January 31, 2010 - 5:00 PM
Choral Evensong
Introit ~ Tallis, O nata lux
Responses ~ Holmes
Service ~ Sumsion, in G major
Anthem ~ Bairstow, Lord I call upon thee

PROGRAM NOTES

The fourth Sunday after Epiphany comes midway through the season that celebrates the Magi’s recognition of the baby Jesus as Emanuel, Jesus’ baptism by John in the River Jordan, and his first miracle at Cana in Galilee.  In some Protestant traditions, the final Sunday of Epiphany, before the onset of Lent, is known as Transfiguration Sunday – the moment in time when God opens the disciples’ eyes to the divine nature of his Son.

And so Epiphany, from the Greek verb epiphania meaning “to make known” or “to reveal,” is the unveiling, evidenced by the events of this season, of Jesus as the Christ, the true Light of the world.

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For those who take note of such milestones, 2010 marks the 505th anniversary of Thomas Tallis’ birth (b. 1505) and the 425th anniversary of his death (d. 1585).  A quick computation reveals that “the father of English church music” enjoyed a longevity vouchsafed few in those perilous times.  He who survived the reigns of four monarchs of England and lived well into the sovereignty of the fifth was a devout Catholic.  That he escaped retribution by the fanatically Protestant Edward VI and actually flourished while Edward’s sister, the likewise-Protestant Elizabeth, was queen, is either an inexplicable miracle or a testament to the extraordinary musical giftedness, rising above sectarianism, of this founding composer of the English Church. 

Tallis wrote innumerable Anglican church-music pieces, one of the most familiar and popular being his motet “If ye love me.”  But he wrote a voluminous body of work for the Catholic rite as well, the most extravagant example his mighty “Spem in alium.”
Tallis’ “O nata lux” is both an evening hymn (paraphrasing Phos hilaron – “O gracious Light”) and an Epiphany ode (acknowledging Christ as the true Light of the world).  While Tallis used the Latin text here, as he did in much of the music he wrote for the Catholic Church, “O nata lux” is more Anglican in form and style:  spare, chordal, non-melismatic.

The comparatively obscure English composer John Holmes (d. 1629) was a contemporary of William Byrd, Thomas Weelkes, Thomas Tomkins, and Thomas Morley, all of whom experimented with the recently imported Italian madrigal style.  Holmes, too, wrote several madrigals (secular, a cappella songs for three to six voices), his best-known one titled “Thus bonny-boots the birthday celebrated,” which was included in “The Triumphs of Oriana,” a collection of English madrigals compiled by Thomas Morley (1557-1603).

Holmes, however, was primarily a church musician, serving as organist and teacher of choristers at both Winchester and Salisbury Cathedrals.  His rich setting of this evening’s Preces and Responses was transcribed in the Tenbury Manuscript 791, Tenbury Wells, Worcestershire.

Herbert W. Sumsion (1899-1995), whose life spanned almost a century, was a contemporary and colleague of Herbert Howells, Gerald Finzi, and Ralph Vaughan Williams, among others – titans all of the 20th-century musical renaissance in Britain.  In addition to Sumsion’s extensive compositional output, primarily for choir and organ but including a number of chamber and orchestral pieces, he organized, oversaw and hosted the Three Choirs Festival at Gloucester Cathedral from 1928 until 1967 when he retired from Gloucester as organist.  Following his retirement, Sumsion continued to compose music for the Church.

He is probably best remembered for his vivid programmatic anthem “They that go down to the sea in ships,” one beloved still by choirs, including the Anglican Singers.  The Magnificat of his Service in G, which the ensemble is performing for the first time tonight, is sprightly and buoyant yet without grandiosity, while the Nunc dimittis is a poignant interpretation of the song of Simeon.

Edward C. Bairstow (1874-1946), a contemporary of Herbert Sumsion, served as organist of York Minster from 1913 to his death in 1946.  In 1932, he was knighted for Services to Music.  Bairstow wrote primarily for the church, including 29 anthems, large and miniature, as well as numerous pieces for the organ.

Never an apostle of tact, the often-peevish Sir Edward ruffled many feathers throughout his lifetime.  No one however, even the victims of his bluntness, could dispute that what he lacked in sociability he made up for in the beauty and emotional power of his music.

Bairstow’s anthem “Lord, I call upon Thee” is a vespers hymn, textually and musically.  The text is taken from Psalm 141.  It is the psalmist’s plea to the Lord to keep him safe and free from guilt by association with wickedness, through the night and across the span of his life.  In Bairstow’s setting, the prayer begins serenely, then progresses to a frenetic quasi-recitative by tenor and bass voices (“Mine enemies live, and are mighty: and they that hate me wrongfully are many in number”) before the full choir restores the tranquility of the opening lines in the final phrases (“I will . . take my rest: for it is Thou, Lord, only that makest me dwell in safety”).

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The prophet St. Simeon, the “God-receiver,” whose valedictory prayer long ago became the canticle Nunc dimittis, waited with patience to behold the Christ before he could be released to death.  It was as he cradled the baby Jesus in his arms at the Feast of the Presentation that Simeon declared, “For mine eyes have seen thy salvation, which thou hast prepared before the face of all people; to be a Light to lighten the Gentiles.”  This vision embodies yet another manifestation of the inextinguishable Light of Epiphany.

Anne Carr Bingham