Christ is Risen indeed.
And what could be more fitting this day than the joyous Easter hymn, “Jesus Christ is Risen Today”? The video below features the amazing fresco of The Resurrection by Piero della Francesca. The Huddersfield Choral Society & Joseph Cullen provide the music.
May the Lord bless you on this Solemnity of His Resurrection!
Featured image top of page: The Resurrection of Christ, by Piero della Francesca, c. 1463-1465
This coming Thursday is the Solemnity of the Ascension of the Lord . . . at least in many dioceses (and of course, wherever the traditional liturgical calendar is followed). It may not surprise you, if you are a regular reader of this blog, that I’m not a fan of moving important feasts like Ascension Thursday to the nearest Sunday in the hopes of roping in those who steer clear of The Lord’s House on weekdays. I’m fortunate in that I live in a diocese where Ascension Thursday still falls on a Thursday. If only they would move Epiphany back to January 6th . . .
I may explore that topic in greater length later in the week, but that’s not what today’s post is about: today is Music Monday. Whether your diocese celebrates the Ascension on Thursday or on the following Sunday, it’s coming up within the next week, so what is more appropriate than J.S. Bach’s magnificent Ascension Oratorio?
The oratorio itself was first performed in 1735, on May 19th, the date of the Feast of the Ascension that year (and a Thursday; who would have guessed?). The video below contains the opening chorus, “Lobet Gott in seinen Reichen” (Praise God in His Kingdoms), performed by the Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra & Choir. The painting of the Ascension of Jesus in the video is by the American artist Benjamin West. I’ve posted the words (by Christian Friedrich Henrici, who went by the pen name “Picander”) in German and in English translation underneath.
Featured image at top of page: “The Ascension”, by Benjaminm West, 1801
“Lobet Gott in seinen Reichen”, BWV 11
Ton Koopman, Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra & Choir
Album: Bach: Ascension Cantatas
Artwork: “The Ascension” by Benjamin West, 1801
Text:
Lobet Gott in seinen Reichen,
Preiset ihn in seinen Ehren,
Rühmet ihn in seiner Pracht;
Sucht sein Lob recht zu vergleichen,
Wenn ihr mit gesamten Chören
Ihm ein Lied zu Ehren macht!
Praise God in his kingdoms,
extol him in his honors
acclaim him in his splendor.
Seek to express his praise rightly
when with assembled choirsyou make a song to his honor!
Today’s Music for Easter selection, performed by the Chancel Choir of the Broadway Baptist Church in Louisville, KY, is the magnificent concluding “Hallelujah” from Beethoven’s Christ on the Mount of Olives. As the title suggests, the work as a whole is a musical dramatization of Christ’s agony in the Garden of Gethsemane. While that sounds like a composition more suited for the Triduum or Lent, we tend not to associate the word “hallelujah” with those penitential seasons. In Christ on the Mount of Olives it signifies the climactic moment when Christ says “Not my will, but ours, be done” (Luke 22:42), committing himself to the passion and death that will lead to the triumph of Easter. This is the part of the composition that points to the Resurrection.
Christ on the Mount of Olives is Beethoven’s only oratorio. The composer himself never really liked it, and was particularly dissatified witht the libretto by Franz Xaver Huber. Posterity seems to have agreed with Beethoven, for the most part: the oratorio itself is rarely performed, except for the majestice “Hallelujah” passage. On the other hand, Christ on the Mount of Olives was Beethoven’s first popular success in the United States when it premiered here in 1809.
The featured image above is “Christ on the Mount of Olives” (1819) by Goya. An interesting connection between Goya and Beethoven: both went deaf later in life.
March 27, 2016,
Easter Sunday Chancel Choir,
Glenna Metcalfe, Organ;
Jim Rago, Timpani;
Trey Sims and Martin Sauer, Trumpets,
Robert Gammon, Director
The Regina Caeli (“Queen of Heaven”) is a prayer that is closely associated with Easter. We usually recite this prayer instead of the Angelus during the Easter Season, at which time it also serves as the the Marian Antiphon at the end of Compline (Night Prayer). The beautiful musical setting for the Regina Caeli below was composed by Gregor Aichinger (1565-1628), and is performed here by the Zürcher Sing-Akademie.
The prayer Regina Caeli itself is of ancient origin. Our oldest record of it comes from the twelfth century, but the website ourcatholicprayers.com tells us:
According to The Golden Legend, a famous 13th century work about the saints, Pope St. Gregory the Great heard angels singing the first three verses from the Regina Caeli during a procession in the 6th century and was inspired to add the fourth line “Ora pro nobis deum” (“pray for to us to God” in Latin). Although this story is itself considered to be a legend, it is, as Father Herbert Thurston once put it in his book Familiar Prayers, “inseparably associated with the Regina Caeli.”
I have posted the prayer in both English and Latin below (the clip itself has subtitles in Latin and German).
(Feature image above: “The Virgin Mary”, detail from the Ghent Altarpiece, by Jan van Eyck c. 1430)
We have seen before that some well-known sacred music settings often start life as secular songs. That was the case with “O Sacred Head Surrounded,” our Music Monday selection last week. The two most famous musical accompaniments to the Ave Maria, the tune by Schubert and the setting adapted by the composer Gounod from an earlier piece by J.S. Bach (“The Bach/Gounod Ave Maria”) were both also created for secular lyrics.
Today’s selection is a little different. The soaring melody was composed explicitly for these words celebrating the Resurrection of Christ at Easter:
Let us sing
That Our Lord is not dead,
And in glory
Has opened the tomb!
Let sing praise
That our Lord is risen
And today is gone up
Into the glory of Heaven!
Inneggiamo, il Signor non è morto.
Ei fulgente ha dischiuso l’avel,
Inneggiamo al Signore risorto
Oggi asceso alla gloria del Ciel!
This magnificent piece is a little like the Treasure Hidden in a Field from Jesus’ parable (see Matthew 13:44). Pietro Mascagni composed it as part of his opera Cavalleria Rusticana, a turgid account of betrayal, jealousy, and murder. At one point in the drama, however, the inhabitants of the little Sicilian village where these unsavory events unfold sing this beautiful hymn in the village square while the choir inside the church intones the traditional Catholic prayer, Regina Coeli, Laetare (“Queen of Heaven, Rejoice”). It’s an unexpected reminder that grace breaks through even in the ugliest of circumstances.
Regarding the Regina Coeli, a prayer traditionally associated with the Easter season, I have more information below the video clip.
The prayer Regina Coeli, Laetare is of ancient origin. Our oldest record of it comes from the twelfth century, but the website ourcatholicprayers.com tells us:
According to The Golden Legend, a famous 13th century work about the saints, Pope St. Gregory the Great heard angels singing the first three verses from the Regina Coeli during a procession in the 6th century and was inspired to add the fourth line “Ora pro nobis deum” (“pray for to us to God” in Latin). Although this story is itself considered to be a legend, it is, as Father Herbert Thurston once put it in his book Familiar Prayers, “inseparably associated with the Regina Coeli.”
We pray this prayer in place of the Angelus during the season of Easter, at which time it also serves as the the Marian Antiphon at the end of Compline (Night Prayer). I have posted the prayer it in both English and Latin below:
English:
Queen of Heaven, rejoice, alleluia.
The Son whom you merited to bear, alleluia.
Has risen, as He said, alleluia.
Pray for us to God, alleluia.
V. Rejoice and be glad, O Virgin Mary, alleluia.
R. For the Lord has truly risen, alleluia.
Let us pray.O God, who through the resurrection of your Son Jesus Christ gave rejoicing to the world, grant, we pray, that through his Mother, the Virgin Mary, we may obtain the joy of everlasting life. Through Christ our Lord. Amen.
Latin:
Regina cæli, lætare, alleluia:
Quia quem meruisti portare, alleluia,
Resurrexit, sicut dixit, alleluia,
Ora pro nobis Deum, alleluia.
Gaude et lætare, Virgo Maria, alleluia.
Quia surrexit Dominus vere, alleluia.
Oremus.
Deus, qui per resurrectionem Filii tui, Domini nostri Iesu Christi,
mundum lætificare dignatus es:
præsta, quæsumus, ut per eius Genitricem Virginem Mariam,
perpetuæ capiamus gaudia vitæ.
Per eundem Christum Dominum nostrum. R. Amen.
Feature image: “”The Resurrection of Christ” by Piero della Francesca, c. 1460
