January 5, 2014 - Christmas 2

Weihnachten Op. 145, No. 3 - Max Reger
The Holly and the Ivy - Benjamin Britten
Coventry Carol - Patrick Walders
Antioch - Emma Lou Diemer

Hymns: #102 Irby, #98 Puer Nobis, #100 Antioch

All of the pieces for this week are based on traditional Christmas carols. The carols that these are based on are of English and German origin and capture the many different emotions of Christmas. These pieces run the gamut from the sadness of Patrick Walders’s setting of The Coventry Carol to the hope of Max Reger’s Weihnachten; from the joy of Emma Lou Diemer’s setting of Antioch to the frolicking strains and, at times, dark message of Benjamin Britten’s setting of The Holly and the Ivy. This year has given the opportunity for an extra Sunday of Christmas music and we are taking full advantage of it.

2013 was the 100^th birthday of Benjamin Britten (1913-1976) and it seemed appropriate to slip one last piece in this centennial celebration. The Holly and the Ivy is a traditional English carol based on the “Sans Day Carol” which was transcribed from a villager in St. Day in Gwennap, Cornwall. The text was first published by Cecil Sharp. The text likely harkens back to the days of “The Contest of Ivy and Holly” which were singing competitions between women (ivy) and men (holly) in which one gender, women for example would exalt the properties of ivy and be little the holly. The two would then resolve their conflict under the mistletoe (the third most important tree in the British wood). Holly was sacred to the Druids and long associated with the Winter Solstice while the Romans associated it with Saturn which they associated with Christmas. This setting by Benjamin Britten has a refrain which is repeated between each verse and the final time a descant is added. The verses pass the melody between soloists accompanied by various sections of the choir. The text makes allusions to Christ’s eminent crucifixion.

Coventry Carol is a 16^th century carol that was the second of three hymns in The Pageant of the Shearman and Tailors performed each year in Coventry. This play is a setting of Matthew 2 and this hymn deals with the story of Herod ordering the death of all the young male children. In the play it is a lullaby sung by three mothers to their children. The melody dates from 1591 and the first record of the text is by Robert Croo in 1534 but the plays had been going on since the 14^th century.  The piece was preserved in a prompt book which was published in 1817 by Thomas Sharp. In 1940 the hymn gained notice when it was featured in a BBC broadcast from the ruins of Coventry Cathedral after the bombing of Coventry. This arrangement by Buffalo native, Patrick Walders, opens with a short aleatoric section. Each of the three verses is voiced differently. The first for four part women, the second four part men and the last mixed choir with descant. The aleatoric section returns and the piece ends just as it began.

Max Reger’s (1873-1916) Weihnachten, Op. 145 No. 3 was originally called Weihnachten,1914. The date was eventually dropped by the publishers but  gives extra meaning to the piece which was written at the beginning of World War I. Reger’s thick compositional style is used here to showcase strife followed by hope. The title of the piece means “Christmas” and that is what it shows. The first section features a solo over dense accompaniment which leads into a dissonant and building B section which clearly evokes images of the strife that the world was going through. This ends and the German chorale tune Vom Himmel Hoch (From Heaven Above to Earth I Come) is heard with strains of Stille Nacht in the left hand as the piece draws to a quiet and hope filled close.

The final hymn for the service is Antioch – Joy to the World. This well-loved hymn of Christmas started life as poem by the English hymn-writer Isaac Watts (1674-1748) about the second coming based on the text of Psalm 98. The American hymnist, Lowell Mason (1792-1872) set the text to a tune which he cited as being “after Handel.” Scholars today are doubtful that there is any Handel in the tune at all point out that the opening strain (a scale) resembles the opening of the Messiah choruses Glory to God and Lift Up Your Heads. The line “and heaven and nature sing” has similarities to the orchestral accompaniment of Comfort Ye.  This setting by the teacher, composer and performer, Emma Lou Diemer (b. 1927) is filled with rhythmic turmoil and great rhythmic drive. Diemer was trained at Yale and Eastman in composition followed  by a Fulbright in Belguim.  After several positions in Kansas City she moved to the University of California at Santa Barbara where she was integral in starting as electronic/Computer music program. Diemer remains active as a recitalist and composer.