Sacred River Sunday 26th November BBC Radio 3

Sacred River celebrates what is spiritual in music – all sorts of music, it’s inspiration from some of the great world religious traditions, and music that is spiritual of itself alone. In a seamless flow, the music will lead the listener through the major themes of religion and belief, encompassing the whole gamut of human experience of the divine. Showcasing music, spanning all periods, which is inspired by the world faiths, we will take a broad view of what it is to believe. We begin by astounding the listener with the wonders of creation and the cosmos, and as darkness is dispelled we see the theme of light emerge, a significant element of many belief systems. From there the pieces chosen will explore the concept of love from the perspective of the sacred and this will lead into pieces inspired by nature and the world around us before turning the focus to ritual, the prayerful, contemplative and meditative part of the human condition as well as the joyous and ecstatic. We finally turn our thoughts to life, death and eternity with music that explores transience, human mortality and beliefs about the world to come.

Peppered throughout the day, the audience will hear lived experience of faith in carefully curated vignettes, opening the intimate and personal world of belief to the wider audience. These will connect with the music, bringing the themes and ideas explored from the conceptual to the actual. We will hear prayer chants, bells and sacred rituals taking place, as well as delving into the innermost depths of the believer’s soul to explore how they relate to the divine.

0630-0900 Breakfast trails ahead to Sacred River. We suggest interviews with: Jonathan Sacks or Rowan Williams, and James MacMillan or Tarik O’Regan (all TBC). The presenter gives info about the purpose of the day, the website, blogs, vlogs, twitter, and other opportunities for audience engagement. Principal points: - It IS a sacred river – a seemless flow of music. No annos on air but there will be lots of information, opinion and anecdotes on the specially constructed and curated R3 webpage as well as the opportunity for the audience to have their say about their favourite sacred music, places and experiences on the R3 social media pages. - Sacred River is for everyone. It touches on the spiritual side of life that so many encounter through music, no matter what their faith or tradition. - The day comprises a creative arc which focusses on universal ideas which our culture inhabits as we think about lived experience. It will lead from Creation and the Cosmos, through valued and inspiring elements of life, light, love and nature, turning to how people experience the sacred through ritual and contemplation before moving to the end of things with music inspired by life, death and eternity. - Exploration of the themes will feature prominently in blogs, vlogs and social media, brief comments from the online hosts succinctly illustrating music choices. - This arc will inform the day’s running order and the mood and content of each hour. We intend to take the listener on an emotional journey, conscious of the impact that each piece will have. We will incorporate pieces that encompass the whole range of human emotion, from despair to ecstasy, peaceful contemplation to riotous joy. - ‘Marks of Faith’ will appear throughout the day which portray the lived experience of the world religions. These will be expertly curated vignettes that will complement the music. - The music – all from the best or most relevant recordings available – displays a stimulating variety of texture, orchestration, tempo and timbre, maximising the impact of a Radio 3 day virtually without speech. - At 0859 The Breakfast presenter sets up Sacred River and announces its inception, pointing listeners to the Radio 3 web pages.

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09:00’00 LIVE News 3’00

09:03’00 VCS Introduction from Neil McGregor 3’02

…ends with ‘it begins with the dawning of Creation and the magnificence of the Cosmos.’

09:06’02 VCS PLAINCHANT Veni creator The Cistercian Monks Of Stift Heiligenkreuz UCJ Music 4766778 Tr.27 2’32

09:08’34 VCS Drop in (Creation and the Cosmos) 1’00

This musical representation of order from chaos from the most famous music on Creation in existence.

09:09’34 VCS HAYDN The Creation (Einleitung, 'Die Vorstellung des Chaos') Orchestre des Champs-Elysees Philippe Herreweghe (cond) PH LPH018 Tr.01 4’51

A track from one of the most important artists to bring Sufi Qawwali to a worldwide audience. Translation includes text: ‘When there was no moon, sun or sky, When the secret of the truth was still unknown, When there was nothing, there was you.’

09:14’25 VCS NUSRAT FATEH ALI KHAN Allah Hoo Allah Hoo Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan And Party Real World Records RWBK 1 Tr.3 3’49

No sacred day would be complete without this iconic choral masterpiece from the Golden Age of English Church Music which is a setting of a Latin text taken from the office of Matins ‘Lord God, creator of Heaven and Earth regard our humility’.

09:18’14 VCS TALLIS Spem in Alium The Sixteen Harry Christophers Coro CORSACD16016 Tr.9 9’34

The title refers to the cluster of stars in the Taurus constellation, named after the seven daughters of Atlas and Pleione in Greek mythology. Several of the daughters had affairs with the male Olympian gods, resulting in the birth of a number of children. The work leads to ‘notions of clouds, nebulas, galaxies of the fragmented dust of beats organized by the rhythm’ – Xenakis.

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09:27’48 VCS XENAKIS Pleiades (Melanges) Kroumata Percussion Ensemble BIS BIS-CD-482 Tr.3 7’55

Rebel’s musical depiction of the creation of the earth begins with one of the most striking chords in all Baroque music.

09:35’43 VCS REBEL Les elemens (Le Chaos) Musica Antiqua Koln Reinhard Goebel (conductor) Archiv 445824-2 Tr.1 6’11

The King of Instruments with a piece based on the Te Deum plainchant: ‘All the earth doth worship thee, the Father Everlasting…To thee all angels cry aloud, the heavens and all the Powers therein’.

09:41’54 VCS DEMESSIEUX Te Deum, Op 11 Francesca Massey (organ) Priory PRCD1078 Tr.12 7’50

Bach’s B Minor Mass is hailed as one of the greatest choral works of all time: The Sanctus includes the text: ‘Heaven and earth are full of thy glory’.

09:49’44 VCS BACH Mass in B minor (Sanctus) Monteverdi Choir and Orchestra John Eliot Gardiner (cond) Archiv 415514-2 CD.2 Tr.10 5’24

A setting in Zulu of the call to the wise men to follow the star – the biblical story in which man and the cosmos are inextricably linked.

09:55’08 VCS SHABALALA Inkanyezi Nezazi (The Star and the Wisemen) Ladysmith Black Mambazo Wrasse WRASS139 Tr.3 4’48

09:59’56 VCS Drop in (Light) 0’58

The section opens with Handel’s sublime representation of the ‘Eternal source of light divine’ from the Ode for the Birthday of Queen Anne.

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10:00’54 VCS HANDEL Ode for the Birthday of Queen Anne 'Eternal source of light divine' (Eternal source of light divine) Elin Manahan Thomas (soprano) David Blackadder (trumpet) Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment Harry Christophers (cond) Heliodor 4765970 Tr.2 3’52

This piece is in the tintinnabuli style, inspired by Gregorian chant, and by church bells heard in Pärt’s native Estonia - Translation of title is ‘Mirror in the mirror’.

10:04’46 VCS PÄRT Spiegel im Spiegel Dietmar Schwalke (cello) Alexander Malter (piano) ECM 4499582 Tr.3 9’02

Ravi Shankar and Philip Glass’ collaboration is based on the Vedic Text: ‘Oh, Lord. Be benevolent to us. Drive the darkness away. Shed upon us the light of wisdom. Take the jealousy, envy, greed and anger from us, and fill our hearts with love and peace’.

10:13’48 VCS SHANKAR & GLASS Passages (Prashanti) Philip Glass Ensemble Sony Classical 88985337612 CD6 Tr.23 13’39

The light of the moon shimmers on an East Asian temple, and there are atmospheric gamelan references within

10:27’27 VCS DEBUSSY Images Book 2 (Et la Lune Descend sur le temple qui fut) Mark-Andre Hamelin (piano) Hyperion CDA67920 Tr.05 5’51

The final movement of Mozart’s Symphony 41 has its origins in the four-note motif of the ancient Gregorian Chant hymn ‘Lucis creator’ – ‘O blest creator of the light’.

10:33’18 VCS MOZART Symphony No 41 (K.551) in C major ‘Jupiter’ (Molto allegro) Dresden Straatskapelle Colin Davis (cond) Philips 4100462 Tr.08 8’40

Tavener’s Buddhist Miniature sets a text from the teaching of the Buddha exalting the listener to ‘cease to do evil and learn to do good’, moral concepts which are often represented as a battle between light and darkness.

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10:41’58 VCS TAVENER A Buddhist Miniature Cappella Nova Alan Tavener (cond) LINN CKD 539 Tr.4 2’22

10:44’20 VCS Drop in (Nature) 1’02

This section of Radio 3’s Sacred River contemplates Nature and begins with Delius’ pantheistic ecstasy inspired by the mountains of Norway ‘Song of the High Hills’.

10:45’22 VCS DELIUS The Song of the High Hills (First movement) – N.B doesn’t finish BBC Symphony Chorus BBC Symphony Orchestra Sir Andrew Davis (cond) Chandos CHSA5088 Tr.15 9’32

Many psalms are inspired by the natural world including Psalm 42 ‘Sicut Cervus’ – ‘Like as the Hart desireth the waterbrook so longeth my soul for thee O God’.

10:55’00 VCS PALESTRINA Sicut cervus New York Polyphony BIS BIS-2203 Tr.21 5’44

The composer Vaughan Williams conjurs images of the English Countryside in much of his music including this famous piece based on Tallis’ hymn tune.

11:00’44 VCS VAUGHAN WILLIAMS Fantasia on a Theme of Thomas Tallis Sinfonia of London Sir John Barbirolli (cond) EMI CDM5672402 Tr.7 16’13

The living composer Paul Winter integrates recordings from the sounds of nature into this setting of the Mass – ‘songs from the wilds to celebrate the whole earth as a sacred space’. The call of the wolf forms the main theme of the Kyrie.

11:16’57 VCS WINTER Missa Gaia (Kyrie) Choir of the Cathedral of St John the Divine, New York Paul Winter Consort Living Music LD0002 Tr.2 5’29

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Text taken from the Rig Veda, a significant Hindu text this Hymn to the king Vena hails the sun rising through the mist – ‘Vena comes, born of light, he drives the many coloured clouds onward’. This choral work has an interesting texture for female voices and harp.

11:22’26 VCS HOLST Choral hymns from the Rig Veda (Hymn to Vena), Op 26 No 3 Royal College of Music Chamber Choir Osian Ellis (Harp) David Willcocks (Cond) Unicorn-Kanchana DKP(CD)9046 Tr.04 5’21

11:27’47 VCS Drop in (Love) 0’45

‘Dark am I, yet lovely, daughters of Jerusalem, dark like the tents of Kedar, like the tent curtains of Solomon’. A racy biblical love song from the Song of Songs opens our section on love. This is a highly sensual setting by Monteverdi.

11:28’32 VCS MONTEVERDI Vespers (Nigra sum) L'Arpeggiata Christina Pluhar (cond) Virgin Classics 5099964199405 Tr.3 3’18

In contrast words of St John ‘Greater love hath no man than this’ were appropriated particularly after World War 1 to domesticate the horrors of trench warfare in this anthem by John Ireland.

11:31’50 VCS IRELAND Greater Love Winchester Cathedral Choir Philip Scriven (organ) David Hill (cond) Herald HAVPCD275 Tr.1 5’57

Bloch’s emotionally intense Jewish Life is inspired by Ahava Rabbah, a prayer giving thanks for the love that God has given to his people.

11:37’47 VCS BLOCH (arr. Palmer) Jewish Life (Prayer) Natalie Clein (cello) BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra Ilan Volkov (cond) Hyperion CDA 67910 Tr.2 3’42

Our second piece of Bach is one of the most beautiful love songs to the crucified Jesus. ‘Have mercy Lord, my God, for the sake of my tears’.

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11:41’29 VCS BACH St Matthew Passion, BWV 244 (Erbarme dich) & (Bin ich gleich von dir gewichen) Marie-Claude Chappuis (alto) Thomanerchor Leipzig Der Tölzer Knabenchor Gewandhausorchester Leipzig Riccardo Chailly (cond) Decca 4782194 CD.2 Tr.2-3 5’46 + 1’03

Widor’s Toccata is associated with weddings, particularly Royal weddings.

11:48’18 VCS WIDOR Symphony for Organ No 5, Op 42 (Toccata) Olivier Latry (organ – Notre Dame) BNL BNL112617 Tr.10 5’42

A piece traditionally performed at a Jewish wedding. The title translates as ‘Escorting the Parents of the Bride and Groom Home’.

11:54’00 VCS TRAD. Firn Di Mekhutonim Aheym The Burning Bush ARC Music EUCD2540 Tr.11 2’58

The contemporary composer Eric Whitacre’s setting of a text by Persian 13th century Sufi mystic Rumi – one of the most important poets in Islamic culture and history – is a blessing for marriage, hoping that it will be like sweet milk, wine, and halvah.

11:56’58 VCS WHITACRE This Marriage Polyphony Stephen Layton (cond) Hyperion CDA67543 Tr.10 2’54

Music for dervishes who performed dances in order to achieve the wisdom and love of God.

11:59’52 VCS TRAD Dervish Prayer Music On Maqam Segah Location recording by Deben Bhattacharya ARC Music EUCD1765 Tr.9 6’06

We close with another setting of the Song of Songs, in a setting from the 17th Century English revival by Purcell.

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12:05’58 VCS PURCELL My beloved spake Julian Podger (tenor) Charles Pott (bass) Peter Harvey (bass) Gabrieli Consort & Players Paul McCreesh (cond) Archiv Producktion 445882-2 Tr.14 9’32

12:15’30 VCS Drop in (Ritual and Contemplation) 1’02 (fades)

We begin our section on Ritual and Contemplation with a Nocturne by Chopin which includes a chorale passage in the middle section. Some interpreters have associated these bars with ‘a prayer played on a country organ’.

12:16’32 VCS CHOPIN Nocturne Op. 37, No. 1 in G minor Vladimir Ashkenazy (piano) London 4437382 Tr.11 6’09

Bernstein’s settings of Hebrew texts only sound as if they use Jewish melodies. This is a setting of Psalm 131 ‘Lord my heart is not haughty nor mine eyes lofty’.

12:22’41 VCS BERNSTEIN Chichester Psalms Psalm 131: Lord my heart is not haughty nor mine eyes lofty John Bogart (alto) Camerata Singers New York Philharmonic Orchestra Leonard Bernstein (cond) Sony 5099951903824 Tr. 6 9’14

Each of the Baroque composer Biber’s Rosary Sonatas have titles relating to the Christian Rosary devotion and are meditations on the life of Christ and the Virgin Mary.

12:31’55 VCS BIBER Mystery (Rosary) Sonata No 4 (The Presentation in the Temple) Rachel Podger (violin) Marcin Swiatkiewicz (harpsichord) David Miller (lute) Channel Classics CCS SA 37315 Tr.4 8’18

This most meditative piece of choral music was composed for the Sistine Chapel to be used within the Rites of Holy Week. It’s a setting of the penitential psalm 51 by Gregorio Allegri which is now more commonly associated with the Ash Wednesday rituals of the Church.

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12:40’13 VCS ALLEGRI Miserere St Paul's Cathedral Choir John Scott (conductor) Hyperion CDA66439 Tr.4 13’32

Kol Nidre is the contemplative Jewish prayer recited on Yom Kippur during the evening service. In Bruch’s setting the solo ‘cello imitates the cantor singing the prayer in the Synagogue.

12:53’45 VCS BRUCH Kol Nidrei, Op 47 Truls Mørk (cello) Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France Paavo Järvi (cond) Virgin Classics 545664 Tr.4 11’02

The mass forms one of the most important parts of ritual in the Church. This recent setting was composed for use in Westminster Cathedral.

13:04’47 VCS Roxanna PANUFNIK Westminster Mass (Gloria) Westminster Cathedral Choir City of London Sinfonia James O’Donnell (cond) Teldec 2564664128 Tr.4 5’42

Mendelssohn’s Symphony no. 5 (‘Reformation’) includes in its final movement a theme based on Luther’s chorale Ein feste Burg ist unser Gott (A Mighty Fortress Is Our God). Such hymns and chorales have formed a central part of Christian ritual throughout the ages.

13:10’29 VCS MENDELSSOHN Symphony No 5 in D major, Op 107 ’Reformation’ (Andante con moto) Vienna Phiharmonic Orchestra Christoph von Dohnanyi (cond) Decca 4602392 Tr.4 8’24

Worship of the Virgin Mary has inspired countless church composers. This setting by Bruckner is one of the most sumptuous expressing the composer’s personal faith.

13:18’53 VCS BRUCKNER Ave Maria Polyphony Stephen Layton (cond) Hyperion CDA67629 Tr.1 4’01

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13:22’54 VCS Drop in (Life, Death and Eternity) 1’08 (fades)

Elgar’s setting of Cardinal Newman’s poem concludes with the Angel gently committing the soul of the deceased Gerontius to rest as choirs of angels in heaven look on.

13:24’02 VCS ELGAR Dream of Gerontius (Softly and Gently) Janet Baker (mezzo) City of Birmingham Symphony Chorus City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra Simon Rattle (cond) EMI CDS7495492 CD2 Tr.13 7’04

Messiaen’s Quatuor pour la fin du temps was composed in a concentration camp. This movement speaks of an angel announcing the end of time.

13:31’06 VCS MESSIAEN Quatuor pour la fin du temps (Vocalise, pour l’ange qui annonce la fin du temps) Huguette Fernandez (violin) Guy Deplus (clarinet) Jacques Nielz (cello) Marie-Madeleine Petit (piano) Warner Classics 2564 62162-2 CD 4 Tr.2 5’27

The Russian Orthodox tradition has always made a distinctive musical contribution, no one more so than Rachmaninov, who requested this piece at his own funeral – ‘Lord now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace’.

13:36’33 VCS RACHMANINOV All-Night Vigil ‘Vespers’, Op 37 (Nunc dimittis) Latvian Radio Choir Sigvards Kļava (cond) Ondine ODE1206-5 Tr.5 3’16

A gospel hymn made famous by Mahalia Jackson performed in a cross-cultural collaboration by Malian super group Trio Da Kali and the Kronos Quartet: ‘It’s the promise that is in heaven, God shall wipe all tears away when we reach that blessed homeland’.

13:39’49 VCS HASKELL God shall wipe all tears away Trio Da Kali Kronos Quartet World Circuit WCD093 Tr.5 3’07

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Tchaikovsky’s personal struggle for success as a composer brings home the pain of artistic endeavour and was completed shortly before his death.

13:42’56 VCS TCHAIKOVSKY Symphony No 6 in B minor, Op 74 ‘Pathétique’ (Adagio lamentoso) Czech Philharmonic Semyon Bychkov (cond) Decca 4830656 Tr.4 9’10

Britten preaches his fervent pacifism in this unique bringing together of the war poetry of Wilfred Owen and the Agnus Dei (‘Lamb of God have mercy on us’).

13:52’06 VCS BRITTEN War Requiem, Op 66 (Agnus Dei) Peter Pears (tenor) London Symphony Chorus London Symphony Orchestra Benjamin Britten (cond) Decca 414383 CD 2 Tr.3 3’37

Liszt was another composer inspired by religious themes and specifically the journey of Jesus Christ to the cross in this Via Crucis.

13:55’43 VCS LISZT Via crucis (Station XIV: Jésus est mis dans le sépulcre) Leslie Howard (piano) Hyperion CDA66388 Tr.28 4’10

Tarik O’Regan takes texts from different faiths in this contemplation death and mortality. The Ninth Century Zoroastrian text ‘Each shall arise in the place where their life departs’ sits alongside the words of the Sufi poet Rumi, William Wordsworth, and Thomas Hardy.

13:59’53 VCS O’REGAN Triptych (From Heaven Distilled A Clemency) Conspirare Craig Hella Johnson (cond) Harmonia Mundi HMU807490 Tr.10 5’07

Commissioned in 1786 by the Oratorio de la Santa Cueva in Cadiz in Spain to be performed during Lent marking Jesus’ Seven Last Words from the Cross, this is Haydn’s own version for string quartet.

14:05’00 VCS HAYDN String Quartet, Op 51 'Seven Last Words from the Cross' (Pater, in manus tuas commendo spiritum meum) Cuarteto Casals Harmonia Mundi HMC902162 Tr.8 6’30

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Music from the Baul tradition. They are a non-conformist sect, primarily from Bengal, who have no formal religion, but instead believe in the religion of music itself. They weave together aspects of the Buddhist, Hindu, and Islamic musical traditions, and many songs address the ultimate union with the divine. Purna Das Baul is considered the reigning king of the Baul clan today.

14:11’30 VCS TRAD. Agun Pani Akosh Matya Purna Das Baul (singer) Nascente NSCD 059 Tr.7 4’39

The In Paradisum from Durufle’s translucent setting of the Requiem speaks of the angels receiving the dead into paradise.

14:16’09 VCS DURUFLE Requiem (In Paradisum) Westminster Cathedral Choir James O’Donnell Hyperion CDA66757 Tr.9 2’58

We begin our final section on Life, Death and Eternity with Plainchant taken from the Requiem describing Judgement day.

14:19’07 VCS PLAINCHANT Dies irae The Benedictine Nuns Of Notre-Dame De L'annonciation, Le Barroux Decca 2748264 Tr.5 fade to time [track 6’02]

Mahler wrote of this movement ‘The earth quakes, the graves burst open, the dead arise and stream on in endless procession. The ‘Last Trump’ is heard – the trumpets of the Apocalypse ring out. A chorus of saints and heavenly beings softly breaks forth: ‘You shall arise, surely you shall arise.’ Then appears the glory of God! An overwhelming love lightens our being. We know and are.’

14:25’00 VCS MAHLER Symphony no. 2 in C minor ‘Resurrection’ (Im Tempo des Scherzo) Kate Royal (sop) Magdalena Kožená (mezzo) Rundfunkchor Berlin Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra Simon Rattle (cond) EMI Classics 5099964736327 Tr.4 35’00

15:00’00

1500 We return to network programming as normal with Choral Evensong from York. This is an archive programme of a very traditional Choral Evensong; the first speech heard since 0900 will be the resonant words of the 1662 Prayer Book. Choral Evensong will be back announced only so it flows in seamlessly from Sacred River.

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An archive broadcast from York Minster to mark the 100th birthday of Francis Jackson which he celebrated last month. Francis Jackson was Organist of York Minster from 1946-82.

Introit: Let my prayer come up (Bairstow) Responses: Jackson Psalms 53, 54, 55 (Vann, Crotch, Clark, Atkins) First Lesson: Exodus 14 vv 5-14 Canticles: Bairstow in G Second Lesson: 1 Corinthians 15 vv 35-49 Anthem: Lord, I call upon Thee (Bairstow) Hymn: God that madest earth and heaven (East Acklam) Organ Voluntary: Impromptu for Sir Edward Bairstow (Jackson)

Philip Moore (Organist and Master of the Music) John Scott Whiteley (Assistant Organist)

First broadcast 10 July 1996.

FILL:

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