"The Little Church Around the Corner"
One East 29th Street, New York
MUSIC NOTES:
Easter VII - May 12, 2002
The late 16th and early 17th centuries is a period which one might think unlikely to produce a great flowering of church music. Some historians have named the period from about 1520 to 1660 as "The Age of the Reformation and the Wars of Religion," a clear indication of the dominance of religious strife during the period from which today's service music arises.
Hans Leo Hassler (1564-1612) and Orlando Gibbons (1583-1625), though one is from Germany and the other from England, led remarkably similar lives. Both were born relatively soon after the break of their country's church with Rome, both were well-traveled and respected musicians who composed in many different genres, both held distinguished posts as church musicians, and both died while in their 40's.
An important element of both the German and English Reformation was the replacement of Latin with the vernacular. While the German language was enthusiastically adopted as the language of worship for parish churches, great cathedrals such as Ulm, Dresden and Cologne were resistant to this until well after the Reformation. Likewise the folk-like harmonized chorales of which Luther was a strong proponent supplanted polyphonic Latin music much more readily in the provinces than in the cities. Hassler's Missa Secunda is a fine example of the continuation of the Latin polyphonic tradition in post-Reformation Germany. The fluidity of line, vibrant melodic quality and assured counterpoint which characterize this Mass setting were learned while Hassler was a student in Venice under Andrea Gabrieli. Hassler continued throughout his life to infuse these Italianate qualities into his music, and his style was studied and emulated by many of his contemporaries.
There are no traces of Italianate style or the Latin language in the church music of Orlando Gibbons. Indeed Donald Jay Grout notes in his History of Western Music that Gibbons "is often called the father of Anglican church music." While it is probably a stretch to make such a claim, and it is certainly doubtful that Gibbons would have regarded himself in any such paternal role, his music is decidedly English, and all of his sacred music is written specifically for the reformed rite of the English Church.
Gibbons was a master of the verse anthem, a genre in which there are intricate exchanges between solo voices and the full choir, with the organ (or viol) accompaniment sometimes acting as a third component, with highly artful imitative passagework. O God, the King of Glory is a verse anthem for Ascensiontide, using as its text the Collect for the First Sunday after Ascension Day. Both sentences of the text are set alternately for soloists and choir in the format AA'; BB'. The first verse section is for treble, altos 1 and 2, tenor and bass; the second is set as a dialogue for the altos.
Our own century is seeing its own wars of religion, and their effect is no less bewildering than those of the 16th century. And as in the late 16th century with composers such as Hans Leo Hassler and Orlando Gibbons, so in the early 21st with composers such as Arvo Pärt and John Tavener, the mystery of redemption is still revealed to us through the gift of sacred music.
Hans Leo Hassler (1564-1612) and Orlando Gibbons (1583-1625), though one is from Germany and the other from England, led remarkably similar lives. Both were born relatively soon after the break of their country's church with Rome, both were well-traveled and respected musicians who composed in many different genres, both held distinguished posts as church musicians, and both died while in their 40's.
An important element of both the German and English Reformation was the replacement of Latin with the vernacular. While the German language was enthusiastically adopted as the language of worship for parish churches, great cathedrals such as Ulm, Dresden and Cologne were resistant to this until well after the Reformation. Likewise the folk-like harmonized chorales of which Luther was a strong proponent supplanted polyphonic Latin music much more readily in the provinces than in the cities. Hassler's Missa Secunda is a fine example of the continuation of the Latin polyphonic tradition in post-Reformation Germany. The fluidity of line, vibrant melodic quality and assured counterpoint which characterize this Mass setting were learned while Hassler was a student in Venice under Andrea Gabrieli. Hassler continued throughout his life to infuse these Italianate qualities into his music, and his style was studied and emulated by many of his contemporaries.
There are no traces of Italianate style or the Latin language in the church music of Orlando Gibbons. Indeed Donald Jay Grout notes in his History of Western Music that Gibbons "is often called the father of Anglican church music." While it is probably a stretch to make such a claim, and it is certainly doubtful that Gibbons would have regarded himself in any such paternal role, his music is decidedly English, and all of his sacred music is written specifically for the reformed rite of the English Church.
Gibbons was a master of the verse anthem, a genre in which there are intricate exchanges between solo voices and the full choir, with the organ (or viol) accompaniment sometimes acting as a third component, with highly artful imitative passagework. O God, the King of Glory is a verse anthem for Ascensiontide, using as its text the Collect for the First Sunday after Ascension Day. Both sentences of the text are set alternately for soloists and choir in the format AA'; BB'. The first verse section is for treble, altos 1 and 2, tenor and bass; the second is set as a dialogue for the altos.
Our own century is seeing its own wars of religion, and their effect is no less bewildering than those of the 16th century. And as in the late 16th century with composers such as Hans Leo Hassler and Orlando Gibbons, so in the early 21st with composers such as Arvo Pärt and John Tavener, the mystery of redemption is still revealed to us through the gift of sacred music.
