Last Sunday I enjoyed playing and directing music by Ralph Vaughan Williams in a celebration of his 150th birthday. Looking ahead to this Sunday, October 23, I am looking forward to another birthday celebration, that of American composer Ned Rorem, who was born in Indiana in 1923.
I was aware of Rorem's music at a young age. One of the movements of his organ suite A Quaker Reader is included in a popular organ method book. But I became more familiar with Rorem when I went to graduate school in his home state.
I attended the premiere of his opera Our Town at Indiana University. At that performance, I was delighted by the inclusion of his anthem "Love divine, all loves excelling" in the opera.
One of the movements of A Quaker Reader ("…no darkness at all…") is based on an Anglican chant that Rorem composed, so, naturally, I thought it would be good to include this Sunday. And, delightfully, it pairs very naturally with Psalm 84, the Psalm for the day.
The result of all of my Rorem recollection is some remarkable resonance between some different phrases. Rightly or wrongly, then, I'm coming to associate Rorem's music with a search for home, for life, for light.
I was aware of Rorem's music at a young age. One of the movements of his organ suite A Quaker Reader is included in a popular organ method book. But I became more familiar with Rorem when I went to graduate school in his home state.
I attended the premiere of his opera Our Town at Indiana University. At that performance, I was delighted by the inclusion of his anthem "Love divine, all loves excelling" in the opera.
One of the movements of A Quaker Reader ("…no darkness at all…") is based on an Anglican chant that Rorem composed, so, naturally, I thought it would be good to include this Sunday. And, delightfully, it pairs very naturally with Psalm 84, the Psalm for the day.
The result of all of my Rorem recollection is some remarkable resonance between some different phrases. Rightly or wrongly, then, I'm coming to associate Rorem's music with a search for home, for life, for light.
The sparrow has found her a house
and the swallow a nest where she may lay her young; *
by the side of your altars, O LORD of hosts,
my King and my God.
— Psalm 84:2
Come, almighty to deliver,
let us all thy life receive;
suddenly return, and never,
nevermore thy temples leave.
Thee we would be always blessing,
serve thee as thy hosts above,
pray, and praise thee without ceasing,
glory in thy perfect love.
— Charles Wesley, "Love divine, all loves excelling"
"Good-bye, Good-bye world. Good-bye, Grover's Corners....Mama and Papa. Good-bye to clocks ticking....and Mama's sunflowers. And food and coffee. And new ironed dresses and hot baths....and sleeping and waking up. Oh, earth, you are too wonderful for anybody to realize you. Do any human beings ever realize life while they live it--every, every minute?"
— Thornton Wilder, "Our Town"
God is light and in him there is no darkness at all.
– 1 John 1:5
Later,
-David