Gesang (Lauda and Litany for voice and piano)

Lauda and Litany – theology through sacred song

The present Lauda and Litany Project is conceived as a set of ongoing musical and spiritual conversations in which the intimate context of solo voice and piano is the forum for an exploration of what might be termed questions of Ultimate Reality and of universal human relevance, with particular reference to sacred texts in the Judeo-Christian tradition.

At least since the time of Franz Schubert’s many overtly religious songs or Beethoven’s Gellert-Lieder Op. 48, and stretching to the present day, there has been a powerful if not always fully acknowledged metaphysical undercurrent running through the vocal/piano repertoire in several of its national streams, some examples of which are well-known (Brahms’ Vier ernste Gesänge, Dvorak’s Biblical Songs, Ravel’s Kaddisch…), others being far less frequently performed yet arguably no less substantial both musically and textually (Schubert’s imposing Die Allmacht or Dem Unendlichen, Rachmaninov’s Raising of Lazarus and 1916 Prayer originally intended for inclusion in his Op. 38 song-cycle but only published in 1973 on the 100th anniversary of the composer’s death…). Although this “private” strand of sacred music may be overshadowed in the public imagination by the far more “public” tradition represented by the great oratorios, Passions, Requiems or Stabat Maters, the case can be made that it complements that tradition by being a perfect vehicle for a consideration of the individual as opposed to the collective dimension of the search for – or response to – God.

One in which there is room for levels of nuance and ambiguity which the wide-angle lens of choral-orchestral music cannot necessarily capture. Traditional religious devotion has its place here, of course, but ambivalence and paradox are by no means absent. Notably because some of the most profound contributions to the repertoire of “spiritual songs” have come from composers who were on the margins of and sometimes struggled with (Schumann) or even openly contested aspects of conventional religious belief and practice (Brahms and Wolf being prime examples). There is little room for the simplistic or sentimentally cloying here; there are at least as many theological questions as “answers” on offer, suggesting that (nonliturgical) art has indeed performed its proper function of being more than what Norman Lebrecht once unkindly and perhaps unfairly termed - with reference to Olivier Messiaen’s opera St François d’Assise - “plain old propaganda”.

In embarking on Lauda and Litany I have sought to engage “dialogically” with this rich tradition, looking to penetrate the artistic and spiritual content of the great works of the past and in some way to search for analogous artistic expressions using contemporary means (the attentive performer or listener may be able to detect eclectic “borrowings” encompassing anything and everything from Henri Dutilleux or Valentin Silvestrov to Miles Davis or Keith Jarrett). Although primarily conceived as concert music, it is nonetheless also hoped that these pieces can also serve as catalysts for discussion in the context of places of worship and theological/cultural institutions of the underlying spiritual issues evoked by music, word and the often complex relationship between the two in the history of Western musical creation and culture more generally.

Each of the songs presented here is intended both as an original composition and at the same time as a “remake” to the extent that not only the texts but also the musical fabric of the “originals” provide at least a departure-point for new settings of varying degrees of fidelity to their models. For this reason the songs in this collection should optimally be performed in juxtaposition with the pieces inspiring them. The adaptations of the latter range from preservation of the melodic (Schubert Im Abendrot, Brahms In stiller Nacht) or structural/gestural outline (Schumann Requiem, Mahler Um Mitternacht), quotation of melodic formulae (Schumann Mondnacht, Mussorgsky Molitva, Wolf Schlafendes Jesuskind, Mahler Urlicht) or adherence to the sung rhythm (Rachmaninov Christ is Risen and From St John’s Gospel) to more general evocations of the climate of the musical template (e.g. Wolf Nun wandre, Maria, Poulenc Hymne).

A final word on the use of the word Lauda; this should be seen as a nod in the direction of a composer whose work is not directly referenced here, but whose prolific settings for voice(s) and instruments of the medieval Laude Cortonese surely constitute one of the most remarkable additions to the sacred repertoire for voice over recent decades, and whose own dialogues with the past offer much food for thought: Gavin Bryars, whose 75th birthday year was being celebrated as much of the present cycle was being written.

Contents:

Three songs after Franz Schubert: Litanei, Im Abendrot, Die Allmacht

Two songs after Robert Schumann: Requiem, Mondnacht

Two songs after Johannes Brahms: In stiller Nacht, O Tod

Three songs after Hugo Wolf: Nun wandre, Maria, Schlafendes Jesuskind, Mühvoll komm' ich und beladen

Two songs after Gustav Mahler: Um Mitternacht, Urlicht

Five Russian songs: Molitva (Prayer) after Modest Mussorgsky, Four songs after Sergei Rachmaninov: The Raising of Lazarus, From St John’s Gospel, Christ is risen!, Molitva (1916)

Two songs after Francis Poulenc: Priez pour paix, Hymne