowing triplets in the organ interspersed with a interludes which feature a solo flute.

The text is by the French dramatist Jean Racine (1639-1699). Racine has been heralded as one of the most important literary figures in Western history despite the fact that his works are largely untranslatable.  The text of the hymn is:

Word of God the most high, our sole hope, Eternal day of the earth and heavens

As we break the silence of the peaceful night Divine saviour, look down upon us.

Imbue us with the fire of thy great mercy so that hell itself will flee at the sound of your voice

Disperse the sleep which leads our languishing souls to stray from the path of righteousness.

O Christ show your favour to your faithful people who have come together to worship you

Receive the praises that they offer up to your immortal glory

And may they come back laden with the gift of your grace.

The voices sing the hymn accompanied by flowing triplets in the organ interspersed with a interludes which feature a solo flute.

The communion anthem is by Maurice Durufle. It is his setting of one of teh antiphons for footwashing for Holy Thursday. The melody was composed sometime between the 4th and 10th centuries or even before and is ususally sung at the Eucharistic Adoration. Durufle maintains the flow of the plainchant by allowing the meter to change constantly. The piece feels like a plainchant that has been harmonized because that is essentially what it is. It also gives the lower voices a chance to shine. The text is:

Where charity and love are, God is there.
Christ's love has gathered us into one.
Let us rejoice and be pleased in Him.
Let us fear, and let us love the living God.
And may we love each other with a sincere heart

January 22, 2012 - Epiphany 3

Fantasie in d minor KV 397 - W.A. Mozart
De Profundis KV 93
God Is Our Refuge KV 20
Fantasie in f minor KV 608

Hymns: LEVAS#14 Soon and Very Soon, #469 St. Helena, #533 Lyons

This week's music is all Mozart for no reason other than the anthems that best fit the text for the day both happened to have settings by him and the opening hymn necessitated the use of the piano so I decided on a piano prelude. The prelude this week is Mozart's Fantasie in d minor KV 397. I am only playing the first section (in minor). This piece opens with arpeggios and then goes into a much more measured theme. This piece captures a great deal of emotion and has quite a bit of contrast. The theme in the right hand is played above throbbing chords in the left hand which breaks way to an obsessive repeated note. After this a much more agitated theme comes in leading to a "grand pause" before the return of the first theme in a new key. A fast scalar figure is then introduced which serves as bookends to the "agitated" second theme. The first theme returns again this time in the original key and through a deceptive cadence moves to the second part of the piece (not heard on Sunday) in a major key.

The postlude is one of only three solo organ works written by Mozart. Late in his life Mozart underwent much financial difficulty and was forced to accept commissions which were less then artistically fulfilling. These pieces were not composed for the organ in the way that traditionally think of it but instead for the mechanical organ in the Muller Exhibition Hall and Mausoleum. Mozart is said to have hated the small pipes of this organ which caused everything to be high and shrill. The work - despite the medium it was composed for is one of Mozart's best. The fugue in it is very sophisticated and rivals that of the Jupiter symphony. There are musicians who feel this piece cannot be played by human organists because it was designed for a machine which could execute the technical demands of the piece perfectly. There are also versions of this for piano four-hands and more recently for orchestra.

The two choral works for Sunday are both by Mozart - sort of. The first De Profundis (Psalm 129) may not be written by Mozart at all but instead by Carl Georg Reutter (1708-1772) a court composer at the Habsburg court in Vienna. The British Museum has a copy of the score in Mozart's hand dated 1771 but recent scholarship has shown that the music in the British Museum may just be a copy of the continuo part for the Reutter piece and a result of Mozart studying the traditions of church music in Vienna at the time. The communion anthem God is our Refuge was written by Mozart at age 9. It is his earliest surviving piece of vocal music and the only time he ever set an English text. It is possible that this piece was based on a suggested melody. Some of the piece is written in Mozart's hand but apparently his father Leopold stepped in to help his son with  some wandering bar lines.
 

January 15, 2012 - Epiphany 2

Brightest and Best - Robert A. Hobby

Star in the East - Howard Boatwright

Wondrous Love - Paul J. Christiansen

Wie Schon Leuctet der Morgenstern - Johann Ludwig Krebs

 

Hymns: #7 Ratisbon, #124 Puer Nobis, #497 Wie Schon Leuchtet

 

The prelude and gradual anthem for Sunday have the common Epiphany text by Reginald Heber Brightest and Best are the stars of the morning as their theme. However, the two pieces use different tunes as the thematic material.  The prelude is by Robert A. Hobby (see the notes for last Sunday's postlude for more information on him) and sets the text to the tune MORNING STAR which it is commonly paired with. This tune comes to us from the pen of James (John) P. Harding (1859[ish] - 1911) [the date of his birth is a bit in question]. Harding served as organist and choirmaster at St. Andrew's Church in Islington, London for 35 years and wrote a considerable amount of sacred music, especially for the Children's festivals at Islington. The organ setting features the tune played on alternating solo registrations in the right hand with lush string accompaniment in the left. The setting is quiet and reverent and depicts a calm and quiet scene as shepherds and wise men journey to the manger.

 

The Boatwright setting takes full advantage of the imagery of the text. It is very simply structured with 4 verses and identical refrains after each verse. The anthem states the tune is "based on a Kentucky Harmony version of the Folk-hymn, as sung by Mrs. Rachel Ritchie, contained in 'Songs of all Time'." The piece was published in 1959 - the same year that Mr. Boatwright went to India on Fulbright and Rockefeller grants to study Indian music in Bombay. This piece, as is true of much of his choral music from this period was probably written for the St. Thomas church in New Haven, CT where he served as music director from 1952-1964. The piece has a Kentucky Harmony feel to it with all four parts joining with gusto on each refrain. The first and last verses are for full choir although, again in the Sacred Harp style the tenors get the melody for the last verse with the other three parts providing commentary around them. The middle two verses feature the women and men respectively. The women sing in canon, the men for their verse sing a much darker chromatic line about bringing treasures to the manger. The setting captures all of the richness of Heber's text as well as the modality and style of the American hymn tune to which it is sometimes connected.

 

For the Communion anthem we again turn to and American folk hymn from the Sacred Harp tradition, Wondrous Love. This hymn has the feel of a spiritual with the modality and text of an Appalachian Folk tune. The arrangement is by Paul J. Christiansen, the son of the famed F. Melius Christiansen, conductor of the St. Olaf Choir. Paul J. spent the bulk of his career developing the Concordia Choir into one of the worlds finest a cappella undergraduate choirs. Christiansen was known for his rigorous two hour daily rehearsals working to get the exact shape of the phrase and the exact tone that he wanted on each chord. Christiansen was recognized as a foremost authority on the application of artistic discipline to choral work. For me, the subtleties of this arrangement perfectly showcase Christiansen's ideals. He doesn't need to alter the melody or do anything too extreme. He merely highlights the innate beauty of the tune and well-matched text.

 

The postlude is a settin of the closing hymn WIE SCHON LEUCHTET which has been dubbed the "Queen of chorale tunes." The tune is by Philipp Nicolai who also penned the "King of chorale tunes" WACHET AUF. The setting is by Johann Ludwig Krebs whose career spanned the end of the Baroque period to the beginning of the Classical period. Due to the changing face of music he was largely unappreciated during his lifetime. Krebs was first taught by his father who had been a student of J.S. Bach. Krebs later attended the Thomasschule where Bach was the music director and continued to sing for Bach until 1730. Krebs held positions as organist at several churches but never the high profile jobs that he deserved. his organ works are similar in style and caliber to those of Bach. This piece is a ritornello chorale prelude. The organ plays the ritornello (a recurring passage of music) and then the left hand enters with the chorale tune. The tune and ritornello are combined and the piece closes with just the ritornello returning.

January 8, 2012 - Epiphany 1

Christ unser Herr zum Jordan Kam - Johann Pachelbel
This Little Babe from Ceremony of Carols - Benjamin Britten
Of the Father's Heart Begotten - arr. Sir David Willcocks
Songs of Thankfulness and Praise - arr. Robert A. Hobby


Hymns: #135 Salzbury, Restoration, #121 Caithness


The organ music and the choir music this week are quite separate in their mood and traditions but do have one thing in common, the melody is always presented in the simplest of fashions. Each composer/arranger goes to great lengths to preserve the integrity of the tune that he is working with. The prelude is a setting of Christ unser Herr zum Jordan Kam by Johann Pachelbel (1653-1706). Pachelbel is one of the most influential Baroque composers of the South German school. Although primarily known at this point for his Canon in D, he is the composer of a great deal of music, much of it composed for the church. Almost half of Pachelbel's existing organ music is chorale based. These chorales were primarily composed during his time as organist in Erfurt where it was expected that he would continue to develop as a composer and demonstrated this by composing chorale preludes as well as one large chorale work each year that would demonstrate personal growth. His chorale settings unlike others by Buxtehude are much more simple. The chorale tune is often presented in a simple unadorned fashion in the outer voices (in this case in the pedal) while the other 2-4 voices provide counterpoint. The manuals in this piece play flowing 16th notes which help to evoke the image of the Jordan river to which Christ came to be baptized.

The postlude is a toccata like setting of the opening hymn Songs of Thankfulness and Praise by Robert A. Hobby (b. 1962). Mr. Hobby is Director of Music for Trinity English Lutheran Church in Fort Wayne, Indiana and has  had his music published by several publishing companies. Much like the Pachelbel, this hymn setting features the hymn tune in the pedals with swirling figures in the manuals.

The choir music this week has a British flavor to it. The communion anthem is a setting of Of the Father's Heart Begotten by the English conductor, composer and organist Sid David Willcocks. Willcocks received his early musical training as a chorister at Westminter Abbey and continued his studies at King's College, Cambridge. WWII brought an interuption to these studies and Willcocks joined the infantry in 1941. After teh war he returned to his studies taking positions at Salisbury Cathedral, Worcester Cathedral and from 1957-1974 as Director of Music at King's College, Cambridge. Willcocks has received many honors and prestigious awards and appointments throughout his long career. His music continues to be performed throughout the world and as General editor of Church Music for Oxford University Press he has helped to shape the tradition of liturgical Church Music. This setting of Of the Father's Heart is very simple and allows the beauty of the tune and the text to shine through. The men and women alternate verses for the first five verses before coming together for the final verse for full choir.

This Little Babe is the final movement of Part 1 of Benjamin Britten's Ceremony of Carols Op. 28. This work was composed in 1942 while Britten and longtime friend Peter Pears were crossing the Atlantic on a trip from the US back to England. Britten had brought along two technical manuals on the harp to read as research for a harp concerto that he planned to write so it is likely that this explains his choice of the harp as accompaniment for the work. The piece was originally scored for three part treble voices and (perhaps at the urging of his publisher) was rescored for four part adult voices. The text for this movement was written by Robert Southwell, a Jesuit priest during the reign of Elizabeth I. It is likely that Southwell wrote this text during his three year imprisonment in the Tower of London for treason. Southwell was hung, drawn and quartered in 1595 for his beliefs and works as a Catholic missionary. In 1929 he was beatified by Pope Paul VI as one of the forty Martyrs of England and Wales. The text for This Little Babe is taken from the final four stanzas of the poem New Heaven, New War published after his death. The piece starts with the choir in unison and then goes to two part and later three part canon before bringing the choir back together, this time with big lush harmonies before the final two lines of the poem which modulate to a major key to bring the movement (and that section of the work) to a triumphal close. Throughout the movement the melody is presented in the same way. We hear the melody simply stated in unison and then broken into a round - but not changed. Even the last section in major is still the same basic melody and is still unaltered.