Epitaph: Music for Remembrance and Celebration
by Gary Wood, Music Director
"Epitaph: Music for Remembrance and Celebration" was performed on November 17 & 18, 2007

Welcome to the opening concerts of our 2007-2008 season. This year, Cantemus Chamber Chorus celebrates its 25th year of performing concerts on the North Shore. To mark this special occasion, we have planned four concert activities instead of our usual two: thus, our first concert is much earlier, falling into the month of November.

In planning repertoire for this November concert, my background as a church musician inspired me to think about All Saint’s Day (November 1) and Requiem texts, along with the secular celebration of All Hallows’ Eve and end-of-life texts. Keeping in mind the “Cantemus plus one” approach (chorus with one instrument as accompaniment), I recalled a beautiful work by one of my conducting teachers. Lloyd Pfautsch was a significant presence in American choral music during the last half of the twentieth century. His “Requiem” is set for chorus and Chimes.

This led to one of the determining factors for this concert—why not works for Chorus and Percussion? Now as you know, “Percussion” does not mean just one instrument, and there are lots of choral works with a variety of percussion instruments as accompaniment.
The Pfautsch “Requiem” is sung in English, with the text taken from “Litany of Intercession” of the Presbyterian liturgy. The work is composed in memory of those who lost their lives in the 1979 tornado in Wichita Falls, Texas.

Randol Alan Bass composed his “Gloria” setting for large orchestra, along with a smaller version for organ, brass, and percussion. We will perform it with organ and percussion, using two percussionists who will play a variety of percussion instruments. This is an exciting and energetic seven minute work with passages of lyrical and harmonic appeal.

The Latin Mass Ordinary text of the “Agnus Dei” (Lamb of God) ends with ‘dona nobis pacem” or “grant us peace. This three word text is the inspiration for the “Dona Nobis Pacem” for women’s voices and handbells composed by Robert J. Bradshaw. Mr. Bradshaw is a local North Shore composer with instrumental and vocal works that have received numerous performances nationally and internationally. This work is placidly serene on the outside and inwardly sizzling with harmonic challenge. Fittingly, the composer writes an instrumental accompaniment for three handbells.

Although it is November, we give a nod to the December season with two more choral/percussion works that are immediately accessible and rhythmically vital. Benjamin Harlan’s arrangement of a traditional spiritual uses several hand percussion instruments to accompany a slow-building texture of voices repeating a simple textual message-“sing we all noel!” And Barrington Brooks’s arrangement of the Nigerian carol “Betelehemu” also uses a variety of hand drums and percussion to celebrate the “Bethlehem, the city of wonder.”

An important set of works by the American composer William Schuman provides a juxtaposition to our concert’s theme. The “Carols of Death” were composed in 1958, commissioned for the Laurentian Singers by St. Lawrence University. Walt Whitman’s poetry is heard in these three works. The first one, “The Last Invocation,” makes use of harmonic shadings and clusters, voice pairings of Soprano/Tenor and Alto/Bass, and predominantly quiet dynamics to evoke the imploring text which asks that Death be patient and arrive with tenderness. The second text, “The Unknown Region,” challenges one to walk out toward that place where Death is, where “all is a blank before us.” Schuman uses a rhythmic canon and musical dynamics to effectively build momentum toward the inevitable final journey. The third and last work in this set of three is “To All, To Each.” This is a beautifully constructed choral palette, with harmonies that reflect the “serene arrival” of “delicate death.”

Rounding out this program are three works of great beauty and varied style. J. S. Bach’s Cantata 118 is also referred to as a funeral motet. There appear to be two versions of this work, one of which uses only wind instruments, leading scholars to believe that it may have been intended for “open air” performance at burial. Our performance will use organ as instrumental accompaniment for the voices, perhaps a “plain” version that nonetheless allows Bach’s genius of balance and clarity to shine.

Edwin Fissinger’s setting of the Latin text “Lux aeterna” became an important choral work in America during the 1980’s after its premiere at a national choral conference. Fissinger builds a choral soundscape of sustained choral tones while exploring a wide range of singing tones from low E in the bass to high A in the soprano. Fissinger also emphasizes a rhythmic fluidity as a backdrop for an extended solo for soprano voice, with chorus and solo singing the Latin words for “rest in peace.”

The contemporary Polish composer Henryk Mikolaj Gorecki’s “Totus Tuus” was first performed at a 1987 High Mass celebrated by Pope John Paul II in Victory Square, Warsaw. This text of supplication (“I am completely yours, Mary”) explores subtle tempo changes, with over twenty indications of tempo variations. The chorus often sings static chords that inspire reflection and dignity within an almost meditative ten minutes of music making.

We hope that you enjoy our expedition beyond our traditional holiday theme, and find inspiration and joy in the collective singing of Cantemus and the dynamic percussion work of Abe Finch and Mark Wheeler. Further, we seek to inscribe an epitaph of beauty in your hearts, and epitaph of wonder in your minds.