Lichfield Cathedral concert
Last Thursday, we went to a concert at Lichfield Cathedral—-as part of the Lichfield Festival—-which celebrated Arvo Pärt’s 70th birthday. The majority of the concert was choral, with the Hilliard Ensemble and Ex Cathedra joining forces for the evening, but there was also an organ piece by Arvo Pärt called ‘Annum Per Annum’.
When the programme notes suggested that the work was “prefaced by a thunderous introduction”, they weren’t exaggerating; I think everyone jumped a little. That’s fine by me. I think that you’re probably failing somewhat as a composer for organ if you don’t use both the tiny, mouse’s whisper high notes, as well as the thunderous bass notes—-how else are you going to get the dust out of those big pipes? This piece did all of that, as well as making use of the organ stop marked ‘Armageddon with Knobs On1’. I got the impression that it was a virtuoso piece to show off the capabilities of the organ, but it was great entertainment.
There was a camera on the organist, Christopher Bowers-Broadbent, and it was fascinating watching him play. I’ve never tried playing a church organ, but it looks like terrifying fun. There are no less than four keyboards, as well as goodness knows how many pedals and stops, and we saw him looking where he was putting his feet once or twice. It also seems to be a relatively good cardio workout.
The concert started with Thomas Tallis’s ‘Spem in Alium’. It’s a 40-part motet, and one of my favourite choral pieces, however, it’s difficult to do well. Sung badly, it sounds exactly like 40 people singing different tunes. Sung brilliantly—-as it was on this occasion—-it’s like watching a flock of birds swooping around. You see the individuals move as one body, but you can let your eye rest on one individual for a while and watch them melt in and out of the main body. It’s uplifting and utterly relaxing at the same time. I got full-body goose pimples once or twice during the piece; it was transporting.
The scores gave some idea of the the complexity of the piece. I don’t think I’ve ever seen musical scores the size of a broadsheet newspaper before. It gave the singers the slightly comical appearance of people reading the paper on the train, but singing like angels at the same time.
There was a world premiere of a piece by Gabriel Jackson called ‘Sanctum Est Verum Lumen’, which is another 40-part motet, written as a companion to ‘Spem in Alium’. I’m so attached to ‘Spem in Alium’ that I was half-expecting not to like the piece, but I thought it was brilliant. It was clearly modern rather than a pastiche of a 16th century piece, but it had the same feeling of the individual and the body of singers merging and separating, and had a lovely bright feeling to it.
The climax of the evening was Pärt’s ‘Miserere’. His later work is known as ‘tintinnabulism’, and is characterised by single, ringing notes, and silences. Miserere starts with a single tenor singing a word at a time, each echoed by a clarinet phrase. Gradually the piece builds for the Dies Irae when the whole choir comes in. If ‘Spem in Alium’ gave me goose pimples, ‘Miserere’ brought tears to my eyes. There’s anger and defiance in the voices, and after having observed a silence that day for the victims of the London bombings, it seemed all the more poignant.
A day of wrath that day shall be, when the earth dissolves in ashes: so David and Sybil prophesied
How great a terror there will be when the Judge appears to make a stern reckoning.
The whole evening was one of the best live musical experiences I’ve had recently.
1 That may or may not be the actual label.
1
Organ music can be a very physical experience. My wife complained that I played music too loudly, so I took her to the Albert Hall, to a Gillian Wier Recital; as the Hall shook beneath us I asked if she still thought.... She had to admit, that the real thing was a lot louder.
Multi part chorale music can be as much of a challenge to listen to as to sing, and I can always see its attraction for scientists, the mathematical precision of each part's progression. Bach is a good place to start.----- Odd how the geeky things attract loads of responses, whereas the life enhancing ones......
by Jonathan Briggs @ 18/07/2005 5:08 pm • Permalink •
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I've always wanted to be able to have a go on a really big church organ. It must be like playing the entire building!
Steve
by SteveC @ 18/07/2005 7:08 pm • Permalink •
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Jonathon Briggs: Yes, organ music is pretty visceral, physical music. I'd never listen to it at home (consideration for the neighbours wouldn't allow me to do it justice), but I love it live. I do quite like the mental challenge of listening to choral music, but Tallis always seems more organic to me than mathematical. I can remember listening to Mozart while revising photosynthesis for my Biology A level. Biochemistry has never been a strong point, but I suddenly had an epiphany as, looking out of the window and listening to the music, I realised that this immensely complex and beautiful process was going on in every single photosynthetic cell of every single blade of grass in the garden. And that when I was considering this staggering activity, I was only thinking about the grasses, and only in my back garden, not across the surface of the earth. That pretty much blew my mind.
And yes---I have noticed that tendency in the comments. Occasionally, I've wondered why.
SteveC: It would be good fun, though the temptation would be to open up all the stops and play a crashing, discordant sound. Not that I know how to make any other kind of sound on a keyboard instrument...
by bsag @ 18/07/2005 8:08 pm • Permalink •
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Organs are quite geeky, I think.
I spent most of my youth playing church organs. Making buildings vibrate is just one of the many pleasures.
Playing three separate tunes (right hand, left hand, and feet trying to emulate the guvnor J S Bach) is also thrilling once you can manage it with some confidence, and I found learning to drive easier than I expected, since I'd been using pedals and looking in mirrors for years. It's hard, though, to get carried away with enjoying the music when you're struggling to control such a mechanical monster (although these days I think they use smart cards to control the programming).
Organs have a language and appeal of their own: many of the stops have beautiful and evocative names, from Vox Humana to the Tromba Marina and Ophicleide. Your "Armageddon" stop was probably the Contra Posaune.
There are organ-spotters (like trainspotters). I'm not one. But I could easily be...
by pete @ 19/07/2005 10:08 am • Permalink •
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pete: It certainly looks like it takes a massive amount of concentration, not to mention coordination. Contra Posaune, eh? Speaking of geeky, look what I found. :-D Excellent.
by bsag @ 20/07/2005 4:08 pm • Permalink •
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organstops.org - of course. Say no more.
by pete @ 20/07/2005 7:07 pm • Permalink •
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