ALL-NIGHT VIGIL
June 8-10, 2012
Program Notes by Sanford Dole
Program Notes by Sanford Dole
In my twelve seasons as music director of Bay Choral Guild we have never repeated an entire program. Until now, that is. In March, 2004, we presented Sergei Rachmaninoff’s amazing magnum opus, the All-Night Vigil. Eight years later, I’ve decided to bring it back in part because it is exquisitely beautiful, very powerful and moving. But also, for a group like ours, this could almost be considered “core repertoire.” With many singers new to the group since 2004, I am happy to be working on the technical and vocal challenges it presents as well as (re)introducing our singers and audience members to one of the great masterworks of twentieth-century choral music.
In the following paragraphs I have freely quoted, adapted and expanded upon the program notes from our previous performance written by Paul S. Andrews and Anthony Antolini.
Vsenoshchnoye Bdeniye, Op. 37, is often referred to as the Vespers, but this is technically not accurate. The term “vespers” only applies to the first six movements of the piece. In fact, this is a setting of the ordinary portions (15 hymns and prayers) of the All-Night Vigil, celebrated on the eve of great feasts in the Russian Orthodox Church. The name of the service reflects the fact that in the traditional church it lasted all through the night, from vespers at dusk through midnight matins until prime at dawn.
Those familiar with Rachmaninoff’s orchestral and piano music may not recognize his characteristic style. Perhaps it is a sign of his genius as a composer that this work stays within the formidable demands of the liturgical tradition—including the ban on musical instruments and the rhythmic supremacy of the text—yet expands and develops the musical forms to unparalleled heights. As one commentator put it, this is a “haunting work of sweeping majesty and great religious sanctity.”
In the early 1800’s the arts in Russia were dominated by the influence of Western ideals, particularly from France. But by the mid-19th century artists of the Russian nationalist movement attempted to restore the indigenous elements of the Russian tradition. Composers began studying ancient chants for their melodies, modal harmonies, and the subordination of rhythm to textual accents. The Moscow Synodal School—the primary center for teaching Russian Orthodox Church music prior to its merger with the Moscow Conservatory in 1919—vigorously promoted liturgical music that combined modern techniques with the ancient chants. Rachmaninoff, an alumnus of the school, took these ideals to heart and composed the All-Night Vigil in less than two weeks during January and February of 1915. The Moscow Synodal Choir, comprised of men and boys, presented the premiere performance on March 10 of that year at a benefit concert. It was received warmly by critics and audiences alike, and was so successful that it was performed five more times within a month. However the Russian Revolution of 1917 and the rise of the Soviet Union led to a ban on performances of all religious music, and this great work was suppressed. Audiences in Russia did not hear it again until the Cold War began to thaw in the late 1970’s and American choirs began to tour Russia, reintroducing this beloved work to native audiences.
The work is a well-refined synthesis of the musical goals of the period and is a wonderfully strange blending of melodic and harmonic elements. Rachmaninoff has incorporated chant into polyphony in a highly sophisticated form, allowing the chant to wander from voice to voice, freely elaborating within a harmonic context, while representing its modal, as well as melodic qualities.
He has drawn from a wide range of ancient sources. Of the fifteen movements that comprise the work, six (Nos. 7, 8, 9, 12, 13, and 14) are based on znamenny chant, an early form of chant using graphical notation. Two movements (Nos. 4 and 5) are based on Kievan chant, a later, simplified form of znamenny chant, and two (Nos. 2 and 15) are based on “Greek” chant, a more recitational style originating in southern Russia and bearing a folk influence. The chants Rachmaninoff used in the other five movements (Nos. 1, 3, 6, 10, and 11) are of his own composition. But these are so heavily influenced by the other chant styles that he called them “conscious counterfeits.”
Like Tchaikovsky before him, Rachmaninoff struggled to stay within, or close to, the formidable demands of the liturgical tradition. At the same time, one feels the presence of more modern techniques and styles in the deliberate doubling of certain registers for unusual effects (as in No. 12), in the orchestral organization of the chorus, and in the large proportions of each movement. Like Bach’s B Minor Mass or Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis, the whole piece seems clearly to have been written with more than liturgical use in mind. Although some movements, particularly No. 6, often get performed in church services today, the breadth and scope of the complete work deter most church choirs from presenting it in its entirety. So we are pleased to present this magnificent example of unaccompanied choral music in a concert setting.
In the following paragraphs I have freely quoted, adapted and expanded upon the program notes from our previous performance written by Paul S. Andrews and Anthony Antolini.
Vsenoshchnoye Bdeniye, Op. 37, is often referred to as the Vespers, but this is technically not accurate. The term “vespers” only applies to the first six movements of the piece. In fact, this is a setting of the ordinary portions (15 hymns and prayers) of the All-Night Vigil, celebrated on the eve of great feasts in the Russian Orthodox Church. The name of the service reflects the fact that in the traditional church it lasted all through the night, from vespers at dusk through midnight matins until prime at dawn.
Those familiar with Rachmaninoff’s orchestral and piano music may not recognize his characteristic style. Perhaps it is a sign of his genius as a composer that this work stays within the formidable demands of the liturgical tradition—including the ban on musical instruments and the rhythmic supremacy of the text—yet expands and develops the musical forms to unparalleled heights. As one commentator put it, this is a “haunting work of sweeping majesty and great religious sanctity.”
In the early 1800’s the arts in Russia were dominated by the influence of Western ideals, particularly from France. But by the mid-19th century artists of the Russian nationalist movement attempted to restore the indigenous elements of the Russian tradition. Composers began studying ancient chants for their melodies, modal harmonies, and the subordination of rhythm to textual accents. The Moscow Synodal School—the primary center for teaching Russian Orthodox Church music prior to its merger with the Moscow Conservatory in 1919—vigorously promoted liturgical music that combined modern techniques with the ancient chants. Rachmaninoff, an alumnus of the school, took these ideals to heart and composed the All-Night Vigil in less than two weeks during January and February of 1915. The Moscow Synodal Choir, comprised of men and boys, presented the premiere performance on March 10 of that year at a benefit concert. It was received warmly by critics and audiences alike, and was so successful that it was performed five more times within a month. However the Russian Revolution of 1917 and the rise of the Soviet Union led to a ban on performances of all religious music, and this great work was suppressed. Audiences in Russia did not hear it again until the Cold War began to thaw in the late 1970’s and American choirs began to tour Russia, reintroducing this beloved work to native audiences.
The work is a well-refined synthesis of the musical goals of the period and is a wonderfully strange blending of melodic and harmonic elements. Rachmaninoff has incorporated chant into polyphony in a highly sophisticated form, allowing the chant to wander from voice to voice, freely elaborating within a harmonic context, while representing its modal, as well as melodic qualities.
He has drawn from a wide range of ancient sources. Of the fifteen movements that comprise the work, six (Nos. 7, 8, 9, 12, 13, and 14) are based on znamenny chant, an early form of chant using graphical notation. Two movements (Nos. 4 and 5) are based on Kievan chant, a later, simplified form of znamenny chant, and two (Nos. 2 and 15) are based on “Greek” chant, a more recitational style originating in southern Russia and bearing a folk influence. The chants Rachmaninoff used in the other five movements (Nos. 1, 3, 6, 10, and 11) are of his own composition. But these are so heavily influenced by the other chant styles that he called them “conscious counterfeits.”
Like Tchaikovsky before him, Rachmaninoff struggled to stay within, or close to, the formidable demands of the liturgical tradition. At the same time, one feels the presence of more modern techniques and styles in the deliberate doubling of certain registers for unusual effects (as in No. 12), in the orchestral organization of the chorus, and in the large proportions of each movement. Like Bach’s B Minor Mass or Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis, the whole piece seems clearly to have been written with more than liturgical use in mind. Although some movements, particularly No. 6, often get performed in church services today, the breadth and scope of the complete work deter most church choirs from presenting it in its entirety. So we are pleased to present this magnificent example of unaccompanied choral music in a concert setting.
To the field of stars: Notes from the composer
Since the very first journeys to Santiago de Compostela began over 1000 years ago, the Way of St. James has been articulated and celebrated in music. The vast Codex calixtinus, dating from the 12th century, is a compendium of advice and instructions for pilgrims, sermons, reports of miracles, prayers and polyphonic motets. Over the years many concert programmes have been devised to relive the Medieval pilgrims’ journey in song, drawn from the codex and other sources, and new pieces have been composed which also reimagine the experience of travelling the Way of St. James.
So the challenge with this commission was to try and say something new and worthwhile about the pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela that hasn’t already been said. I didn’t want to write a literal account of the journey, a series of postcards from the pilgrimage route—today we are in Puente la Reina…tomorrow we reach Finisterre—for that has already been done and done very well. So while To the field of stars is about the pilgrimage to Santiago, it is also about journeying in a wider sense—the physical, emotional and psychological struggle to reach a long-sought-after and life-changing goal.
One of the first things that struck me was the possible etymological origin of ‘Compostela’ as ‘campus stellae’, the field of stars. This suggested a literal field of stars, and that notion became the sixth movement of the piece, a sustained, glistening carpet of murmured stars’ names underpinning a flickering high cello descant.
In order to articulate and give structure to the journey, the piece is divided into seven movements, seven ‘stations’ as it were, points of meditation and reflection, which are separated by choral refrains and brief cello envois. The texts of the refrains are drawn from a Medieval pilgrims’ hymn in the Codex calixtinus, and they also act as a Latin grammar primer, each verse addressing St. James in one of the six grammatical cases (nominative, genitive, vocative, etc.). These bare and rustic-sounding refrains are isorhythmic—the rhythm remains identical each time, only the pitches changing.
The piece begins with an ecstatic and ululatory Intrada, a brief choral fanfare which apostrophises St. James and his illustrious martyrdom. The seven movements that follow are both stages in the physical journey and reflections on the transforming experience of any arduous voyage, often sparked by key words in the preceding refrain in a kind of free association.
Prayer for travelling is by turns optimistic and apprehensive, full of both fear and excitement about the journey ahead. A quiet chorale is repeatedly answered by melismatic exlamations from upper voices and cello, replete with sighing appogiaturas and declamatory glissandi.
In the second movement, Pilgrim’s song with history lesson, the female voices sing of the joys of travel in rather obsessively jubilant tones. At this stage of the journey there is much to look forward to, and the almost-nonsense verse of their effusions is anchored by a jaunty march from the cello. Later in the movement we hear an account of the history of the shrine from the second president of the USA, John Adams.
Walking with God is dominated, in contrast, by the male voices, a dark-hued riposte to the bright cheerfulness of the preceding movement. Cowper’s poem, so familiar as a comfortable Anglican hymn, is here reimagined as a raw and angry dark night of the soul. Beset by doubt and uncertainty, the pilgrims sing in ornate and anguished tones, thoughts of the dove of peace offering a brief moment of balm, and leading to a quiet and unsure conclusion.
St. James was noted for his performance of miracles, and in the fourth movement Walt Whitman tells of his apprehension of the divine in the everyday in a poem that is truly sacred in the broadest sense. Linguistically rich and full of ritualistic repetition, Whitman’s vision is set to some of the lushest music in the piece, its polyphonic intertwinings both meditative and sensual.
In Emily Dickinson’s Our journey had advanced the end destination is almost certainly death (as was her wont) but that “God at every gate” may equally be found at the shrine of St. James. The movement is simple and quiet, for the most part, its bare homophony briefly overlaid with filigree in the second verse.
In a kind of other-wordly interlude, the whispered field of stars that is the sixth movement supports a solo soprano cantilena that also longs for those “heavenly citadels among the stars.”
And then, at last, we reach our destination—the Basilica of St. James—and “O how glorious is the kingdom” indeed! 2011 is the 400th anniversary of the death of the great Spanish composer Tomás Luis de Victoria, and here his iconic 4-part motet is elaborated by a further four polyphonic voices, its long concluding pedal-point launching the final peroration, an exuberant and jubilant hymn to St. James. Bedecked by virtuosic cello roulades and chiming bell sounds, the piece ends, exhausted but uplifted, in a clanging paean of fortissimo ecstasy.
So the challenge with this commission was to try and say something new and worthwhile about the pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela that hasn’t already been said. I didn’t want to write a literal account of the journey, a series of postcards from the pilgrimage route—today we are in Puente la Reina…tomorrow we reach Finisterre—for that has already been done and done very well. So while To the field of stars is about the pilgrimage to Santiago, it is also about journeying in a wider sense—the physical, emotional and psychological struggle to reach a long-sought-after and life-changing goal.
One of the first things that struck me was the possible etymological origin of ‘Compostela’ as ‘campus stellae’, the field of stars. This suggested a literal field of stars, and that notion became the sixth movement of the piece, a sustained, glistening carpet of murmured stars’ names underpinning a flickering high cello descant.
In order to articulate and give structure to the journey, the piece is divided into seven movements, seven ‘stations’ as it were, points of meditation and reflection, which are separated by choral refrains and brief cello envois. The texts of the refrains are drawn from a Medieval pilgrims’ hymn in the Codex calixtinus, and they also act as a Latin grammar primer, each verse addressing St. James in one of the six grammatical cases (nominative, genitive, vocative, etc.). These bare and rustic-sounding refrains are isorhythmic—the rhythm remains identical each time, only the pitches changing.
The piece begins with an ecstatic and ululatory Intrada, a brief choral fanfare which apostrophises St. James and his illustrious martyrdom. The seven movements that follow are both stages in the physical journey and reflections on the transforming experience of any arduous voyage, often sparked by key words in the preceding refrain in a kind of free association.
Prayer for travelling is by turns optimistic and apprehensive, full of both fear and excitement about the journey ahead. A quiet chorale is repeatedly answered by melismatic exlamations from upper voices and cello, replete with sighing appogiaturas and declamatory glissandi.
In the second movement, Pilgrim’s song with history lesson, the female voices sing of the joys of travel in rather obsessively jubilant tones. At this stage of the journey there is much to look forward to, and the almost-nonsense verse of their effusions is anchored by a jaunty march from the cello. Later in the movement we hear an account of the history of the shrine from the second president of the USA, John Adams.
Walking with God is dominated, in contrast, by the male voices, a dark-hued riposte to the bright cheerfulness of the preceding movement. Cowper’s poem, so familiar as a comfortable Anglican hymn, is here reimagined as a raw and angry dark night of the soul. Beset by doubt and uncertainty, the pilgrims sing in ornate and anguished tones, thoughts of the dove of peace offering a brief moment of balm, and leading to a quiet and unsure conclusion.
St. James was noted for his performance of miracles, and in the fourth movement Walt Whitman tells of his apprehension of the divine in the everyday in a poem that is truly sacred in the broadest sense. Linguistically rich and full of ritualistic repetition, Whitman’s vision is set to some of the lushest music in the piece, its polyphonic intertwinings both meditative and sensual.
In Emily Dickinson’s Our journey had advanced the end destination is almost certainly death (as was her wont) but that “God at every gate” may equally be found at the shrine of St. James. The movement is simple and quiet, for the most part, its bare homophony briefly overlaid with filigree in the second verse.
In a kind of other-wordly interlude, the whispered field of stars that is the sixth movement supports a solo soprano cantilena that also longs for those “heavenly citadels among the stars.”
And then, at last, we reach our destination—the Basilica of St. James—and “O how glorious is the kingdom” indeed! 2011 is the 400th anniversary of the death of the great Spanish composer Tomás Luis de Victoria, and here his iconic 4-part motet is elaborated by a further four polyphonic voices, its long concluding pedal-point launching the final peroration, an exuberant and jubilant hymn to St. James. Bedecked by virtuosic cello roulades and chiming bell sounds, the piece ends, exhausted but uplifted, in a clanging paean of fortissimo ecstasy.
