Grant Park Orchestra and Chorus
Carlos Kalmar, Principal Conductor
Christopher Bell, Chorus Director
Golden Anniversary Choral Spectacular
Friday, June 29, 2012 at 6:30PM
Saturday, June 30, 2012 at 7:30PM
Jay Pritzker Pavilion
Grant Park Chorus
Carlos Kalmar, Conductor
Christopher Bell, Chorus Director & Conductor
Saira Annaliese Frank, Soprano*
Mary Elizabeth MacKenzie, Soprano†
Sarah Ponder, Mezzo-Soprano*
Hoss Brock, Tenor* °
Peder Reiff, Tenor†
Daniel Eifert, Bass†
Thomas Hall, Bass* °
Anima Children’s Chorus
Emily Ellsworth, Director
STRAVINSKY
Les Noces *
Part I
At the Bride’s House (“The Tresses”)
At the Bridegroom’s House
The Bride’s Departure
Part II
The Wedding Feast
WHITACRE
Cloudburst
TORMIS
Raua Needmine °
INTERMISSION
ORFF
Carmina Burana †
Fortuna Imperatrix Mundi
I. Primo Vere
II. In Taberna
III. Cour d’amours
Fortuna Imperatrix Mundi
This concert is sponsored by:
Grant Park Chorus 50th Anniversary Sponsor
2012 Program Notes, Book 2 A13
Friday, June 29 and Saturday, June 30, 2012 Anima (formerly the Glen Ellyn Children’s
Chorus) celebrates its 47th year with the 20112012 season. One of the leading children and
youth choral organizations in North America,
its rich heritage has served as an artistic and
educational model for many years. William
Mason, General Director of Lyric Opera of
Chicago, recently wrote about Anima, “I simply
cannot say enough about how superb they were
at every performance. They performed with
extreme professionalism and are marvelously
pleasant and disciplined.” Recent awards include
the once-in-an-organizational lifetime Margaret
Hillis Award for Choral Excellence from Chorus
America in 2008 and the 2009 Dale Warland
Singers Commissioning Award from Chorus America, funded by the American Composers
Forum. The Chorus is dedicated to transforming young lives through excellence in music
education and choral singing. Its five ensembles serve 200 children from over 30 different
Chicago communities, with outreach programs reaching 1200 additional children annually.
International tours have taken the Chorus to six continents, most recently to Spain and
Morocco in 2010. Anima (AH-nee-mah) is the Latin word for breath, life, soul, spirit.
Anima Young Singers of Greater Chicago
Emily Ellsworth, Artistic Director
William Buhr, Principal Accompanist
Ron Korbitz, Assistant Conductor
Megan Drahos, Assistant Conductor
Alyssa Antolin, Eileen Baird, Lucy Baird, Sarah Baird, Jesslyn Cohen, Jessica Costenaro, Johanna
Crawford, Brennan Dougherty, Amanda DuMerer, Julia Garcia, Kathrene Garcia, Bridget Guerin,Kate
Harrison, Kirsten Holmberg, Benjamin Hoppe, Duncan Johnson, Elysse Keske, Amanda Kolody,
Tommy Kolody, Kellen Klapatch, Nathan Klapatch, Marissa Kuick, Anthony Lanzillo, Becca Loiacono,
Tara Lumb, Leslie Lynch, Isabella Main, Natasha Martinez, Janna McAndrews, Alina Milasius, Brendan
Parravano, Audrey Pauer, Noelle Pekny, Hailey Quinn, Natalia Salgado, Julia San Filippo, Olivia Smith,
Joseph Stella, Ian Strasma, Annie Wagner, Brooke Wills, Madelynn Zeller
“With her strong, silvery soprano, Saira Frank shines,” raved
Madison’s Capitol Times. Recent performances include Duchess
Christina in Philip Glass’ Galileo Galilei with Madison Opera. Other
roles in her diverse repertory include Tatiana in Eugene Onegin,
The Merry Widow and Alcina. She holds degrees in voice and
French from Northwestern University and a master’s in opera from
the UW-Madison.
Described by the New York Times as
“a soprano of extraordinary agility and concentration” Mary
Elizabeth Mackenzie made her professional opera debut
as Despina in Così fan tutte with Madison Opera. Notable solo
appearances include Jean Barraqué’s Chant Aprés Chant with
the Juilliard Percussion Ensemble at Alice Tully Hall, Schoenberg’s
String Quartet No. 2 with the Borromeo String Quartet, Pierre
Boulez’s Improvisations sur Mallarmé No. 1 & 2 for the composer’s
85th birthday celebration, and Schoenberg’s Pierrot Lunaire with
Carnegie Hall’s Academy Ensemble.
A14 2012 Program Notes, Book 2
Friday, June 29 and Saturday, June 30, 2012
Mezzo-soprano, Sarah Ponder frequently performs as both
a soloist and ensemble singer with Chicago’s finest musical
organizations. Favorite recent performances include a recital
with the Musicians Club of Women “Award Winners in Concert”
Series, the role of Ino in Handel’s Semele, and solo appearances
with Maestro Riccardo Muti as part of her continued work as a
Teaching Artist with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra’s outreach
programs. In addition to her performing and outreach work, Sarah
also maintains a large private studio.
Tenor Hoss Brock’s operatic credits include the Majordomo of
the Marschallin in Der Rosenkavalier at the San Francisco Opera,
and Ramiro in Rossini’s La Cenerentola with the San Francisco
Opera’s Merola Opera Program. He is a full-time member of the
Lyric Opera Chicago chorus and Chicago a cappella. Recently he
has performed Verdi’s Requiem with the Peninsula Music Festival,
Baba Yetu from CIV IV at Video Games Live, and appeared in the
American premiere of Richard Blackford’s Not in Our Time.
Tenor Peder Reiff has been a member of the Grant Park Chorus
for nine years and is thrilled to be making his solo debut in Carmina
Burana. A graduate of Indiana University, Peder currently holds
the record for appearing in the greatest number of operas in a
single season, having appeared in seven operas in one year. Peder
frequently sings with the ensembles of the Lyric Opera of Chicago
and Chicago Symphony, as well as solos with many local orchestras
and choruses.
Bass Daniel Eifert is a featured soloist across the Chicago
area whose recent engagements include the Chicago Symphony
Orchestra, Chicago Civic Orchestra, Elmhurst Symphony Orchestra,
and the Apollo Chorus of Chicago. A frequent performer of the
works of J.S. Bach, he regularly appears with the Bach Institute of
Valparaiso University. Equally comfortable as a chorister, Daniel is a
long-term member of the Grant Park Music Festival Chorus and the
Chicago Symphony Chorus where he currently serves as Section
Leader.
Bass Thomas Hall has been a member of the Grant Park Chorus
since 1999. He is also a frequent soloist in both concert and opera
performances, most recently performing the title role in a concert
performance of Verdi’s Rigoletto with the Ann Arbor Symphony,
Il Conte di Luna in Il Trovatore with Opera de Nuevo Leon in
Monterrey, Mexico, and Telramund in Wagner’s Lohengrin at the
Savonlinna Opera Festival in Finland.
2012 Program Notes, Book 2 A15
Friday, June 29 and Saturday, June 30, 2012 Les Noces, Scènes Chorégraphiques Russes
(“The Wedding, Choreographed Russian
Scenes”) (1914-1923)
Igor Stravinsky (1882-1971)
When Stravinsky was immersing himself in Russian lore and
ritual during the composition of The Rite of Spring in 1911-1913,
he had an idea for a new “dance cantata” with soloists and
chorus for Serge Diaghilev’s Ballet Russe whose subject would
be a Russian peasant wedding incorporating “actual wedding
material through direct quotations of popular — i.e., non-literary — verse.” The
premieres of The Rite in May 1913 and the opera The Nightingale twelve months later
in Paris precluded any work on Les Noces until July 1914, when he went to his family’s
estate at Ustilug in Ukraine to handle some personal affairs and gather collections of
popular Russian poems and phrases from his father’s library. After making a research
stop at Kiev, he returned to Salvan, Switzerland, thirty miles south of Montreux, where
he had recently moved from Paris in order to find a secluded place to work as well as
a haven from the growing political tensions on the Continent. World War I erupted the
following month and the Russian Revolution three years later, and the visit to Ustilug
proved to be the last time he set foot in his homeland for 48 years.
Stravinsky began to assemble the libretto for Les Noces from his sources and
his imagination as soon as he arrived in Switzerland, and he quickly decided that
he would omit the marriage ceremony itself in favor of four scenes that would show
the traditional rituals and celebration of the wedding outside of the church: the
preparations of the bride and the groom in their respective homes, the departure of
the bride, and the wedding feast. He began composing the music in late summer
1914 and had completed the first two scenes in piano score by the time Diaghilev and
his troupe settled in Switzerland the following spring to wait out the war. He started
scoring Les Noces for a massive orchestra of 150 musicians, but soon realized that such
an ensemble was not only ill-suited to the subject and character of the work but would
also make its performance difficult in war-torn Europe (or almost anywhere else). He
put the score aside to work on Renard (“The Fox”), a “burlesque story” for singers and
small orchestra for Diaghilev, and then suffered some ill health and the deaths of his
beloved childhood nurse and his brother in 1916. When he returned to Les Noces in
1917, he sketched the remaining two scenes and tried scoring the first two scenes for a
smaller orchestra, but then decided that “an electrically driven piano and harmonium,
an ensemble of percussion, two keyed bugles and two Hungarian cimbaloms” might
be more practical and appropriate. That configuration also proved unsatisfactory,
however (Stravinsky recalled that the “mechanical piano was grossly, irremediably and
intolerably out of tune”), so he again shelved the work to compose The Soldier’s Tale,
Pulcinella, Symphonies of Wind Instruments, The Song of the Nightingale and a host of
smaller pieces. By the time he finally took up Les Noces again, in 1921, he had come
up with the definitive solution for its scoring — a unique ensemble of four pianos and
percussion to accompany the four vocal soloists and chorus. The score was completed
in April 1923 and premiered by the Ballet Russe on June 13, 1923 at the Théatre de la
Gaité Lyrique in Paris.
Stravinsky wrote of Les Noces in his 1936 Autobiography, “It was not my intention
to reproduce the ritual of a peasant wedding, and I paid little heed to ethnographical
considerations. My idea was to compose a sort of scenic ceremony, using as I liked
those ritualistic elements so abundantly provided by village customs which had been
established for centuries in the celebration of Russian marriages. I took my inspirations
from those customs, but reserved to myself the right to use them with absolute freedom.”
Though Stravinsky envisioned Les Noces as primarily a work for voices (there is only a
A16 2012 Program Notes, Book 2
Friday, June 29 and Saturday, June 30, 2012
single measure and a brief coda of bell-tones played exclusively by the instruments),
the soloists and chorus do not represent specific characters but rather perform the
text somewhat in the manner of a Greek chorus, as narrators and commentators on
the scenes rather than as participants in them. “Thus the soprano in the first scene is
not the bride, but merely the bride’s voice,” Stravinsky explained. “The same voice
is associated with the goose in the last scene.” Other than two or three phrases, the
music is all original with Stravinsky, though its small range, repeating motives and
largely diatonic motion were based on folk models. The rhythm, perhaps the salient
technical feature of Les Noces, derives from the speech inflections of the text, but its
galvanic urgency, for which several slow passages of almost incantatory nature provide
a foil, is Stravinsky’s creation alone.
PART 1
Scene 1: The Bride’s Chamber (‘The Tresses’)
THE BRIDE
Kosal moya ko,
Tress my tress, O thou fair tress of my hair,
Kosa moya kosynka rusaya! O my little tress.
Vechor tebya, kosynka, matushka plyala, My mother brushed thee at evening,
Serebryanym kolechkom matushka vila! Mother brushed my tress. Yeshcho okhti mne!O woe is me, O alas poor me.
Chesu, pochesu Nastasinu kosu, Chesu, pochesu Timofeevny rusu, A yeshcho pochesu, a i kosu, zapletu, Alu lentu uplyatu. Chesu, pochesu Nastasinu kosu, Chesu, pochesu Timofeevny rusu. Rusu kosu chesu, Chastym grebnem raschesu.
BRIDESMAIDS
I comb her golden tresses, Nastasia’s bright hair,
Timofeevna’s fair tresses.
I comb and plait it, with ribbon red I twine it,
I twine her golden hair.
I comb her fair tresses, bright golden tresses,
I comb and I twine Timofeevna’s fair tresses,
I bind her tresses, I comb them and plait them,
With a fine comb I dress them.
THE BRIDE
Priyekhala svashenka nemilostliva, Cruel, heartless, came the match-maker,
Shto ne milostliva i ne zhalostliva! Pitiless, cruel one, pitiless, cruel one.
Nachala kosynku rvat i shchipat — She tore my tresses, tore my bright
golden hair, pulled it, tearing it.
Rvat i shchipat — i rvat i shchipat, She tore my hair that she might plait it in
Na dve zapletat, na dve zapletat —
Two plaits, plaiting it in two.
O-o-ho-ho! Yeshcho okhti mne!O woe is me, O alas, poor me.
Chesu, pochesu Nastasinu kosu, Chesu, pochesu Timofeevny rusu, A yeshcho pochesu, a i kosu zaplyatu, Alu lentu uplyatu, goluboyu perevyu!
Kosal moya kosynka rusaya.
BRIDESMAIDS
I comb her golden tresses, Nastasia’s bright hair,
Timofeevna’s fair tresses.
I comb and plait it, I bind up her hair,
With a red ribbon, twine it with a ribbon blue.
THE BRIDE
Golden tresses bright, O my tresses fair.
BRIDESMAIDS
Ne klich ne klich, lebedushka, Weep not,
Ne klich v pole belaya,O dear one, weep not,
Ne plach ne tuzhi, Nastasyushka, Let no grief afflict thee, my dear one,
weep no more, Nastasia,
Ne plach, ne grusti, dusha Timofeevna! O weep no longer, my heart, my Timofeevna.
Po batyushke, po matushke —Of your father think, your mother’s care
Po gromkom solove vo sadu. And of the nightingale in the trees.
Kak svekor li batyushka k tebe budet milostliv, Your father-in-law, he will welcome you,
Uzh kak svekrov li matushka k tebe budet milos Your mother-in-law will bid you welcome, 2012 Program Notes, Book 2 A17
Friday, June 29 and Saturday, June 30, 2012 K tebe budet zhalostliva. And tenderly will love you
Khvetis sudar Pamfilevich u tebya As though you were their own dear child.
solovei vo sad
Vo vysokom teremu, vo vysokom In your garden a nightingale is singing,
izukrashennom
Noble Fetis Pamfilievitch,
Denyochek on svistit i vsyu nochenku poyot. In the palace garden all day
Tebya li, tebya li, Nastasyushka, he whispers cooing notes,
Tebya li, svet Timofeevnu, At nightfall hear him singing his song of love.
Zabavlyaet, uteshaet, Spat dolgone meshaet, ’Tis for you, Nastasia, his singing, my dear one,
K obed ne razbuzhaet. For you alone his singing, for your happiness.
Rai, rai! Udaly skomoroshek He shall not disturb you sleeping, in time
s sela do sela, for mass he’ll wake you.
Rai, rai! shtob nasha Nastasyushka, Come, let us make merry from one village
to another.
Shtob byla vesela, rai! Come, come, dear Nastasia shall be happy,
Uzh shtob byla za vsegda. She must be gay and joyful.
S pod kamushka s pod belova Come! She should always be of good cheer.
Rucheek bezhit. ’Neath the little stones a brook flows.
S pod kamushka s pod belova Underneath the stones a little brook is flowing,
Tsimbalami byut i pyut i lyut Beneath the stones, making loud, happy music.
V tarelki byut. Loud and gay it sounds like beating drums,
Vot znat nashu Nastasyushku Like beating drums, gaily loudly making music.
Nashu Timofeevnu k venchaniyu vedut.
So Nastasia Timofeevna, so in marriage
do we give thee.
THE BRIDESMAIDS, THE BRIDE AND THE MOTHER
Prechistaya Mater prikhodi k nam u khat, Virgin Mary, come to us and aid us,
Svakhe pomogat, kosu raspletat,
Plait her hair, aid us, wed her,
Zapletit ko mne rusu kosu Nastasia fair …
Uzh ty kornyu tugokhonko
Plait, plait my little tresses,
Sredi kosy melyokhonko Plait my hair and bind it with ribbon red,
Pod konets-to alu lentochku. In plaits bind it tightly.
Chesu, pochesu Nastasinu kosu, I will comb Nastasia’s fair tresses,
Chesu, pochesu Timofeevny rusu, I bind the fair hair of my Timofeevna,
Yeshcho pochesu Nastasinu kosu, Once more I comb it and bind it with ribbon,
Yeshcho pochesu Timofeevny rusu, A ribbon entwined about her hair,
A yeshcho pochesu, a i kosu zapletu, Again I will comb Nastasia’s fair tresses,
Alu lentu uplyatu. I comb them and twine them, my Timofeevna,
Chesu, pochesu Nastasinu kosu, I twine her fair hair, with a ribbon I bind it,
Chesu, pochesu Timofeevny rusu, A ribbon of bright red.
Rusu kosu chesu, Blue, a ribbon blue,
Chastym grebnem raschesu. And ribbon red,
Uzh ty lenta, moya lentochka, Bright red, as my own lips are red.
Ala lenta buketova, A ribbon blue,
Buketova fialetova.
As blue as my eyes.
Scene 2: The Bridegroom’s House
BRIDEGROOM’S FRIENDS
Prechistaya Mat, khodi, Virgin Mary, come and aid our wedding,
Khodi k nam u khat, Come, Mary hear our prayer, aid us as
we comb the fair curls of Fetis.
Svakhe pomogat kudri raschesat, Virgin Mary, comb the fair locks of Fetis,
Khvetisevy kudri, Kudri raschesat, Pamfilicha While we brush the curls of Pamfilievitch.
Chem chesat, chem maslit da Khetisevy kudri? Virgin Mary come.
Chem chesat, chem maslit Wherewith shall we brush and comb
da Pamfilicha rusy? and oil the fair locks of Fetis?
Khodi, khodi nam u khat, Come, come to aid us, Virgin Mary,
Svakhe pomogat, kudri raschesat. O come, Mary aid us, uncurl his fair locks.
Kinemsya, brosimsya vo tri torga goroda Quickly let us go to the town and
buy some pure olive oil,
A18 2012 Program Notes, Book 2
Friday, June 29 and Saturday, June 30, 2012
Rascheshem, razmaslim Khvetisovi Kudri, Kupim my, kupim my paravanskogo masla, Rascheshem, razmaslim Pamfilicha rusy!
And curl his locks, his fair locks.
Come Virgin Mary, come to aid our wedding,
Aid us now as we uncurl the bridegroom’s locks.
PARENTS
Vichor sa vichoru sidei Khvetis vo tiryomu.
Last night, Fetis sat in his house all the while.
Sidei i Pamfilich, chesal rusy kudri.
Last night Pamfilievitch his locks sat brushing.
Vy komu-to kudri dostanetes? Now to whom will these curls belong?
Dostanetes, kudri, krasnoi devitse? Now to whom will these curls belong?
Oi, vy komu-to rusy dostanetes? Now they will belong to a rosy-lipped maiden.
Shto Nastase Timofeevne. Do they now belong to her, to the tall one,
Uzh ty, Nastyushka, To Nastasia, to Timofeevna?
Polelei kudri! Now Nastasia, pour oil on them.
Ty polelei rusy! Do you pour oil on them;
Ty, Timofeevna, polelei rusy! You, Timofeevna, you pour oil on them.
Kvas, shto malinoe Oil the fair, the curly locks of Pamfilievitch,
Desyatyu nalivan! The fair and curly locks.
Uzh vilis, povilis na Khvetisu kudri, O the fair, the curly locks of Fetis,
Vilis, povilis na Pamfilichu rusy. The fair and curly locks of Pamfilievitch.
Ty, polelei rusy! Thy mother curled them oft,
Zavivala ikh matushka, zavivala Saying then while she was curling them,
Da prigovarivala: “Little son, white and rosy-cheeked little son,
“Bud ty moye dityatko My little child, my son.
Belo i rumyano, And another one will curl your locks,
Rumyano i nevrochlivo! And another one will love you.”
Da prigovarivala belo i rumyano. Shining locks and curly, whose are they?
Kalinoe parilo! Malinoe stiralo!”O Pamfilievitch, lovely locks curly of Fetis,
Na kom kudri, na kom rusya? Well oiled and lovingly curled.
Na Khvetisu kudri rusya, Glory to the father, glory to the mother,
Na Pamfilichya poraschesannya, Well have they brought up their wise
one obedient,
Spalat, spalat otsu materi, Obedient and wise one
Khorosho ditya vosporodili, Obedient.
Umnago i razumnago, pokornago A clever prudent child.
i poslovnago.
Prilegaite, kudri rusya k moemu litsu belomu, Let my fair curls be in order upon my white face,
K moemu umu razumu, And grow used
Da shto k obychyu molodetskomu, To my young man’s ways, my habits,
Privykai, dusha Nastasyushka.
My dandy young habits are usual there.
CHORUS
A v Moskve-to tem kudryam Ah, in Moscow, dandy young habits are usual.
Vzdivovalisya. Virgin Mary, come and aid our wedding,
Prechistaya Mat, khodi, Aid us to brush and uncurl the locks of Fetis,
Khodi k nam u khat,
Aid us to uncurl the fair locks of Fetis.
Svakhe pomogat kudri raschesat, Virgin Mary come and aid us to uncurl
the fair locks of Fetis.
Khvetisevy kudri, Holy Mother, come to us,
Kudri raschesat, Pamfilicha rusy. Thyself come, we pray Thee.
I ty Mater Bozhya,
Come to the wedding, to the wedding.
Sama Bogorodicha, And with Thee, all the holy Apostles.
Pod na svadbu —
Come to the wedding, to the wedding,
I so vsemi Postolami — And with Thee come all the angels.
I so vsemi s angelyami — Come to the wedding, to the wedding.
Boslovi Bozha, Bozhunka, Now may God bless us all and His Son,
Pod na svadbu!
Come to the wedding, to the wedding.
Boslovite otech s materyu, Svavo tsadu, THE BRIDEGROOM
Bless me, my father, my mother, bless me,
Your child who proudly goes
2012 Program Notes, Book 2 A19
Friday, June 29 and Saturday, June 30, 2012
Ko stolnu gradu pristupit kamennu, Stenu razbit, svoyu suzhennuyu ponyat V sobor, cherkov skhodit Serebryan krest potselovat. Gde sidit tam Khvetis gosudar. Tam svechei svetik naidet.
Bozhya milost Bogorodicha!
Against the strong wall of stone to break it.
See him, Fetis, the noble Fetis there,
See him, the noble Fetis,
There to win his bride, his lady.
So the candles are lighted.
We go now to the church and to kiss the silver,
To invoke our Lady’s blessing.
FIRST BRIDESMAID
Smotrelshchiki, glyadelshchiki, All that came to see the bride passing by
Zevaki i paloshni kolyubaki Did stay to see her taken away.
V put dorozhenku yekhati, Give you blessing, bless the prince on his way,
Suzheno, ryazheno vzyat! The bridegroom who is gone to meet his bride,
Boslovite tko vse knyazya novobrashnava! To wed her whose troth is plighted,
Pod zolotoi venets stoyat! Oi!On his brow to set a golden crown.
CHORUS
Oi! Lebedinoe pero upadalo! Ah, on his brow to set a golden crown.
Ivan palo! See there fades the flower, too.
Pered teremom upadalo. Falls a white feather, now the flower fades,
Ivan palo!
Fades the flower, too, fades the flower,
Upadal Khvetis The feather falls,
Pered rodnym batyushkoi, So did Fetis kneel down before his own father,
Upadal Pamfilich pered rodnoi matushkoi: So did Fetis kneel before his mother graciously,
Prosit i mene Asking their blessing upon the son
who goes to be married,
I boslovi ko Bozhyu sudu yekhati And may the saints go with him, guarding him,
K svyatomu venchanitsu, May the saints go with him too, and keep
him in their care.
Kak privel Bog pod krestom Lord, O bless us all from oldest
to the youngest children.
I tak by pod ventsom. Saint Damien, bless us also.
Baslavite vse at starava da malava. Bless us Lord, bless the bride and bridegroom,
Kuzmu Demyanu sygrat! The oldest, the youngest, O bless us.
Baslavi Bozha do dvukh porozhden Bless us, O Lord, and bless our wedding,
Da stolko zhe nam svadbu sygrat. Oi! Bless us, Lord, bless us all.
Baslavi Bozha do dvukh posazhen, Bless us, O bless the father and mother,
sister and brother.
Baslavi Bozha Mikita poputchik, Bless us, O bless the sister and the brother,
Mikhala Arkhangel! Bless us, we pray Thee, bless all who are faithful,
Baslavi Bozha Rozhdestvo Khristova, All who fear and love him.
Baslavi Bozha khrestyn baslavyati, God protect us, aid us now, God be with us now.
K ventsu atpushchati. Abide with us, abide with us now, Saint Luke,
Baslov Bozha, Bozhunka. Be with us, bless us, Saint Luke.
Pod na svadbu! Pod na svadbu! Bless our marriage rites we pray thee, Svyaty Luka, pod na svadbu, Bless the couple whom thou hast chosen,
Svyaty Luka, slutsi svadbu Bless the pair, Saint Luke, bless them whom thou
Dvukh molodyonykh, slutsi posazhenykh.
Thou hast chosen.
Slutsi svadbu dvukh suzhenykh Grant, O grant thy blessing for always,
I pervy mladen!
And to their children.
Scene 3: The Departure of the Bride
CHORUS
Blagoslovlyalsya svetyol mesyats Okolo yasnago solnushka, Blagoslovlyalas knyaginyushka U gosudarya u batyushki,
U gosudaryni matushki.
A20 2012 Program Notes, Book 2
Brightly shines the moon on high,
Beside the glowing sun,
Even so the princess lived in the palace happily
Beside her aged father and her mother,
Happily beside her father and her mother dear.
Friday, June 29 and Saturday, June 30, 2012
Blagoslovi menya, batyushka, Da na chuzhuyu storonushku.
BRIDE
Grant me your blessing, father,
For now I go to a foreign land.
FATHER AND MOTHER
Pritapelas svetsa vosku yarago See the candles burn before the icon,
Pered obrazom dolgo stoyutsi, So I have stood before it long,
Pristoyala knaginya skory nozhenki.
So the princess stood awhile and quickly
then away she went.
CHORUS
Uzh kak boslovili oni devitsu So they gave their blessing to their daughter fair,
Pered batsuskoi gorko platsutsi. So she before her father stood weeping,
Da shto na chetyre na storonushki And to every quarter of the world I go.
Khlebom solyu Spasom obrazom. Holding the icon, holding bread and salt too,
Svyaty Kuzma pod na svadbu! Holding bread and holding salt too.
Svyaty Kuzma Demyan pod na svadbu! Thou Saints Cosmo and Damien come with us,
Vo gornitse vo svyatlitse O come with us,
Dva golubya na tyablitse. Saint Cosmo, grant that the wedding prosper,
Svyaty Kuzma, skui nam svadbu, Enduring from youth unto age,
Skui nam krepku, krepku tverdu, Enduring from youth to old age.
Dolgovetnu, vekovetnu, To the room where the two little doves sit,
S mladosti i do starosti I do malykh detushek! Two little doves in a small room,
Vo gornitse vo svetlitse Holy Cosmo and Damien walked
about the hall and came back.
Dva golubya na tyablitse, To our children, even unto them.
Oni pyut, oni pyut i lyut, In the little room, the happy room,
V politiry byut, v tsimbali podygryvayut. There are sitting two little doves.
Svyaty Kuzma, pod na svadbu, There is singing, dancing, drinking too.
Svyaty Kuzma, slutsi svadbu Tambourines sounding, cymbals clashing
S malosti do starosti Long and happy union grant thou them.
I do malykh detushek! May the wedding endure from their youth,
Kuzma Demyan po senyam khodila, From their youth unto old age and unto
their children.
Gvozdi sobirala, svadebku kovala. Holy Cosmo and Damien walked about the hall,
I ty, sama Mat Bozhya sama Bogorodicha,
They walked about the hall and they came back.
Pod na svadbu, slutsi svadbu, Virgin Mary, give Thy blessing,
Slutsi svadbu, slutsi krepku, Virgin Mary, Mother of our blest Saviour,
grant Thy blessing on this union.
I so vsemi s Postolami, The apostles and all angels,
as the hops entwine together,
I so vsemi s Angelyami. So our newly married couple cling together,
I kak vyotsya khmel po tytsyu, As one they cling together, as the hops
entwine together.
Tak by nashi molodye vilis drug kolo drugu!
So they cling together, as the hops entwine.
Enter the mothers of the groom and bride from either side of stage.
MOTHERS
Rodimoe moyo dityatko, moyo miloe, My dear one, child of mine, my little one,
Ne pokin menya goremychnuyu! Do not leave me, my dear one, child of mine,
Vorotis, moya dityatka, vorotis, moya milaya, Do not leave me, come again to me.
Rodimoe moyo dityatko,
My own, my child,
Poila bylo ya kormila tebya. Dear child of mine.
Vorotis, moya milaya, Ah, do not leave me lonely, my dear one,
Zabyla ty, dityatko, na stopke Child you have forgotten, dear one,
the golden keys hanging,
Zoloty klyuchi na shelkovom poyase. Hanging golden keys, hanging there,
Rodimoe dityatko.
My own little child, dear one.
The mothers go out.
2012 Program Notes, Book 2 A21
Friday, June 29 and Saturday, June 30, 2012
PART II
Scene 4: The Wedding Feast
CHORUS
Yagoda s yagodoi sokatilasya, Berries two there were on a branch,
they fell to the ground,
Yogoda yagode poklonilasya. One berry bows to another berry.
Ai lyuli, lyuli, lyuli! Lyushenki ai lyuli! Ai, louli, louli, louli! Louchenki, ai louli,
Yagodka krasna! Zemlyanichka spela, A very red one and a strawberry did ripen,
Ai lyushenki lyuli! Ai, louchenki, louli.
Yagoda yagode slovo molvila, And one berry to another spoke sweetly,
Yagoda ot yagody ne vdali rosla. Close one berry grew to another,
Vesyol, vesyol khodit i Fedor Tikhnavich, And one berry represents
Nashyol zolot perstin, The noble bridegroom, Fetis,
Zolot s dorogim sy kamenem. And the other, Nastasia, ’tis the white one.
Odna-to yagoda Khvetisushka sudar, So gaily goes he, Theodor Tichnovitch,
A drugaya yagoda Nastasyushka dusha. I found a golden ring set with precious stones.
Yunyv, yunyv khodit Palagei Spanovich, Who comes here so gaily? Palagy Spanovitch,
Poteryal zolot perstin, Who comes here so gaily? Palagy Spanovitch.
Zolot s daragim sy kamenyam. I have lost the golden ring set
with precious stones.
Letala gusynya, letala! Oh, poor me, poor Palagy, no more is gay,
Letala seraya, letala. No more is he gay, oh, poor Palagy.
A yagoda yagode poklonilasya, Flying comes a grey, a little goose.
Yagoda yagode slovo molvila. One red berry bows to another red berry,
Letala gusinya, letala seraya, One red berry spoke to another red berry.
Krylya primakhala. Flying comes a grey, a little goose,
Mazoli potirala. Flying comes a grey little goose.
Stolby skolykhala, Now its wings are beating, its tiny feet
are scratching, raising clouds of dust,
Boyar probuzhdala.
Making all the nobles notice.
Vot tebe, zhana, ot Boga sazhdana.
BRIDE’S FATHER
Now behold your wife, whom God hath given you.
CHORUS
Sei lyon da kanapli. And what did we tell you,
Ai, my tebe, Nastyushka, govorili —
Dear Nastasia?
Sprashivai s neyo rubashki da portki! Your wife must sew and spin, she must
keep the linen
Oi, my tebe, milaya, govorili!
And sew and spin the flax white.
The bride’s mother leads her to her son-in-law.
Zyatik moi lyubezny vruchayu Tebe docheryu lyubeznuyu.
BRIDE’S MOTHER
To you I entrust her, my son-in-law,
I entrust her, my daughter dear.
CHORUS
Sei lyon da zamashki, Let her sew the linen, food you shall give
her and clothe her,
Sprashivai s neyo rubashki, Give her to eat and to drink
Poi, kormi da odevai, And set her to work, you feed her
Da na rabotu otpravlyai
And clothe her and bid her work.
Rubi drova.
FATHER
You saw the logs. Ask again.
Lyubi kak dushu, tryasi kak grushu! Boyare vstavali v charki nalivali, Gostei obkhodili, Marye podnosili: CHORUS
Love her and shake her like a pear tree.
They are come, our nobles, fill the goblets,
Round the tables going, fill the goblets,
A22 2012 Program Notes, Book 2
Friday, June 29 and Saturday, June 30, 2012
Vypei, Matushka, Skushai Kharitonovna! Going among the guests and toasting Mary.
Ne pyu, ne kushayu,
Drink little mother, eat thou Maritovna.
Boyar ne slushayu. I do not drink, I do not eat, I listen here,
Kaby byl Simeón? Listen to the nobles as they eat and
drink their wine.
Ya by spila, skushala, If our Simon were here,
Boyar poslushala’.O you gay, noisy chattering goose,
where have you been?
Oi ty, gusynya, Noisy goose, where have you been and
what did you see there?
Zvonkaya, kitaiskaya! A Chinaman? Where have you been,
what did you see there?
Uzh ty gde gusynya zvonkaya, I have been far away at sea,
Gde pobiyvala i shto videla? A swan-necked maiden in the sea was bathing,
“I ya byla na sinem na mori, Washing there her Sunday dress.
Na mori, na ‘zere, lyuli na mori, na ‘zere. A little white swan did you see there
Na tom li na mori, na ‘zere lebyad And did you see a little white swan.
belaya kupala
Lyuli, na belo palaskalasya.” And how should not I have seen the sea.
Videl li ty, beloi lebyodku? I not have seen the sea?
“Da i kak zhe mnc da na mori, How should not I have seen the sea,
na mori ne byvat,
seen the little swan?
Da i kak zhe mne lebyodushki ne vidat? Ay, beneath his wing the swan hides his mate.
U lebedya lebedyushka pod krylom, Two white swans in the sea were swimming
U lebedya kosataya pod krylom, In the sea, two swans.
U Khvetisa — to Nastasyushka pod bochkom, Ay, and Fetis holds Nastasia right tenderly,
U Khvetisa Timofeevna pod kiylom.”
And Fetis holds his bride to him tenderly.
Oi chem zhe ty Nastasyushka udala?
Ya po poyas vo zolote obvilas Zhemchuzhnye makhorchiki do zemli.
FIRST BRIDESMAID
And you, Nastasia, what have you done?
BRIDE
I have donned a golden belt,
It is plaited with pearls that hang to the ground.
BEST MAN
Okh, poinik, propoinik, nastin batyushka O you merry old rogue.
Propil svoyu chadu za vinnuyu charu. Nastasia’s father, you,
Na vinnoi charochke, He has sold his child for wine,
Ne medovoi stopochke!
For flowing goblets.
CHORUS
Svyatushki! Povorashivaites, Now all you who are come to the feast,
Podavaite nevestu, Lead the bride in, the bridegroom
is waiting, lonely,
Zhenikh skuchaet!
Holding a goblet of rare old wine.
Krasny devitsy, pirozhny yamasteritsy, You fair maids, and you pastry-cooks,
and you plate-washers,
Gorshechnya pagubnitsy, You good-for-nothings, you chatterboxes,
Zhenushki posivya, zheny podkhilya, All you lazy wives, you silly Reds, foolish ones,
Malye rebyata,
And all you naughty ones
Gorokhovy tati, markovnye pagubniki!
Who are among the wedding guests.
One of the friends chooses among the guests a man and his wife,
and sends them to warm the bed for the bridal pair.
Poitepesni!
Raise your voices.
Khvetisushka skazhet: “Spat khochu.” Hear the bridegroom say, “I would sleep now.”
Nastasyushka molvit: “I ya s toboi.” And the bride reply, “Take me with you.”
Khvetisushka skazhet: “Korovat tesna.” Hear the bridegroom say, “Is the bed narrow?”
Natasyushka molvit: “Budet s nas.”
And the bride reply, “Not too narrow.”
Khvetisushka skazhet: “Deyalo kholodno.”
Hear the bridegroom say, “How cold
are the blankets?”
2012 Program Notes, Book 2 A23
Friday, June 29 and Saturday, June 30, 2012
Nastasyushka molvit: “Budet teplo.”
And the bride reply, “They shall warm them.”
To Khvetisu pesenka, da shto yasnomu sokolu ’Tis to thee Fetis sing we this little song,
I so beloi lebyodushkoi, svet Nastasei And to the little dove, the white one,
Timofeevn
Slyshish li Khvetis Gospodin?
To Nastasia, to our Timofeevna, too.
Slyshish li Pamfilevich? Hear us, Fetis. Hear us, Pamfilievitch.
My vam pesnyu poyom, my vam We are honoring you, we sing to you.
ehest vozdayom
Ne lezhi y krute berege. Do not lie thus by the steep river bank,
Ne sidi, Savelyushka, Ay, sit down, Savelyouchka,
Vo besedushke. Sryazhai svadebku In a summer house, a wedding prepare
Khvetisavu!
now for Fetis.
GUESTS
Okh, na izbe zelya, uvyzbe veselya. In the farmhouse see how jolly a feast is held,
Za stolom boyare, Nobles sat at table drinking honey and wine,
Oni myod, vino pili, rechi govorili: And all the while made speeches,
U menya svadebka na divo suryazhena, Merrily, oh merrily, our wedding went truly.
Devyati varov pivo vareno,
Nine kinds of beer the good wife had prepared,
A desyaty var zelena vina. But the tenth is finest, the best of all.
Vedut Nastasyushku na chuzhu storonu. Our Nastasia goes to dwell in a distant country.
Na chuzhoi storone umeyuchi devke, Wisely shall she live there and in happiness
let her be submissive,
Umeyuchi zhit! Let her be obedient.
Vse pokornoi devke, vse pokornoi byt. She who knows how to be obedient and happy.
Pokornoi golovushke vezde Bow then courteously, both to the old
Iyubo khorosho. and the young ones.
I staromu i malomu vse nizki poklon, To the very youngest maidens you must
bow lower.
Molodym molodushkam po nizhe etogo. In the garden there, Fetis stood and looked
Po ulitse, da po shirokoi ulitse khodil, Upon the marks of his Nastasia’s feet,
Gulyal molodets. His own Nastasia.
Po zelenom sadu, po Nastinam sledam, A smart young dandy, a dandy went
walking down the street,
Glyadel, smotrel Khvetisushka na Down the long wide street
Nastyushku svoyu: Walking.
Svyazal svoyu golovu shlyapoi pukhovoyu. On his head he wore a fine furry cap for winter.
U moyei, u Nastyushki pokhodochka My Nastasia walks very quickly
chastaya,
and her new little coat, Shubochka novaya, opushka bobrovaya.
It is cosily lined with the fur of martens.
FRIENDS
Black her brows and beautiful.
Nastya chernobrovaya!
ONE OF THE FRIENDS
Nu-ka rodimy batyushka, Now then, old man, come and drink
a little glass of wine,
Ryumochku vypivai!
Drink a good glass of wine.
MEN, FRIENDS AND WOMEN
Nashikh molodykh odaryai! Nashim molodym mnogo nado, Odni khotyat domishkom zhit, domishka pribav
Na uglu banyu postavit. Ty zaidesh da poparishsya, A poslei togo pokhvalishsya: Vot kak stali nashi molodye-to zhit! A24 2012 Program Notes, Book 2
Toast the happy married couple,
For our married ones
Need many things.
They want to have a little house,
A bath will they build
For themselves there.
You come and have a bath, afterwards you
Friday, June 29 and Saturday, June 30, 2012
will be warmed.
Gorko! Okh! Okh! Nelzya pit! So did our married pair begin
their happy days together.
Nu-zhe, nu-zhe, nu ryumochku vypivai, Now then! Now then!
A nashikh molodykh daryai!
Drink to their health, toast our pair.
The bride and bridegroom embrace one another.
CHORUS
Eta, eta, eta, khot kuda, eta i taper stoit rublya,Drink again, toast the pair,
A kak yei, yei boka nadut, za etaku i dva, And embrace the two.
dva dadut. Khot by tak, khot by tak, khot by rublikov, This one, this one, this one, this is good,
Khot by pyat, a kogda budet tvoya chest, This one even now cost a ruble,
Khot by rublikov, khot by chest. But if you squeeze it in your hand,
Volga reka razlivaetsya,
Squeeze it tightly, it costs double that.
Zyatik u vorot ubivaetsya: I don’t care at all though it costs as much.
“Akh tyoshsha moya, tyoshsha laskovaya!” Now the river Volga overflows
Khot by tak, khot by tak, And before the gate I hear one calling,
Khot by rublikov pyat. “Oh mother dear,
A kogda budet tvoya chest, My mother dear
Khot by rublikov, khot by shest.
Who calls me.”
ONE OF THE FRIENDS
Ai vy, druzhki, spely, Shto devka detinke Vse boka protolkala.
V kletochku zvala!
A otdali nam devku, otdaitya postelku!
All you silly maidens
Tell me who the maiden
Was who ruled her true love.
If we’ve got your daughter
Let’s have a bed, too!
Those who are warming the bed go out. Fetis and Nastasia are conducted to the bed
and laid in it, after which they left alone, and the door is shut.
ALL
The fathers and mothers settle themselves on a bench before the door, everybody facing them.
Pastelya moya, karavatushka! Lovely little bed
Na karavatushke perinushka, Where I lay me down,
Na perinushke uzgolovitsa. How soft the pillow where I lay my head.
U zgolovitsa odiyalitsa,
Soft the pillow where I lay my head,
folded in the soft blankets,
Pod dialitsom dobry molodets. Folded in the blankets, the blankets warm,
Dobry molodets Khvetisushka, See our Fetis Pamfilievitch.
Khvetis Pamfilev
Vorobei vorobku paruet posadivshi The little sparrow makes first his nest,
na karavat. then takes his mate to be with him.
Khvetisushka Nastasyushku tseluit, Fetis holds Nastasia and kisses his bride,
Yon tseluit miluit, Na ruchku kladyot,
Kisses her and holds in his hand her little hand.
Ky serdechku zhmyo.
Holds her hand and presses it upon his heart,
Akh ty dushka, zhyonushka, Holds her hand and lays it upon his heart.
Dannaya moya poglyadenya, Dear heart, little wife, my own dearest treasure,
Nochnaya moya zabava, My sweet, my honey.
Pazhivyom my s toboi kharashenichka, Dearest flower and treasure, sweetest wife,
Shtoby lyudi nam zavidyvali.
Let us live in happiness that all men may envy us.
2012 Program Notes, Book 2 A25
Friday, June 29 and Saturday, June 30, 2012
Cloudburst (1991)
Eric Whitacre (born in 1970)
Eric Whitacre initially gained notice as a composer in 1993 when
he received First Prize in the American Choral Directors Association’s
“Composers of the Future” competition for Cloudburst; he was 23
years old and had only started reading musical notation five years
before. Whitacre, born in Reno, Nevada in 1970, taught himself
piano and played synthesizers and wrote a few tunes for a garage
band in high school. Though he had received no formal training
and was not fluent reading music, he showed enough ambition and talent that he was
admitted in 1988 to the University of Nevada/Las Vegas as a music education major,
vaguely hoping that it might help his career in pop music. (“I was astonished to find that
there was no degree program offered for future pop stars,” he recalled.) It was an encounter
during his sophomore year with David Weiller, the choral conductor at UNLV, that changed
Whitacre’s life: “He auditioned me to sing in one of his groups and graciously accepted
me into the university chorus. I distinctly remember how weird I thought the choir people
were, with their embarrassing stretches and warm-ups, and undoubtedly the only reason
I stayed in class was because there were so many cute girls in the soprano section…. The
first piece we sang was the Mozart Requiem. It was like seeing color for the first time, and
I was regularly moved to tears during rehearsals, crushed by the impossible beauty of the
work. I became a choir geek of the highest magnitude.”
In the fall of 1991, Whitacre used his new-found notational skills to make an a cappella
setting of Edmund Waller’s Go, Lovely Rose for Weiller; Weiller not only performed the
work in Las Vegas but also used it to close the choir’s tour concerts in Hawaii the following
A26 2012 Program Notes, Book 2
Friday, June 29 and Saturday, June 30, 2012
spring. Later in 1991, Whitacre composed Ghost Train for symphonic wind band (which has
become a staple of the wind ensemble repertory) and Cloudburst for chorus. After finishing
his baccalaureate at UNLV in 1995, Whitacre completed his master’s degree in composition
at the Juilliard School during the next two years, studying there with David Diamond and
Pulitzer Prize and Oscar-winning composer John Corigliano. He moved to Los Angeles
in 1997, and has since devoted himself to composing, conducting concerts, festivals and
choral workshops across North and South America, Europe and Asia, serving as chorus
master for the Nevada Symphony Orchestra, and fulfilling residencies with Cambridge
University, Pacific Chorale, Cincinnati Conservatory of Music, Northwestern University,
Marktoberdorf Music Festival (Germany), NOW Contemporary Music Festival (Columbus,
Ohio) and Mid-Europe Festival (Schladming, Austria, the biggest wind orchestra festival
in Europe). He has also collaborated with composer Hans Zimmer on the score for the
feature film Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides and written the music, book and
lyrics for Paradise Lost: Shadows and Wings, a musical based loosely on Milton. After
being premiered in Pasadena in 2007 starring his wife, Grammy Award-winning soprano
Hila Plitman, Paradise Lost won the ASCAP Harold Arlen Award and the Richard Rodgers
Award, and received ten nominations for Los Angeles Stage Alliance Ovation Awards. In
2010, Whitacre signed a core recording contract with Universal/Decca; his debut album
on that label, Light & Gold, became the No. 1 Classical Album in the United States and
England within a week of its release in October 2010. Also in 2010, Whitacre organized
the first “Virtual Choir,” in which 185 vocalists from twelve countries individually submitted
videos of their singing the appropriate voice part while watching him conduct his Lux
Aurumque on YouTube; the finished video of the mixed voices received over a million
views in just two months. Virtual Choir 2.0 (April 2011, performing Sleep) involved over
2,000 voices from 58 countries (see http://ericwhitacre.com/the-virtual-choir). In addition
to his “Composers of the Future” award, Whitacre has been honored by the Barlow
International Composition Competition, ASCAP, American Composers Forum and other
leading musical organizations; in 2001 he became the youngest recipient ever awarded
the coveted Raymond C. Brock commission by the American Choral Directors Association.
Whitacre wrote that Cloudburst, a setting of El cántaro roto (“The Broken Water Jar”)
by the Nobel Prize-winning Mexican poet, writer and diplomat Octavio Paz (1914-1998),
“is a ceremony, a celebration of the unleashed kinetic energy in all things. The mood
throughout is reverent, meditative and centered. This does not imply solemn or calm; it
simply means the performer must take the spiritual journey with total respect for the power
of the water and the profundity of the rebirth.” The first section, which encompasses all
of Paz’s verses, is for chorus alone; bells, percussion and piano join with the clapping and
finger-snapping of the singers to create a musical simulacrum of the title in Cloudburst’s
closing portion.
La lluvia … The rain …
Ojos de agua de sombra,
ojos de agua de pozo,
ojos de agua de sueño.
Eyes of shadow-water,
eyes of well-water,
eyes of dream-water.
Soles azules, verdes remolinos,
picos de luz que abren astros
como granadas.
Blue suns, green whirlwinds,
birdbeaks of light pecking open
pomegranate stars.
¿Dime, tierra quemada, no hay agua?
But tell me, burnt earth, is there no water?
¿Hay sólo sangre, sólo hay polvo,Only blood, only dust,
sólo pisadas de pies desnudos sobre la espina? only naked footsteps on the thorns?
La lluvia despierta …
The rain awakens …
Hay que dormir con los ojos abiertos,
hay que soñar con les manos,
We must sleep with open eyes,
we must dream with our hands,
2012 Program Notes, Book 2 A27
soñemos sueños activos de río buscando su cauce,
sueños de sol soñando sus mundos,
hay que soñar en voz alta,
hay que cantar hasta que el canto eche,
raíces, tronco, ramas, pájaros, astros,
hay que desenterrar la palabra perdida,
recordar lo que dicen la sangre, la marea, la tierra y el cuerpo,
volver al punto de partida …
Friday, June 29 and Saturday, June 30, 2012
we must dream the dreams of a river
seeking its course,
of the sun dreaming its worlds,
we must dream aloud,
we must sing till the song puts forth roots,
trunk, branches, birds, stars,
we must find the lost word,
and remember what the blood,
the tides, the earth, and the body say,
and return to the point of departure …
Raua Needmine (“Curse Upon Iron”)
(1972; revised 1991)
Veljo Tormis (born in 1930)
Veljo Tormis was born on August 7, 1930 into a musical
family in Kuusalu, near the Estonian capital city of Tallinn, and
received his early music instruction from his father, the organist
and choir director at a local Lutheran church. Tormis began his
formal studies at the Tallinn Conservatory in 1943, but illness
and the exigencies of World War II interrupted his education. He
resumed his training at the Conservatory in 1949, studying organ and choral conducting
and beginning to compose, and won his first composition prize the following year for
Ringmängulaul (“Circle Game Song”) on a text by the historian and critic Lea Rummo,
who later became his wife. Tormis continued his studies at the Moscow Conservatory
from 1951 to 1956, where his teachers included Vissarion Shebalin and Yury Fortunatov;
Dmitri Shostakovich was chairman of the jury for his graduation examination. From 1956
to 1960, Tormis taught theory and composition at the Tallinn Conservatory, where the
gifted Arvo Pärt was among his students. He also served as a consultant to the Estonian
Composers’ Union between 1956 and 1969 and as the organization’s vice-president from
1974 to 1989. He announced his retirement from composition in 2000 on his seventieth
birthday, thereafter calling himself “Composer Emeritus” and placing a plaque to that
effect over the doorbell to his flat in Tallinn. Tormis’ many distinctions include the titles
of Estonian SSR Honored Worker in Arts, ESSR People’s Artist and USSR People’s Artist,
and winning the Soviet Estonia Prize, USSR State Prize, ESSR Annual Prize for Music,
Estonian State Cultural Award, Composition Prize of the Estonian Music Council and
the Order of Friendship of Peoples; in 1998, he received the Estonian National Culture
Foundation Prize for his life’s work, and in 2009, he was granted the First Class Order of
the National Coat of Arms.
Tormis wrote, “The most essential part of my work is choral music, the most essential
part of which, in turn, is connected with the ancient folk song of Estonians and other
Finnic peoples. My music can by no means be labelled as folk or world music. It is rather
an attempt to preserve the authenticity of the source material, making a compromise
with the forms and performing opportunities of modern music…. My best-known
compositions in the choral field are the incantation Raua Needmine (‘Curse Upon Iron’)
and the extended series Eesti Kalendrilaulud (‘Estonian Calendar Songs,’ 29 runic songs
about the peasant’s work throughout the course of the year) and Unustatud rahvad
(‘Forgotten Peoples,’ on motifs from Livonian, Votic, Izhorian, Ingrian Finnish, Vepsian
and Karelian folklore). All in all, I have written about sixty cycles or series, about forty
extended choral works and about eighty songs for a cappella choir. In other genres,
the Overture No. 2 for Orchestra, the opera Swan’s Flight (‘Luigelend’) and the cantataballet Estonian Ballads (‘Eesti ballaadid’) have gained wide critical acclaim.
“The idea of Raua Needmine (‘Curse Upon Iron,’ 1972) was on my mind for years
A28 2012 Program Notes, Book 2
Friday, June 29 and Saturday, June 30, 2012
before I found a perfect form for it in an enchanting repetitive ostinato accompanied by
a shamanic drum. I combined those elements with modern choral techniques. The idea
of the composition derives from shamanism: in order to acquire power over a material
or immaterial thing, one communicates knowledge to the object. Thus the describing
and explaining of the birth of iron to iron itself forms a part of the shamanic process.
The magical rite is performed to restrain the evil hiding inside iron. Each and every thing
created by man may turn against man himself when used without respect for the living.
The lyrics composed in Estonian by August Annist were based on the ritual incantations
of the Finnish epic Kalevala, whereas current Estonian poets Paul-Eerik Rummo and
Jean Kaplinski added elements from modern reality.”
Ohoi sinda, rauda raiska,
rauda raiska, rähkä kurja,
liha sööja, luu pureja,
vere süütuma valaja!
Kust said kurja, kange’eksi,
üleliia ülbe’eksi?
Hurjuh sinda, rauda raiska!
Tean ma sündi su sõgeda,
arvan algust su õela!
Ohoi cursed, evil iron!
Ohoi evil, cursed iron!
Flesh consuming, bone devouring,
spilling blood, devouring virtue!
Whither comes your cruel cunning,
haughtiness so overbearing?
Fie upon you, evil iron!
Your beginnings reek of malice.
You have risen from villainy.
Käisid kolme ilmaneitsit,
taeva tütarta tulista,
lüpsid maale rindasida,
soo peale piimasida.
Üks see lüpsis musta piima,
sest sai rauda pehme’eda,
teine valgeta valasi,
sellest tehtud on teraksed,
kolmas see veripunasta,
sellest malmi ilma tulnud.
From above the earth appeared
fiery maidens in the heavens,
heavily with milk aladen,
spilling milk upon the marshes.
Black, the liquid from one maiden,
turning into ductile iron.
White milk flowing from the other,
tempered steel from this arising.
From the third a crimson liquid,
cursed, rusty ore created.
Ohoi sinda, rauda raiska,
rauda raiska, rähkä kurja!
Ei sa siis veel suuri olnud,
ei veel suuri, ei veel uhke,
kui sind soossa solguteldi,
vedelassa väntsuteldi.
Hurjuh sinda, rauda raiska!
Tean ma sündi su sõgeda,
arvan algust su õela!
Ohoi cursed, evil iron!
Ohoi evil, cursed iron!
Then you were not high and mighty,
not so mighty, not so haughty,
when you slumbered in the swampland
when you suffered in the marshes.
Fie upon you, evil iron!
Your beginnings reek of malice.
You have risen from villainy.
Susi jooksis sooda mööda,
karu kõmberdas rabassa,
soo tõusis soe jalusta,
raba karu käpa alta.
Kasvid raudased orased,
soe jalgade jälile,
karu käppade kohale.
Ohoi rauda, laukalapsi.
rabarooste, pehme piima!
Kes su küll vihale käskis,
kes pani pahale tööle?
Then a wolf came running hither,
bear arambling over yonder.
Footprints stirring over swampland,
traces from the swamp arising
giving rise to iron seedlings,
in the shadows of the wolf prints
in the traces of the bear tracks.
Ohoi wretched child of bogland,
born of rust and milk of maidens!
Tell me who made you so angry!
Who set you to evil doings?
Surma sõitis sooda mööda.
taudi talveteeda mööda,
leidis soost terakse taime,
raua rooste lauka’alta.
Death came riding through the marshes,
plague along the wintry byways,
till they found the iron seedlings
resting in the lowly swampland,
Notes
A1
2012 ProgramProgram
Notes, Book
2 A29
Friday, June 29 and Saturday, June 30, 2012
leidis soost terakse taime,
raua rooste lauka’alta.
finding seedling steel in swampland
rusty iron in a boghole.
Nii kõneles suuri surma,
taudi tappaja tähendas:
mäe alla männikussa,
põllulla küla päralla,
talu aitade tagana:
siin saab surma sepipada,
siia ahju ma asetan,
siia tõstan lõõtsad laiad,
hakkan rauda keetamaie.
raua roostet lõõtsumaie,
rauda tampima tigedaks.
Then great death began to utter,
killer plague began intoning,
in a pinegrove on a hillside,
in a field behind the village,
far beyond the farmer’s granges.
Here will be the fateful forging!
Here a furnace I will fashion,
mighty fanning bellows anchor!
Here I’ll set the iron boiling!
Blast the rusty ore to flaming!
Pound the iron full of fury!
Rauda, vaene mees, värises,
jo värises, jo võbises.
kuulis kui tule nimeda,
tule kurja kutsumista.
Iron quaked and iron quivered,
quaked and quivered, tossed and trembled,
when he heard the call for fire,
heard the iron’s angry summons.
Ohoi sinda, rauda raiska!
Ei sa siis veel suuri olnud,
ei veel suuri, ei veel uhke,
kui sa ääsilla ägasid.
vingusid vasara alla.
Taat see ahjuita ärises,
halliparda vommi päälta:
Rauda rasvana venikse,
ila kombel valgunekse,
veerdes alla ääsilta,
voolates valululesta.
Ohoi cursed evil iron!
Then you were not high and mighty,
not so mighty, not so haughty!
Moaning in the blazing furnace,
whining under beating anvils.
Droned the old man on the oven,
groaned the greybeard from the furnace:
“Iron stretches out like tallow,
dripping down like oozing spittle,
flowing from the blazing furnace,
seeping from the scalding fire.
Veel sa rauda pehmekene,
miska sind karastatakse,
terakseksi tehtanekse?
Toodi ussilta ilada,
musta maolta mürgikesta.
Ei see raud kuri olekski
ilma usside ilata,
mao musta mürkideta.
Yet the iron, soft and gentle,
must be toughened, must be tempered,
turned into steel defiant.
Get the spittle from a serpent!
Bring the venom from a viper!
Iron would not harbor evil,
if it had no serpent spittle
had no murky viper venom.”
Taat see ahjuita ärises,
halliparda vommi päälta:
Varja nüüd vägeva Looja,
kaitse kaunike Jumala,
et ei kaoks see mees koguni,
hoopistükkis ema lapsi,
Looja loodusta elusta.
Jumala alustatusta.
Uued ajad. Uued jumalad.
Kahurid, lennukid,
tankid, kuulipildujad.
Uus raud ja teras,
uhiuued, targad,
täpsed, vägevad tapjad,
aulomaatsete sihtimisseadmetega
tuumalaengut kandvad,
tõrjerelvadele kättesaamaiud raketid.
Droned the old men on the oven,
groaned the greybeard from the furnace:
“Shelter us, Supreme Creator!
Grant us safety, God Almighty,
Changing eras, modern deities.
Cannons, airplanes, tanks, armed warfare.
Cannons, tanks, airplanes.
so that mankind will not perish,
future children be protected
New steel and iron,
transformed into precise
evil, powerful killers
armed with automated guiding devices,
armed with nuclear warheads
useless against all defenses.
from destruction, from extinction,
ever part of God’s creation.”
Noad, odad,
kirved, taprid, saablid,
Knives spears, axes,
halberds, sabers,
A30
2012 Program Notes, Book 2
A2 Program
Notes
Friday, June 29 and Saturday, June 30, 2012
lingud, tomahawkid, bumerangid.
ammud, nooled, kivid, kaikad,
küüned, hambad, luv ja sool,
tuhk ja tõrv, napalm ja süsi.
slings, tomahawks, boomerangs,
bows and arrows, rocks and clubs,
claws and teeth, sand and salt,
dust and tar, napalm and coal.
Uus ja kõige kaasaegsem tehnika
elektroonika viimne sõna,
valmis liikuma igasse punkti.
kõrvalekaldumatult sihti tabama,
peatama, rivist välja lööma,
hävitama,
võitlusvõimetuks tegema,
haavama, leadmata kaotama.
tapma, tapma raua, terase,
kroomi, titaani, uraani, plutooniumi,
ja paljude teiste elementidega.
Innovations, far-reaching, technical,
electronic, ultimate...
Ready to fly in any direction,
stay undeflected, striking target forcefully.
Annihilate, knocking out of action,
obliterate, render hopelessly impotent,
render hopelessly impotent,
Killing, killing, with steel and iron!
Killing, steel and iron, chromium,
titanium, uranium, plutonium, and
multitudes of elements.
Ohoi sinda, rauda kurja.
mõõka sõja sünnitaja,
rauda rähka, kulda kilpi,
sina leras, nurja tõugu!
Hurjuh sinda, rauda raiska!
Oleme ühesta soosta,
ühest seemnest me siginud,
sina maasta, mina maasta,
musta muida me mõlemad.
Ühe maa pääl me elame,
ühe maa sees kokku saame,
maad meil küllalt sus mõlemal.
Ohoi cursed, evil iron!
Sword, begetter of all warfare!
Golden guardian of the swamp ore,
steel that’s kith and kin to evil.
Fie upon you, evil iron!
You and I are from the same seed,
from the same earth we have sprouted.
From the same good soil we hearken,
you and I, we share this planet,
bound to share the earth together,
earth that will us all recover,
earth enough for all, forever.
Carmina Burana, Cantiones profanae
(1935-1936; arranged 1956)
Carl Orff (1895-1982)
Arranged by Wilhelm Killmayer (born in 1927)
About thirty miles south of Munich, in the foothills of the Bavarian
Alps, is the abbey of Benediktbeuren. In 1803, a 13th-century codex
was discovered among its holdings that contains some 200 secular
poems that give a vivid, earthy portrait of Medieval life. Many
of these poems, attacking the defects of the Church, satirizing contemporary manners
and morals, criticizing the omnipotence of money, and praising the sensual joys of food,
drink and physical love, were written by an amorphous band known as “Goliards.” These
wandering scholars and ecclesiastics, who were often esteemed teachers and recipients
of courtly patronage, filled their worldly verses with images of self-indulgence that were
probably as much literary convention as biographical fact. The language they used was a
heady mixture of Latin, old German and old French. Some paleographic musical notation
appended to a few of the poems indicates that they were sung, but it is today so obscure as
to be indecipherable. This manuscript was published in 1847 by Johann Andreas Schmeller
under the title, Carmina Burana (“Songs of Beuren”), “carmina” being the plural of the Latin
word for song, “carmen.”
Carl Orff encountered these lusty lyrics for the first time in the 1930s, and he was immediately
struck by their theatrical potential. Like Aaron Copland and Virgil Thomson in the United
States, Orff at that time was searching for a simpler, more direct musical expression that
could immediately affect listeners. Orff’s view, however, was more Teutonically philosophical
than that of the Americans, who were seeking a music for the common man, one related to
2012 ProgramProgram
Notes, Book
2 A31
Notes
A3
Friday, June 29 and Saturday, June 30, 2012
the everyday world. Orff sought to create a musical idiom that would serve as a means of
drawing listeners away from their daily experiences and closer to the realization of oneness
with the universe. In the words of the composer’s biographer Andreas Liess, “Orff’s spiritual
form is molded by the superimposition of a high intellect on a primitive creative instinct,”
thus establishing a tension between the rational (intellect) and the irrational (instinct). The
artistic presentation of the deep-seated psychological self to the thinking person allows
an exploration of the regions of being that have been overlaid by accumulated layers of
civilization.
Orff chose 24 poems from the Carmina Burana to include in his work. Since the 13thcentury music for them was unknown, all of their settings are original with him. The work is
disposed in three large sections with prologue and epilogue. The three principal divisions
— Primo Vere (“Springtime”), In Taberna (“In the Tavern”) and Cour d’Amours (“Court
of Love”) — sing the libidinous songs of youth, joy and love. However, the prologue and
epilogue (using the same verses and music) that frame these pleasurable accounts warn
against unbridled enjoyment. “The wheel of fortune turns; dishonored I fall from grace
and another is raised on high,” caution the words of Fortuna Imperatrix Mundi (“Fortune,
Empress of the World”), the chorus that stands like pillars of eternal verity at the entrance
and exit of this Medieval world. They are the ancient poet’s reminder that mortality is the
human lot, that the turning of the same Wheel of Fortune that brings sensual pleasure may
also grind that joy to dust. It is this bald juxtaposition of antitheses — the most fundamental
human pleasures with the sternest of cosmic admonitions — coupled with Orff’s elemental
musical idiom that gives Carmina Burana its dynamic theatricality.
The work opens with the chorus Fortuna Imperatrix Mundi, depicting the terrible
revolution of the Wheel of Fate through a powerful repeated rhythmic figure that grows
inexorably to a stunning climax. After a brief morality tale (Fortune plango vulnera — “I
lament the wounds that fortune deals”), the Springtime section begins. Its songs and dances
are filled with the sylvan brightness and optimistic expectancy appropriate to the annual
rebirth of the earth and the spirit. The next section, In Taberna (“In the Tavern”), is given
over wholly to the men’s voices. Along with a hearty drinking song are heard two satirical
stories: Olim lacus colueram (“Once in lakes I made my home”) — one of the most fiendishly
difficult pieces in the tenor repertory — and Ego sum abbas Cucaniensis (“I am the abbot
of Cucany”). The third division, Cour d’Amours (“Court of Love”), leaves far behind the
rowdy revels of the tavern to enter a refined, seductive world of sensual pleasure. The music
is limpid, gentle and enticing, and marks the first appearance of the soprano soloist. The
lovers’ urgent entreaties grow in ardor, with insistent encouragement from the chorus, until
submission is won in the most rapturous moment in the score, Dulcissime (“Sweetest Boy”).
The grand paean to the loving couple (Blanzifor et Helena) is cut short by the intervention of
imperious fate, as the opening chorus (Fortuna), like the turning of the great wheel, comes
around once again to close this mighty work.
Carmina Burana in its original scoring calls for a massive orchestra, so in 1956, to make
the work accessible to more modest performing situations, Orff’s student Wilhelm Killmayer
arranged its instrumental parts for two pianos, timpani and percussion with the composer’s
approval. Killmayer was born in Munich in 1927 and attended the city’s university before
studying composition with Orff from 1951 to 1954. He has led a successful career as a
composer, scholar, conductor and teacher, winning awards for his many stage, orchestral,
chamber and vocal works from the Fromm Music Foundation, Schleswig-Holstein Music
Festival, City of Munich and Kaske Foundation, as well as being accepted for membership
in the Bavarian Academy of Fine Arts and the Berlin Academy of Arts.
©2012 Dr. Richard E. Rodda
A32 2012 Program Notes, Book 2
Friday, June 29 and Saturday, June 30, 2012
FORTUNA IMPERATRIX MUNDI (Fortune, Empress of the World)
1. O fortuna
Chorus
O fortuna,O fortune!
velut luna
Like the moon
statu variabilis,
ever-changing,
semper crescis
rising first
aut decrescis;
then declining;
vita detestabilis
hateful life
nunc obdurat
treats us badly
et tunc curat
then with kindness,
ludo mentis aciem,
making sport with our desires,
egestatem,
causing power
potestatem
and poverty alike
dissolvit ut glaciem.
to melt like ice.
Sors immanis
et inanis,
rota tu volubilis,
status malus,
vana salus
semper dissolubilis,
obumbrata
et velata
michi quoque niteris;
nunc per ludum
dorsum nudum
fero tui sceleris.
Dread destiny
and empty fate,
an ever turning wheel,
who make adversity
and fickle health
alike turn to nothing,
in the dark
and secretly
you work against me;
how through your trickery
my naked back
is turned to you unarmed.
Sors salutis
et virtutis
michi nunc contraria,
est affectus
et defectus
semper in angaria.
Hac in hora
sine mora
corde pulsum tangite;
quod per sortem
sternit fortem,
mecum omnes plangite!
Good fortune
and strength
now are turned from me,
Affection
and defeat
are always on duty.
Come now,
pluck the strings
without delay;
and since by fate
the strong are overthrown,
weep ye all with me.
Fortune plango vulnera
stillantibus ocellis,
quod sua michi munera
subtrahit rebellis.
Verum est, quod legitur
2. Fortune plango vulnera
Chorus
I lament the wounds that fortune deals
with tear-filled eyes,
for returning to the attack
she takes her gifts from me.
It is true
sed plerumque sequitur
occasio calvata.
the well-thatched pate
may soonest lose its hair.
fronte capillata,
as they say,
In fortune solioOnce on fortune’s throne
sederam elatus,
I sat exalted,
prosperitatis vario
crowned with a wreath
flore coronatus;
of prosperity’s flowers.
quicquid enim florui
But from my happy,
felix et beatus,
flower-decked paradise
2012 Program Notes, Book 2 A33
Friday, June 29 and Saturday, June 30, 2012
nunc a summo corrui
gloria privatus.
I was struck down
and stripped of all my glory.
Fortune rota volvitur:
descendo minoratus;
alter in altum tollitur;
nimis exaltatus
rex sedet in vertice —
caveat ruinam!
Nam sub axe legimus
Hecubam reginam.
The wheel of fortune turns;
dishonored I fall from grace
and another is raised on high.
Raised to over-dizzy heights of power
the king sits in majesty —
but let him beware of his downfall!
For ’neath the axle of fortune’s wheel
behold Queen Hecuba.
I. PRIMO VERE (Springtime)
3. Veris leta facies
Small Chorus
Veris leta facies
mundo propinatur,
hiemalis acies
victa iam fugatur,
in vestitu vario
Flora principatur,
nemorum dulcisono
que canto celebratur.
Flore fusus gremio
Phebus novo more
risum dat, hoc vario
iam stipatur flore.
Zephyrus nectareo
spirans in odore;
certatim pro bravio
curramus in amore.
Cytharizat cantico
dulcis Philomena,
flore rident vario
prata iam serena;
salit cetus avium
silve per amena,
chorus promit virginum
iam gaudia millena.
The joyous face of spring
is presented to the world;
winter’s army
is conquered and put to flight.
In colorful dress
Flora is arrayed,
and the woods are sweet
with birdsong in her praise.
Reclining in Flora’s lap
Phoebus again
laughs merrily,
covered with many-colored flowers.
Zephyr breathes around
the scented fragrance;
eagerly striving for the prize,
let us compete in love.
Trilling her song
sweet Philomel is heard,
and smiling with flowers
the peaceful meadows lie;
a flock of wild birds
rises from the woods;
the chorus of maidens
brings a thousand joys.
4. Omnia sol temperat
Baritone
Omnia sol temperat
purus et subtilis,
novo mundo reserat
faciem Aprilis;
ad amorem properat
animus herilis,
et iocundis imperat
deus puerilis.
Rerum tanta novitas
in solemni vere
et veris auctoritas
iubet nos gaudere;
vias prebet solitas,
et in tuo vere
fides est et probitas
tuum retinere.
A34 2012 Program Notes, Book 2
All things are tempered by the sun
so pure and fine.
In a new world are revealed
the beauties of April;
to thoughts of love
the mind of man is turned,
and in pleasure’s haunts
the youthful God holds sway.
Nature’s great renewal
in solemn spring
and spring’s example
bid us rejoice;
they charge us keep to well-worn paths,
and in your springtime
there is virtue and honesty
in being constant to your lover.
Friday, June 29 and Saturday, June 30, 2012
Ama me fideliter!
Fidem meam nota:
de corde totaliter
et ex mente tota
sum presentialiter
absens in remota.
Quisquis amat taliter,
volvitur in rota.
Ecce gratum
et optatum
ver reducit gaudia,
purpuratum
floret pratum,
sol serenat omnia.
Iamiam cedant tristia!
Estas redit,
nunc recedit
Hyemis sevitia.
Iam liquescit
et decrescit
grando, nix et cetera;
bruma fugit,
et iam sugit
ver estatis ubera;
illi mens est misera,
qui nec vivit,
nec lascivit,
sub estatis dextera.
Gloriantur
et letantur
in melle dulcedinis,
qui conantur,
ut untantur
premio Cupidinis;
simus jussu Cypridis
gloriantes
et letantes
pares esse Paridis.
Love me truly!
Remember my constancy.
With all my heart
and all my mind
I am with you
even when far away.
Whoever knows such love
knows the torture of the wheel.
5. Ecce gratum
Chorus
Behold the welcome,
long-awaited spring,
which brings back pleasure
and with crimson flowers
adorns the fields.
The sun brings peace to all around.
Away with sadness!
Summer returns,
and now departs
cruel winter.
Melt away
and disappear
hail, ice and snow;
the mists flee,
and spring is fed
at summer’s breast.
Wretched is the man
who neither lives
nor lusts
under summer’s spell.
They taste delight
and honeyed sweetness
who strive for
and gain
Cupid’s reward.
Let us submit
to Venus’ rule,
and joyful
and proud
be equal to Paris.
UF DEM ANGER (On the Green)
6. Tanz (Dance)
Orchestra
7. Floret silva
Chorus and Small Chorus
Floret silva nobilis
The noble forest
floribus et foliis.
Is decked with flowers and leaves.
Ubi est antiquus
Where is my old,
meus amicus?
my long-lost lover?
Hinc equitavit,
He rode away on his horse.
eia, quis me amabit?
Alas, who will love me now?
Floret silva undique,
The forest all around is in flower,
nach mime gesellen ist mir we.
I long for my lover.
Gruonet der walt allenthalben,
The forest all around is in flower,
was ist min geselle alse lange?
whence is my lover gone?
Der ist geriten hinnen,
He rode away on his horse.
owi, wer sol mich minnen?
Alas, who will love me now?
2012 Program Notes, Book 2 A35
Friday, June 29 and Saturday, June 30, 2012
8. Chramer, gip die varwe mir
Children’s Chorus and Chorus
Chramer, gip die varwe mir,
Salesman, give me colored paint
die min wengel roete,
to paint my cheeks so crimson red,
damit ich die jungen man
that I may make these bold young men,
an ir dank der minnenliebe noete.
whether they will or not, love me.
Seht mich an,
Look at me,
jungen man!
young men all!
Lat mich iu gevallen!
Am I not well pleasing?
Minnet, tugentliche man,
Love, all you right-thinking men,
minnecliche frouwen!
women worthy to be loved!
Minne tuot iu hoch gemuot
Love shall raise your spirits high
unde lat iuch in hohlen eren schouwen.
and put a spring into your step.
Seht mich an, etc.
Look at me, etc.
Wol dir, werit, das du bist
Hail to thee, O world that art
also freudenriche!
in joy so rich and plenteous!
Ich wil dir sin undertan
I will ever be in thy debt
durch din liebe immer sicherliche.
surely for thy goodness’ sake!
Seht mich an, etc.
Look at me, etc.
Swaz hie gat umbe,
daz sint allez megede,
die wellent an man
alle disen sumer gan.
Chume, chum, geselle min,
ih enbite harte din.
9. Reie (Round Dance)
Swaz hie gat umbe
Chorus
They who here go dancing round
are young maidens all
who will go without a man
this whole summer long.
Chume, chum, geselle min
Small Chorus
Come, come, dear heart of mine,
I so long have waited for thee.
Suzer rosenvarwer munt,
chum un mache mich gesunt.
Sweetest rosy colored mouth,
come and make me well again.
Swaz hie gat umbe
Chorus
Swaz hie gat umbe, etc.
They who here go dancing round, etc.
10. Were diu werlt alle min
Chorus
Were diu werlt alle min
If the whole world were but mine
von deme mere unze an den Rin,
from the sea right to the Rhine,
des wolt ih mih darben,
gladly I’d pass it by
daz diu chünegin von Engellant
if the Queen of England fair
lege an minen armen.
in my arms did lie.
II. IN TABERNA (In the Tavern)
Estuans interius
ira vehementi
in amaritudine
loquor mee menti:
factus de materia,
cinis elementi,
similis sum folio,
de quo ludunt venti.
11. Estuans interius
Baritone
Seething inside
with boiling rage,
in bitterness
I talk to myself.
Made of matter,
risen from dust,
I am like a leaf
tossed in play by the winds.
A36 2012 Program Notes, Book 2
Friday, June 29 and Saturday, June 30, 2012
Cum sit enim proprium
But whereas it befits
viro sapienti
a wise man
supra petram ponere
to build his house
sedem fundamenti,
on a rock,
stultus ego comparor
I, poor fool,
fluvio labenti,
am like a meandering river,
sub eodem tramite
never keeping
nunquam permanenti.
to the same path.
Feror ego veluti
I drift along
sine nauta navis,
like a pilotless ship
ut per vias aeris
or like an aimless bird,
vaga fertur avis;
carried at random through the air.
non me tenent vincula,
No chains hold me captive,
non me tenet clavis,
no lock holds me fast;
quero mihi similes,
I am looking for those like me,
et adiungor pravis.
and I joined the depraved.
Mihi cordis gravitas
The burdens of the heart
res videtur gravis;
seem to weigh me down;
iocus est amabilis
jesting is pleasant
dulciorque favis;
and sweeter than the honeycomb.
quicquid Venus imperat,
Whatever Venus commands
labor est suavis,
is pleasant toil;
que nunquam in cordibus
she never dwells
habitat ignavis.
in craven hearts.
Via lata gradiorOn the broad path I wend my way
more iuventutis,
as is youth’s wont,
inplicor et vitiis,
I am caught up in vice
immemor virtutis,
and forgetful of virtue,
voluptatis avidus
caring more for voluptuous pleasure
magis quam salutis,
than for my health;
mortuus in anima
dead in spirit,
curam gero cutis.
I think only of my skin.
12. Olim lacus colueram
Tenor and Male Chorus
Olim lacus colueram,Once in lakes I made my home,
olim pulcher extiteram —
once I dwelt in beauty —
dum cignus ego fueram.
that was when I was a swan.
Miser, miser!
Alas, poor me!
Modo niger
Now I am black
et ustus fortiter!
and roasted to a turn!
Girat, regirat garcifer;On the spit I turn and turn,
me rogus urit fortiter:
the fire roasts me through;
propinat me nunc dapifer.
now I am presented at the feast.
Miser, miser! etc.
Alas, poor me! etc.
Nunc in scutella iaceo,
Now in a serving dish I lie
et volitare nequeo,
and can no longer fly;
dentes frendentes video.
gnashing teeth confront me.
Miser, miser! etc.
Alas, poor me! etc.
13. Ego sum abbas
Baritone and Male Chorus
Ego sum abbas Cucaniensis,
I am the abbot of Cucany,
et consilium meum est cum bibulis,
and I like to drink with my friends.
et in secta Decii voluntas mea est,
I belong from choice to the sect of Decius,
et qui mane me quesierit in taberna,
and whoever meets me in the morning
at the tavern
post vesperam nudus egredietur,
by evening has lost his clothes,
et sic denudatus veste clamabit:
and thus stripped of his clothes cries out:
2012 Program Notes, Book 2 A37
Wafna, wafna!
Quid fecisti sors turpissima?
Nostre vite gaudia
abstulisti omnia!
Wafna, wafna!
Ha, ha!
Friday, June 29 and Saturday, June 30, 2012
Wafna, wafna!
What hast thou done, oh, wicked fate?
All the pleasures of this life
thus to take away!
Wafna, wafna!
Ha, ha!
14. In taberna quando sumus
Male Chorus
In taberna quando sumus,
When we are in the tavern
non curamus quid sit humus,
we spare no thought for the grave,
sed ad ludum properamus,
but rush to the gaming tables
cui semper insudamus.
where we always sweat and strain.
Quid agatur in taberna,
What goes on in the tavern,
ubi nummus est pincerna,
where a coin gets you a drink —
hoc est opus ut queratur,
if this is what you would know,
si quid loquar, audiatur.
then listen to what I say.
Quidam ludunt, quidam bibunt,
Some men gamble, some men drink,
quidam indiscrete vivunt.
some indulge in indiscretions.
Sed in ludo qui morantur,
But of those who stay to gamble,
ex his quidam denudantur,
some lose their clothes,
quidam ibi vestiuntur,
some win new clothes,
quidam saccis induuntur.
while others put on sack cloth.
Ibi nullus timet mortem,
There no one is afraid of death,
sed pro Bacho mittunt sortem.
but for Bacchus plays at games of chance.
Primo pro nummata vini;
First the dice are thrown for wine;
ex hac bibunt libertini,
this the libertines drink.
semel bibunt pro captivis,Once they drink to prisoners,
post hec bibunt ter pro vivis,
then three times to the living,
quater pro Christianis cunctis,
four times to all Christians,
quinquies pro fidelibus defunctis,
five to the faithful departed,
sexies pro sororibus vanis,
six times to the dissolute sisters,
septies pro militibus silvanis.
seven to the bush-rangers.
Octies pro fratribus perversis,
Eight times to the delinquent brothers,
nonies pro monachis dispersis,
nine to the dispersed monks,
decies pro navigantibus,
ten times to the navigators,
undecies pro discordantibus,
eleven to those at war,
duodecies pro penitentibus,
twelve to the penitent,
tredecies pro iter angentibus.
thirteen to travelers.
Tam pro papa quam pro rege
They drink to the Pope and king alike,
bibunt omnes sine lege.
all drink without restraint.
Bibit hera, bibit herus,
The mistress drinks, the master drinks,
bibit miles, bibit clerus,
the soldier drinks, the man of God,
bibit ille, bibit illa,
this man drinks, this woman drinks,
bibit servus cum ancilla,
the manservant with the serving maid,
bibit velox, bibit piger,
the quick man drinks, the sluggard drinks,
bibit albus, bibit niger,
the white man and the black man drink,
bibit constans, bibit vagus,
the steady man drinks, the wanderer drinks,
bibit rudus, bibit magus.
the simpleton drinks, the wise man drinks.
Bibit pauper et egrotus,
The poor man drinks, the sick man drinks,
bibit exul et ignotus,
the exile drinks and the unknown,
bibit puer, bibit canus,
the boy drinks, the old man drinks,
bibit presul et decanus,
the bishop drinks and the deacon,
bibit soror, bibit frater,
sister drinks and brother drinks,
bibit anus, bibit mater;
the old crone drinks, the mother drinks,
bibit ista, bibit ille,
this one drinks, that one drinks,
bibunt centum, bibunt mille.
a hundred drink, a thousand drink.
A38 2012 Program Notes, Book 2
Friday, June 29 and Saturday, June 30, 2012
Parum sexcente nummate
durant, cum immoderate
bibunt omnes sine meta.
Quamvis bibant mente leta,
sic nos rodunt omnes gentes,
et sic erimus egentes.
Qui nos rodunt confundantur
et cum iustis non scribantur.
Six hundred coins are not enough
when all these drink too much,
and without restraint.
Although they drink cheerfully,
many people censure us,
and we shall always be short of money.
May our cries be confounded
and never be numbered among the just.
III. COUR D’AMOURS (Court of Love)
Amor volat undique,
captus est libidine.
Iuvenes, iuvencule
coniunguntur merito.
Siqua sine socio,
caret omni gaudio;
tenet noctis infirma
sub intimo
cordis in custodia:
fit res amarissima.
15. Amor volat undique
Children’s Chorus and Soprano
Love flies everywhere
and is seized by desire.
Young men and women
are matched together.
If a girl lacks a partner,
she misses all the fun;
in the depths
of her heart
is darkest night:
it is a bitter fate.
16. Dies, nox et omnia
Baritone
Dies, nox et omnia
Day, night and all the world
mihi sunt contraria,
are against me,
virginum, colloquia
the sound of maidens’ voices
me fay planszer,
makes me weep.
oy suvenz suspirer,
I often hear sighing,
plu me fay temer.
and it makes me more afraid.
O sodales, ludite,O friends, be merry,
vos qui scitis dicite,
say what you will,
michi mesto parcite,
but have mercy on me, a sad man,
grand ey dolur,
for great is my sorrow,
attamen consulite
yet give me counsel
per voster honur.
for the sake of your honor.
Tua pulchra facies,
Your lovely face
me fey planszer milies,
makes me weep a thousand tears
pectus habet glacies,
because your heart is of ice,
a remender
but I would be restored
statim vivus fierem
at once to life
per un baser.
by one single kiss.
17. Stetit puella
Soprano
Stetit puella
rufa tunica;
si quis eam tetigit,
tunica crepuit.
Eia, eia.
Stetit puella,
tamquam rosula;
facie splenduit,
os eius floruit.
Eia, eia.
There stood a young girl
in a red tunic;
if anyone touched her,
the tunic rustled.
Heigho, heigho.
There stood a girl
fair as a rose;
her face was radiant,
her mouth like a flower.
Heigho, heigho.
2012 Program Notes, Book 2 A39
Friday, June 29 and Saturday, June 30, 2012
18. Circa mea pectora
Baritone and Chorus
My breast
is filled with sighing
for your loveliness,
and I suffer grievously.
Manda liet,
manda liet,
my sweetheart
comes not.
Your eyes shine
like sunlight,
like the splendor of lightning
in the night.
Manda liet, etc.
May God grant, may the gods permit
the plan I have in mind:
to undo the bonds
of her virginity.
Manda liet, etc.
Circa mea pectora
multa sunt suspiria
de tua pulchritudine,
que me ledunt misere.
Manda liet,
manda liet,
min geselle
chumet niet.
Tui lucent oculi
sicut solis radii,
sicut splendor fulguris
lucem donat tenebris.
Manda liet, etc.
Vellut deus, vellent dii
quod mente proposui:
ut eius virginea
reserassem vincula.
Manda liet, etc.
19. Si puer cum puellula
Male Chorus and Baritone
If a boy and a girl
linger together,
happy is their union.
Increasing love
leaves tedious
good sense far behind,
and inexpressible pleasure fills
their limbs, their arms, their lips.
Si puer cum puellula
moraretur in cellula,
felix coniunctio.
Amore sucrescente,
pariter e medio
avulso procul tedio,
fit ludus ineffabilis
membris, lacertis, labiis.
20. Veni, veni, venias
Double Chorus
Come, come, pray come,
do not let me die,
hyrca, hyrca, nazaza,
trillirivos ...
Lovely is your face,
the glance of your eyes,
the braids of your hair,
oh, how beautiful you are!
Redder than the rose,
whiter than the lily,
comelier than all the rest;
always I shall glory in you.
Veni, veni, venias,
ne me mori facias,
hyrca, hyrca, nazaza
trillirivos ...
Pulchra tibi facies,
oculorum acies,
capillorum series,
oh, quam clara species!
Rosa rubicundior,
lilio candidior,
omnibus formosior,
semper in te glorior!
In trutina mentis dubia
fluctuant contraria
lascivus amor et pudicitia.
Sed eligo quod video,
collum iugo prebeo:
ad iugum tamen suave transeo.
Tempus est iocundum,
21. In trutina
Soprano
In the scales
of my wavering indecision
physical love and chastity are weighed.
But I choose what I see,
I bow my head in submission and take
on the yoke which is after all sweet.
22. Tempus est iocundum
Soprano, Baritone and Children’s Chorus
Pleasant is the season,
A40 2012 Program Notes, Book 2
Friday, June 29 and Saturday, June 30, 2012
O virgines;O maidens;
modo conguadete,
now rejoice together,
vos iuvenes.
young men.
Oh, oh, oh,Oh, oh, oh,
totus floreo,
I blossom,
iam amore virginali
now with pure love
totus ardeo,
I am on fire!
novus, novus amor
This love is new, new,
est, quo pereo.
of which I perish.
Mea me confortat
My love brings me comfort
promissio,
when she promises,
mea me deportat
but makes me distraught
negatio.
with her refusal.
Oh, oh, etc.Oh, oh, etc.
Tempore brumali
In winter time
vir patiens,
the man is lazy,
animo vernali
in the spring he will turn
lasciviens.amorous.
Oh, oh, etc.Oh, oh, etc.
Mea mecum ludit
My chastity
virginitas,
teases me,
mea me detrudit
but my innocence
simplicitas.
holds me back!
Oh, oh, etc.Oh, oh, etc.
Veni, domicella,
Come, my darling,
cum gaudio,
come with joy,
veni, veni, pulchra,
come, my beauty,
iam, pereo.
for already I die!
Oh, oh, etc.Oh, oh, etc.
23. Dulcissime
Soprano
Dulcissime,
ah, totam tibi subdo me!
Sweetest boy,
ah, I give my all to you!
BLANZIFLOR ET HELENA (Blanziflor and Helena)
24. Ave formosissima
Chorus
Ave formosissima,
gemma pretiosa,
ave decus virginum,
virgo gloriosa,
ave mundi luminar,
ave mundi rosa,
Blanziflor et Helena,
Venus generosa.
Hail to thee, most lovely,
most precious jewel,
hail pride of virgins,
most glorious virgin!
Hail, light of the world,
hail, rose of the world!
Blanziflor and Helena,
noble Venus, hail!
FORTUNA IMPERATRIX MUNDI (Fortune, Empress of the World)
25. O fortuna
Chorus
O fortuna,O fortune!
velut luna, etc.
Like the moon, etc.
2012 Program Notes, Book 2 A41