Program Notes
Introduction
In the middle of this program the longest number, an entire act
from John Rutter’s The Reluctant Dragon, gallops right up to us, as it
were. This work is a concert-version musical comedy, a mini-operetta
complete with a narrator and actors who speak their parts. Its music
is an integral part of the whole. The songs tell parts of the story that
are best expressed, that can only be expressed, in music. That this is
so is both amazing and something we take for granted.
The other ten songs of this concert have their own contexts, though
they do not have spoken words which preface and conclude them.
But that is the purpose of program notes: to place the songs in their
contexts. It’s a paradoxical task – to use words to try to describe what
“is best expressed in music.”
As always, I encourage you to read the texts. Read them before, after
or during the performances. Who knows – you might find yourselves
wanting to come back tomorrow if you are here on Saturday night or
wanting to call for an “encore!” if you are here on Sunday – for that’s
what the audiences of 19th century operettas did!
Mizmor l’David (Psalm 29) by Shlomo Carlebach, arranged by
Joshua Jacobson
A Psalm of David. Ascribe to Adonai, O divine beings, ascribe to Adonai
the glory and strength. Ascribe to Adonai the glory of God’s name; bow
down to Adonai, majestic in holiness. The voice of Adonai is over the
waters; the God of glory thunders, Adonai, over the mighty waters. The
voice of Adonai is power; the voice of Adonai is majesty; the voice of
Adonai breaks cedars; Adonai shatters the cedars of Lebanon. God makes
Lebanon skip like a calf, Sirion, like a young wild ox. The voice of Adonai
kindles flames of fire; the voice of Adonai convulses the wilderness;
Adonai convulses the wilderness of Kadesh; the voice of Adonai causes
hinds to calve, and strips forests bare; while in God’s temple all say
“Glory!” Adonai sat enthroned at the Flood; Adonai sits enthroned,
sovereign forever. May Adonai grant strength to the people; may Adonai
bestow well-being on the people.
In classical Jewish liturgical tradition, the entire Book of Psalms is
recited either once a week or once a month. And then there are
special psalms which are appointed to be used on the Sabbath.
In these lectionaries, Psalm 29 is either the last of the twenty-nine
for Sunday, or the first psalm of “Day 5.” It is also the psalm for the
second Sabbath of the liturgical year, when the Torah readings relate
the story of Noah. But in the kibbutz or, to be precise, the “moshar”
of the Carlebach community in Israel, this setting of Psalm 29 is the
climactic concluding psalm of those sung at the opening of the festive
Friday evening service.
Shlomo Carlebach was a charismatic, guitar-playing rabbi who
started “The House of Love and Prayer” in San Francisco in 1969
and led it from California to Israel. He wrote and sang hundreds
of devotional songs, many of which have become “standards” in
contemporary Jewish worship. Arranger Joshua Jacobson wrote that
“in this arrangement, I have tried to capture the intensity, the joy and
the spiritual connection I experienced when I visited the Carlebach
community in 2005.”
Ubi Caritas by Maurice Duruflé
Ubi caritas et amor,Deus ibi est.
Where there is charity and love, God is there.
Congregavit nos in unum Christi amor.
The love of Christ has gathered us together.
Exsultemus et in ipso jucundemur.
Let us rejoice and be glad in it.
Timeamus et amemus Deum vivum.
Let us revere and love the living God.
Et ex corde diligamus nos sincero. And from a sincere heart let us love one another.
O Sacrum Convivium! Motet au Saint-Sacrement by Olivier Messiaen
O sacrum convivium in quo Christus sumitur:
recolitur memoria passionis ejus:
mens impletur gratia:
et futurae gloriae
nobis pignus datur. Alleluia!
O sacred banquet
in which Christ is received:
the memory of his passion is recalled,
the mind is filled with grace,
and, of future glory,
to us, a pledge is given. Alleluia!
O Magnum Mysterium by Morten Lauridsen
O magnum mysterium, O great mystery,
et admirabile sacramentum, and wondrous sacrament,
ut animalia viderent Dominum that animals should see
natum, jacentem in praesepio!
Beata Virgo, cujus viscera
meruerunt portare
Dominum Christum. Alleluia!
the newborn Lord, lying in their manger!
Blessed is the Virgin whose womb
was worthy to bear the
Lord Jesus Christ. Alleluia!
In most contemporary churches, a motet would be called either
“special music” or simply “anthem.” That is, a motet stands for music
that is more complicated than what can be sung by the average
churchgoer. Its simplest definition is, “A piece of music in several
parts with words.”
Poetically speaking, the first two motets, “Ubi Caritas” and “O Sacrum
Convivium” are rondeaux, that is poems which begin and end with
the same words. They are both by French composers. Duruflé’s work
is one of four motets he composed using “themes from traditional
Gregorian chants.” Messiaen’s motet has the added, mystical
significance of being described as sung “to the Holy Sacrament.”
The motet of the modern American composer (with a very Norwegian
name!), Morten Lauridsen, is both a Christmas carol and a hymn to
the Virgin Mary.
It’s easy to imagine the settings – the contexts – of these devotional
works as we sit here in a sanctuary dedicated to the worship of God.
The Chamber Chorale has often brought their music – their songs – to
sing as integral parts of a worship service. You might consider inviting
them to perform some special music for a Sabbath service.
Unicornis Captivatur by Ola Gjeilo
Unicornis captivatur, Aule regum presentatur Venatorum laqueo, Palo serpens est levatus, Medicatur sauciatus Veneno vipereo. The Unicorn is captured,
It’s presented to the royal court
In the hunter’s snare;
Creeping, it freed itself from the pole;
Because it’s wounded, it heals itself
With the viper’s venom.
Alleluia canite, Agno morienti, Alleluia pangite, Alleluia promite Leoni vincenti. Sing Alleluia
To the dying lamb;
Sing Alleluia,
Cry Alleluia
To the victorious Lion.
Pellicano vulnerato Life returns to the wounded Pelican
Vita redit pro peccato After miserable death
Nece stratis misera, Phos fenicis est exusta, Concremanturque vetusta Macrocosmi scelera. In its nest for the sins of the world.
The Phoenix’ light is burnt out,
The ancient sins of the world
Are utterly consumed by flame.
Alleluia canite… Sing Alleluia…
Idrus intrat crocodillum, Extis privat, necat illum, Vivus inde rediens; Tris diebus dormitavit Leo, quem resuscitavit Basileus rugiens. The Hydra enters the crocodile,
Deprives it of its entrails, kills it,
and comes back alive.
Three days long
The Lion slept till the King
Awakened it with a roar.
Alleluia canite… Sing Alleluia…
– Anonymous, Engelberg Codex 31
There are works of sacred music whose contexts are not liturgical
per se, but which fall under a category which can be hard to explain
“in church.” This category is that of entertainment.
Unicornis Captivatur is a late Medieval Latin poem. Note the rhymes –
they are a preview of “the poetry of the future” which the monks of
the Engelberg monastery in Switzerland wrote for their “off-hour”
pleasure. If it wasn’t originally sung, it was surely chanted in some
form. I don’t think it’s too far-fetched to compare monasteries to the
Bible camps of today, for they were places where songs were created,
where music had a daily place.
The poem is an expression of the intellectual pleasure experienced
when you give yourself the challenge of coming up with other ways
to illustrate a sacred story. It’s not a crossword puzzle or a wordsearch, but it’s similar. The real (and sometimes mystical) animals
of the poem all represent the story of Christ in some way. We all
know the Unicorn and the Phoenix, the lamb and the lion. And we
perhaps know the myth of the self-sacrificing mother pelican. We
may even remember the bronze serpent which Moses lifted up in the
wilderness in order to save his people. We are a little weaker in the
story of the hydra and the crocodile, where the hydra “stands for”
Jesus who entered or descended into hell (= the crocodile).
But remember, these medieval “bestiaries” are direct ancestors of
such modern tales as C.S. Lewis’ Chronicles of Narnia and Tolkien’s
Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit.
The Norwegian-born composer, Ola Gjeilo, writes that this work was
“born out from the inspiration of a particular text that lights a special
spark in the composer’s heart.”
Ruth by Paul Ayres
[And Ruth said,] “I will go wherever you go and live wherever you live.
Your people will be my people, and your God will be my God. I will die
where you die and will be buried there.” (Ruth 1:16-17)
There are three things that amaze me – no, four things I do not
understand: how an eagle glides through the sky, how a snake slithers
on a rock, how a ship navigates the ocean, how a man loves a woman.
(Proverbs 30:18-19)
Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too great for me to know!
(Psalm 139:6)
The composer himself shares the very personal context of the
creation of and the first performance of this piece: “When my fiancée,
Ruth Pepper, said to me as we were discussing our future lives, ‘I will
go wherever you go,’ – these words from the Old Testament book
of Ruth became an ideal text for our wedding. I combined them
with two other favorite passages and the work was first performed
by a choir made up of our wedding guests at St. Peter’s church in
suburban London in Feb. 2001.”
Whether this song becomes a classic like the one Peter Stookey (of
“Peter, Paul and Mary”) wrote for the wedding of Paul and Mary – the
“Wedding Song” of the 70s (and later!) is of interest, but it doesn’t
really matter. What is always noteworthy is the creation of a beautiful
work of musical art and how it can be “used” in many contexts other
than its original one, such as in this concert.
Abraham Lincoln Walks at Midnight by Abbie Betinis
Would I might rouse the Lincoln in you all.
It is portentous and a thing of state
That here at midnight, in our little town
A mourning figure walks, and will not rest,
Near the old courthouse pacing up and down.
Or by his homestead, or in shadow’d yards
He lingers where his children used to play,
Or through the market, on the well-worn stones
He stalks until the dawn-stars burn away.
A bronzed, lank man! His suit of ancient black,
A famous high top-hat and plain worn shawl –
Would I might rouse the Lincoln in you all.
He cannot sleep upon his hillside now.
He is among us: — as in times before!
And we who toss and lie awake for long
Breathe deep, and start, to see him pass the door.
His head is bowed. He thinks on men and kings.
Yea, when the sick world cries, how can he sleep?
Too many fight, too many weep.
The sins of war-lords all but burn his heart.
He sees the dreadnaughts scouring ev’ry main.
He carries on his shawl-wrapped shoulders now
The bitterness, folly and the pain.
He cannot rest until a spirit-dawn
Shall come; — the shining hope of people free:
The league of sober folk, the Workers’ Earth,
Bringing long peace to Cornland, Alp and Sea.
It breaks his heart that kings must murder still,
That all his hours of travail seem yet in vain.
And who, who will bring sweet peace
That he may sleep upon his hill again?
– from “Lincoln” and “Abraham Lincoln Walks at Midnight” by Vachel Lindsay (18791931), both poems edited and slightly modified by the composer.
Abraham Lincoln does not need to be “rescued from the past.” He
continues to “walk” among us in Oscar-winning films, and on our
pennies and $5 bills. We know what he represents: a rare example
of Presidential integrity which could articulate our highest national
ideals in ways that everyone could understand. Lincoln is, to use the
modern term, “iconic.” That is, he is something like a popular saint.
The American poet Vachel Lindsay was moved to invoke the presence
of Lincoln right before the outbreak of World War I. Lindsay was
himself a native of Springfield, Illinois and was very familiar with the
“Land of Lincoln.” The contemporary Minnesota composer Abbie
Betinis was commissioned to write Abraham Lincoln Walks at Midnight
for the bicentennial of Lincoln’s birth in 2009. It was premiered by
the Minnesota All-State Men’s Chorus. Again, read the text. Imagine,
along with Lindsay, how the spirit of Lincoln might help to “bring long
peace to Cornland, Alp and Sea” – in 1914 and in 2013!
Scene from The Reluctant Dragon by John Rutter
The English composer John Rutter subtitled this piece, “An
Entertainment.” As mentioned in the introduction to these notes, it
is a “concert-version” musical comedy – for armed knights and fiery
dragons are very hard to depict realistically on stage!
The work was first performed by the King’s Singers and the London
Symphonia during the 1983 Christmas season. It is in the “TopsyTurvy” tradition of Gilbert and Sullivan operettas. For here, the story
of noble St. George destroying the ruthless dragon is turned into a
tale of sensitive, modern characters. The dragon is an aspiring poet;
St. George is a diplomat much more interested in friendly relations
than combat; there is a boy and his shepherd father who both
possess triumphant innocence. And, oh yes, there’s a nice narrator
and some not so nice villagers who tend to speak (and sing!) by
dropping their “h’s” – that is, with a Cockney accent.
The original fable is by Kenneth Grahame, the whimsical author of
The Wind in the Willows, that 1908 children’s classic about friendship
and adventure (and also about the potential for harm from the
new-fangled invention called “the automobile”). In the 1898 original,
the story ends with a stanza of poetry which the dragon imagines
St. George singing. It’s not “great poetry,” but great poetry does not
usually make for great songs!
Then St. George, he made a reverence, in the stable so dim.
“I vanquished the dragon, so fearful and grim.
So grim and so fierce – so now we may say,
‘All peaceful is our waking on Christmas Day’!”
The Frozen Logger, words and music by James Stevens, arranged
by Robert de Cormier
As I sat down one evening within a small café,
A forty year old waitress to me these words did say:
I see that you’re a logger and not just a common bum,
’cause nobody but a logger stirs his coffee with his thumb.
My lover was a logger, there’s none like him today,
If you poured whiskey on it, he’d eat a bale of hay.
He never shaved his whiskers from off of his hairy hide,
He’d just drive them in with a hammer and bite them off inside.
My lover came to see me upon one freezing day,
He held me in a fond embrace that broke three vertebrae.
He kissed me when we parted, so hard he broke my jaw,
I could not speak to tell him he forgot his mackinaw.
I saw my logger leaving, sauntering through the snow,
He was going bravely homeward at forty-eight below.
The weather it tried to freeze him, it tried its level best,
At a hundred degrees below zero, he just buttoned up his vest.
It froze clean through to China, it froze to the stars above,
At a thousand degrees below zero, I lost my logger love.
And so she lost her lover and to this café she’s come,
And here she waits ’til someone stirs his coffee with his thumb.
The Cremation of Sam McGee words by Robert W. Service, music
by Ken Berg
There are strange things done in the midnight sun
By the men who moil for gold;
The Arctic trails have their secret tales
That would make your blood run cold;
The Northern Lights have seen queer sights,
But the queerest they ever did see
Was the night on the marge of Lake Lebarge
I cremated Sam McGee.
Now Sam McGee was from Tennessee,
where the cotton blooms and blows.
Why he left his home in the South to roam
‘round the Pole, God only knows.
He was always cold, but the land of gold
seemed to hold him like a spell;
Though he’d often say, in his homely way
that he’d “sooner live in hell!”
On a Christmas Day we were mushing our way
over the Dawson Trail.
Talk of your cold! Thru the parka’s fold
it stabbed like a driven nail.
If our eyes we’d close, then the lashes froze
till sometimes we couldn’t see;
It wasn’t much fun, but the only one
to whimper was Sam McGee!
And that very night, as we lay packed tight
in our robes beneath the snow,
And the dogs were fed, and the stars o’erhead
were dancing heel and toe,
He turned to me, and “Cap,” says he,
“I’ll cash in this trip, I guess;
And if I do, I’m askin’ that you
won’t refuse my last request!”
Well, he seemed so low that I couldn’t say no;
then he says with a sort of moan:
“It’s the cursèd cold, and it’s got right hold
till I’m chilled clean through to the bone.
Yet ‘tain’t bein’ dead, it’s my awful dread
of the icy grave that pains;
So I want you to swear that, foul or fair,
you’ll cremate my last remains!”
Refrain
A pal’s last need is a thing to heed,
so I swore I would not fail;
And we started on at the streak of dawn;
but God! he looked ghastly pale!
He crouched on the sleigh and he raved all day
of his home in Tennessee;
And before nightfall a corpse was all
that was left of Sam McGee!
There was not a breath in that land of death,
and I hurried, horror-driv’n,
With a corpse half hid that I couldn’t get rid,
because of a promise giv’n;
It was lashed to the sleigh and it seemed to say:
“You may tax your brawn and brains,
But you promised true, and it’s up to you
to cremate my last remains!”
I came to the marge of Lake Lebarge,
and a derelict there lay;
It was jammed in the ice, but I saw in a trice
it was called the “Alice May.”
And I looked at it, and I thought a bit,
and I looked at my frozen chum;
Then “Here,” said I, with a sudden cry,
“is my cre-ma-to-re-um!”
Some planks I tore from the cabin floor,
and I lit the boiler fire;
Some coal I found that was lying around,
and I heaped the fuel higher;
The flames just soared, and the furnace roared,
such a blaze you seldom see;
And I burrowed a hole in the glowing coal,
and I stuffed in Sam McGee.
Then I made a hike, for I didn’t like
to hear him sizzle so;
And the heavens scowled, and the huskies howled,
and the wind began to blow.
I was sick with dread, but I bravely said,
“I’ll just take a peep inside.
I guess he’s cooked, and it’s time I looked;”
then the door I opened wide.
And there sat Sam, looking cool and calm,
in the heart of the furnace roar;
And he wore a smile you could see a mile,
and he said, “Please close that door!
It’s fine in here, but I greatly fear
you’ll let in the cold and storm.
Since I left Plumtree, down in Tennessee,
it’s the first time I’ve been warm!”
Refrain
For many, the first context of these songs is Junior High, excuse me,
I mean “Middle School,” English class. That’s where I first read “The
Cremation of Sam McGee.” And it’s where I first came into contact
with the world of Paul Bunyan – the most famous logger of them all!
But I did not know until writing this note that James Stevens (18921971) wrote two collections of Paul Bunyan stories and a novel about
the Pacific Northwest entitled Big Jim Turner.
I’m a little too young to remember how the influential folk music
group, “The Weavers,” first recorded “The Frozen Logger” in 1951. I’ve
yet to discover its original context. But my guess is that the “punch
line” came first. It must have been proverbial in the old days to say,
“Nobody but a logger stirs his coffee with his thumb.”
I don’t know if it spoils the famous poem we all, or almost all of us,
learned when we were young to know that “The Cremation of Sam
McGee” was based on a true story that Service heard during his days
in the Yukon. The appeal of the poem is how it takes a grim and grisly
event and turns it into a universally popular tale. I think the happy,
“death-defying” ending helps too!
The English major in me is compelled to point out that Ken Berg’s
version omits two and a half stanzas of the original thirteen. And he
has the famous opening and closing refrain repeated one extra time
in the middle.
Robert Service’s poetry and novels earned him enough money so he
could leave the Yukon (where he worked, in fact, in a bank), and live
almost happily-ever-after in Paris and on the north coast of Brittany,
France. He and his French wife were in Hollywood during World War II
helping to write “good” propaganda. T.S. Eliot, another “banker poet,”
was envious of Service’s popular success, and so was critical of his
work. But that is another story. As is the true story of how German
troops arrived at Service’s house in Brittany just after he was smart
enough to leave in June, 1940. They wanted to capture him because
he had written a comic poem about Herr Hitler!
Oh, Jerusalem in the Morning, traditional spiritual arranged by
Joseph H. Jennings
The original context of this beautiful narrative song was, of course,
a worship service in an African-American church around Christmas
time. But the contemporary context is universal. It’s a wonderful
carol that, as far as I know, is the first and only one that depicts
the conversation between Joseph and Mary right before the actual
moment that Jesus was born. That all this takes place in Jerusalem
and not Bethlehem doesn’t matter!
Program Notes by Rev. Donald H. Fox, a UCC (Congregational) clergyman
living in La Crosse (since 1989), serving as pastor of Lower Coon Valley
Lutheran Church (since 2004) and as a chaplain at Mayo Clinic Health
System Franciscan Healthcare (since 1999).