It's been a good year on the blog, though the last month has been quiet due to a very busy work schedule. For Christmas Eve this year, here's a brand new work I wrote for our church's Lessons and Carols service as sung by the choir on Sunday. I only wrote this over Thanksgiving weekend, so they had less than a month to learn it, and we had only one and a half run-throughs with the strings.
Christina Rossetti is quite well-known for a couple of other poems which have become well-known Christmas hymns: In the bleak midwinter (set by Holst, and even better by Darke) and Love came down at Christmas. But I thought this poem, which is new to me, has a very special quality with its emphasis on paradox and the lovely "refrain" ending to each stanza. My goal in setting it was to bring out this mysterious quality, but I won't say too much about the technical aspects for now - I still have shopping to do!
Here are Rossetti's words:
Christmas hath a darknessBrighter than the blazing noon,Christmas hath a chillnessWarmer than the heat of June,Christmas hath a beautyLovelier than the world can show:For Christmas bringeth Jesus,Brought for us so low.Earth, strike up your music,Birds that sing and bells that ring;Heaven hath answering musicFor all Angels soon to sing:Earth, put on your whitestBridal robe of spotless snow:For Christmas bringeth Jesus,Brought for us so low.
And here's what it sounds like. [This is the live recording with no edits, although I did supplement it here with a backdrop from the digital practice version I'd made just to help smooth out the room sound.]
OK, I will say one technical thing about the music, which was actually in part an accident. The first five pitches (A-G-F-D-C#) of the main melody (introduced by violin and sung by the women right after) are also the five pitches with which that final couplet concludes both stanzas. I don't think I did this intentionally, but I was very satisfied when I realized it was so.
Merry Christmas.
Ghosts of Christmas Past:
- The Twelve Composers of Christmas
- Fugue on Adeste fideles
- Fugue in Royal David's City
- Vertical Christmas Medley
- In Season
- In Season Re-mix
- Sleigh Ride in 7/8 Time
- Sleigh Ride in a Fast Machine
- Sleigh Ride of the Valkyries
- Trippin' with Chestnuts
- Carol of the Beethoven
- A Christmas Carol (16-minute feature film!)
- The Twelve Tones of Christmas
- Christmas Time is Here
