Elijah: "Be Not Afraid" - Felix Mendelssohn
Messiah: "But Thou Didst Not Leave His Soul In Hell"
- G.F. Handel
Chaconne in C - Dietrich Buxtehude
Hymns: #192 Vreuchten, #193 Puer nobis,
#209 St. Botolph
This week is a bit of a German extravaganza as we prepare to
sing Mendelssohn’s epic oratorio, Elijah. We will present a preview of this,
using the chorus “Be Not Afraid” as our gradual anthem. We are also traveling
backwards through time chronologically with our composers starting the morning
with Hindemith then moving through Mendelssohn and Handel before ending with
Buxtehude.
The prelude is the second movement of Paul Hindemith’s
(1895-1963) Organ Sonata III. The third of his three sonatas for organ was
written in 1940 after he had fled Nazi Germany and emigrated to the US moving
first to Buffalo, NY and then to New Haven, CT to teach at Yale. Unlike the
first two sonatas, the third is based on German folksongs with each movement bearing
a line of text as its title. “Awake, my treasure,” the second movement is a song taken from the 15th
century Locham Book. Hindemith sets this in his way with winding lines that
are, at times angular and still somehow gentle.
The song that this is best on is a song of two lovers that meet and must
part at the breaking dawn. I however, in reading the title immediately
associated it with the resurrection. It seems for me (if in title only) a
fitting open to the second Sunday of Easter.
Traveling back in time almost 100 years from Hindemith’s
sonata we come to Felix Mendelssohn’s (1809-1847) oratorio, Elijah. This biblical drama tells the
story of God’s prophet Elijah and his mission to get the Israelites to renounce
the false gods of their rulers and to turn to the one true God. Part two of the oratorio opens with the
soprano aria “Hear Ye, Israel” (see the post from 1/19/14 for more on this
aria) and then the choir explodes with the further affirmation that God, thy
help is near. This chorus takes its text from Isaiah and the Psalms, beginning
with large thick chords and full orchestra before changing to a faster tempo, a
minor key, and a fugue that reminds the hearer that although things are bad in
the surrounding world, God’s people need not be afraid. Mendelssohn’s oratorio was greatly influenced by the large choral works that preceded it by many different composers but one of the most notable composers of oratorio is obviously Georg Friedrich Handel (1685-1759), and probably his most well-known piece, Messiah is where the tenor aria “But Thou Didst Not Leave His Soul in Hell” is taken from. Messiah is an oratorio on the life of Christ and takes us from the Old Testament prophecies of his birth to his incarnation. Part two, where this aria is found, opens with the prophecy of his death and moves then to his resurrection. This text from Psalm 16 is set as a light tenor aria (although in other editions it has been assigned to a soprano). This piece reminds us that even though Christ was put to death, his soul was not allowed to languish in hell. It is further reinforcement of the promise of “Be Not Afraid.”
The postlude takes us back a bit further still in the history of German music to Dietrich Buxtehude (1637-1707). One of his best-known organ works, The Prelude, Fugue and Chaconne is a joyful piece with three very distinct sections. The third (my postlude) is the chaconne. A chaconne is a set of variations over a repeated harmonic progression. There is often but not always a repeated bass line, but that is not required. These short variations grow in rhythmic intensity allowing the piece to build. The fact that the piece is in C and is built around the lowest note the organ can produce (low “c “in the pedal)adds gravitas and grandeur to this celebratory piece of North German Organ Music.
This tour of the history of German music (sort of) will be continued next week as we present Felix Mendelssohn’s oratorio Elijah with choir(s) and orchestra. This is an event not to be missed.
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