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The Mystic & the Storyteller

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The Mystic & the Storyteller The Mystic & the Storyteller f e a t u r i n g The Little Match Girl Passion b y D a v i D L a n g 2009-2010 eighteenth season 1 The Mystic We thank the Fredericksburg & the Storyteller f e a t u r i n g Friends of Conspirare The Little whose generous gifts Match Girl Passion support the May 6 performance: Thursday, May 6, 7:30 pm St. Mary’s Catholic Church, Fredericksburg Fischer & Wieser Specialty Foods Friday, May 7, 8:00 pm Mary & Jim Hatchette Saturday, May 8, 8:00 pm Carolyn Keating Sunday, May 9, 2:30 pm St. Martin’s Lutheran Church, Austin Timothy Koock Craig Hella Johnson, Artistic Director & Conductor Susan & Frosty Rees Dian & Harlan Stai Jack Swanzy tes A Andrew Y COVer PHOtO BY LeOn ALesi 2 3 program PROGRAM NOTES The Little Match Girl Passion I wanted to tell a story. A particular story – in fact, the story of The Little Match Girl, by the Danish author Hans Christian Andersen. The original is ostensibly for children, and Chorale: O Haupt voll Blut und Wunden J. S. Bach it has that shocking combination of danger and morality that many famous children’s from St. Matthew Passion (1685-1750) stories do. A poor young girl, whose father beats her, tries unsuccessfully to sell matches on the street, is ignored, and freezes to death. Through it all she somehow retains her Christian purity of spirit, but it is not a pretty story. What drew me to The Little Match Girl is that the strength of the story lies not in its plot Requiem: Missa Pro Defunctis Tomás Luis de Victoria but in the fact that all its parts—the horror and the beauty—are constantly suffused with (1548-1611) their opposites. The girl’s bitter present is locked together with the sweetness of her past 1. Introit memories; her poverty is always suffused with her hopefulness. There is a kind of naive 2. Kyrie equilibrium between suffering and hope. 3. Graduale 4. Offertorium There are many ways to tell this story. One could convincingly tell it as a story about 5. Sanctus faith or as an allegory about poverty. What has always interested me, however, is 6. Agnus Dei that Andersen tells this story as a kind of parable, drawing a religious and moral 7. Communio equivalency between the suffering of the poor girl and the suffering of Jesus. The girl suffers, is scorned by the crowd, dies, and is transfigured. I started wondering what secrets could be unlocked from this story if one took its Christian nature to its conclusion and unfolded it, as Christian composers have traditionally done in musical settings of the Passion of Jesus. Versa est in luctum Tomás Luis de Victoria The most interesting thing about how the Passion story is told is that it can include texts other than the story itself. These texts are the reactions of the crowd, penitential thoughts, statements of general sorrow, shock, or remorse. These are devotional guideposts, the intermission markers for our own responses to the story, and they have the effect of making the audience more than spectators to the sorrowful events onstage. These responses can have a huge range—in Bach’s Saint Matthew Passion, these extra texts range from famous chorales that his congregation was expected to sing along with to completely invented The Little Match Girl Passion David Lang characters, such as the “Daughter of Zion” and the “Chorus of Believers.” The Passion format—the telling of a story while simultaneously commenting upon it—has the effect (b. 1957) of placing us in the middle of the action, and it gives the narrative a powerful inevitability. My piece is called The Little Match Girl Passion and it sets Hans Christian Andersen’s Plorate filii Israel Giacomo Carissimi story The Little Match Girl in the format of Bach’s Saint Matthew Passion, interspersing from Historia di Jephte (c.1605-1674) Andersen’s narrative with my versions of the crowd and character responses from Bach’s Passion. The text is by me, after texts by Han Christian Andersen, H. P. Paulli (the first translator of the story into English, in 1872), Picander (the nom de plume of Christian Friedrich Henrici, the librettist of Bach’s Saint Matthew Passion), and the Gospel according to Saint Matthew. The word “passion” comes from the Latin word for suffering. There is no Bach in my piece and there is no Jesus—rather the suffering of the Little Match Girl has been substituted for Jesus’s, elevating (I hope) her sorrow to a higher plane. Notes by David Lang, composer 4 5 PROGRAM NOTES contiNuED TS ExT AND TRANSlATiONS “O Haupt voll Blut und Wunden” from St. Matthew Passion O Haupt voll Blut und Wunden J. S. Bach’s St. Matthew Passion was composed for Good Friday at St. Thomas Church in O Haupt voll Blut und Wunden, O Head full of blood and wounds, Leipzig in 1729. A traditional Passion like Bach’s tells the story of Jesus’s suffering (Latin passio) and death. It does not end in the triumph of Christ’s resurrection, but with his voll Schmerz und voller Hohn, full of pain and full of derision, entombment and the mourning of his disciples – not a happy story. In the Passion narrative, O Haupt, zu Spott gebunden O Head, in mockery bound the chorale “O Haupt voll Blut und Wunden” is inserted after the scene in which Pilate’s mit einer Dornenkron; with a crown of thorns, soldiers strip Jesus, mockingly dress him in a scarlet robe and crown of thorns, spit on him, O Haupt, sonst schön gezieret O Head, once beautifully adorned and strike his head. Here the listener in Bach’s church would have joined in the singing of mit höchster Ehr’ und Zier, with the most honour and adornment the familiar chorale, stepping personally into the drama and reacting to it as a member of jetzt aber hoch schimpfieret: but now most dishonored: the faithful Christian congregation. The chorales, even if new to one’s ears, seem familiar in gegrüßet seist du mir! let me greet you! their regular, foursquare phrases and simple melodies, although adorned in Bach’s poignant harmonies. The multiple musical forms Bach employs in theSt. Matthew Passion include Du edles Angesichte, You noble countenance, dramatic settings of the words from the Bible, masterfully artistic arias commenting on these dafür sonst schrickt und scheut before which once shrinks and cowers words, and stunning double choruses forcefully advancing the action – yet the strongest das große Weltgerichte, the great might of the world, emotional responses may come from these superficially simple four-part chorales. wie bist du so bespeit! how you are spat upon! Requiem: Missa Pro Defunctis Wie bist du so erbleichet! How you are turned pallid! The great late-Renaissance Spanish composer Tomás Luis de Victoria was a native of the Wer hat dein Augenlicht, Who has treated those eyes province of Ávila, where he received his early musical training. His music is often described dem sonst kein Licht nicht gleichet, to which no light is comparable as embodying the mysticism of St. Theresa, another great figure of the Counter-Reformation so schändlich zugericht’? So shamefully? from Ávila. After studying in Rome, possibly as a student of Palestrina, Victoria became a priest and served with distinction as an organist and chapelmaster. He returned to Spain in 1587 and spent the rest of his life as chaplain to the Dowager Empress Maria, sister of Requiem: Missa Pro Defuncto King Philip II and widow of Emperor Maximilian II, at the convent to which she and her 1. Introitus 1. Introit daughter had retired in Madrid. Victoria composed the Requiem (Mass for the Dead) for Requiem æternam dona eis, Domine, Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord, Maria’s funeral in 1603. Victoria’s music is stylistically similar to that of Palestrina, whose restrained polyphony was embraced by the Roman church as a centerpiece of the Counter- et lux perpetua luceat eis. and let perpetual light shine upon them. Reformation. The preponderance of long notes and the slowly-moving harmony allow the Te decet hymnus Deus, in Sion, A hymn becomes you, O God, in Zion, words of the text to be intelligible, and the sonorities created in a resonant church setting et tibi reddetur votum in Ierusalem. and to you shall a vow be repaid in Jerusalem. create a mystical and ethereal atmosphere perfectly in tune with the eternal subjects of the Exaudi orationem meam; Hear my prayer; Requiem text. One short motet by Victoria is also on today’s program. ad te omnis caro veniet. to you shall all flesh come. Requiem æternam dona eis, Domine, Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord, “Plorate, filii Israel” from Historia di Jephte et lux perpetua luceat eis. and let perpetual light shine upon them. Jephte by Giacomo Carissimi is one of the earliest examples of an oratorio: a musical drama, usually on a religious theme, performed without costumes, scenery, or stage action. Working 2. Kyrie 2. O Lord his entire career in Rome, Carissimi was an important teacher and a composer of wide fame. Kyrie eleison; Lord have mercy upon us; His oratorios trend toward an operatic style that emphasizes solo arias more than choruses. Christe eleison; Christ have mercy upon us; Usually performed during the penitential season of Lent, they emphasize themes of suffering and obedience. TheJephte (1648) libretto, a paraphrase and elaboration of the words from the Kyrie eleison Lord have mercy upon us.
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