"The Little Church Around the Corner"
One East 29th Street, New York
MUSIC NOTES:
Trinity Sunday - June 10, 2001
Today's service music presents a cross-section of works spanning three generations of the so-called Second Renaissance in English church music. The first great flowering of this repertory began early in the 16th Century, and is generally considered to have closed at the end of the 17th Century with the death of Henry Purcell. With a few exceptions such as Maurice Greene and William Boyce, 18th-century composers rarely turned their attention to church music, partly because the English Church itself was languishing in decline and complacency throughout the 18th century. As the 19th Century progressed, new life was breathed into the Church, in theology, liturgy, architecture and design, and also in music.
Sir Charles Villiers Stanford (1852-1924) played a key role in this renaissance, and could even be seen as the one who gave it its initial impetus. Born and educated in Ireland, he entered Queens College Cambridge at the age of 18. The college granted him leave to study abroad, and during this time he mingled with leading musical figures such as Brahms and Saint-Saëns, and literati such as Joachim and von Bülow. Thus it was with anything but the insularity of 19th-century England that Stanford returned there to begin his life's work in earnest. He became a renowned teacher - formidable, unyielding and demanding, yet sought after by virtually every composer in England. So great was his reputation as a teacher, that it overshadowed his work as a composer, with the result that his music has only recently been given the attention it deserves. Today's service setting, drawn from the Mass in C and Mass in F, is a fine example not only of Stanford's lyrical style and sure command of musical language, but also of his sensitivity to liturgical considerations such as clarity and continuity of text, and brevity of the individual movements.
The Te Deum in F is part of a Morning Service composed by John Ireland (1879-1962) for St. Luke's Chelsea, where he was organist and choirmaster from 1904 to 1926. Like his teacher Stanford, Ireland established himself as a leading composer and teacher of his generation, though his personality was entirely different from Stanford's. He was shy and introspective, and was plagued throughout his life by feelings of insecurity and inadequacy. None of this is evident in his splendid setting of the Te Deum, a lengthy text that has proven oddly resistant to effective musical treatment in any form but Gregorian chant. Perhaps Ireland succeeds here by setting this text as a prayer, as in the beloved Mode III chant, rather than as a triumphalist extravagence, as in Handel's Dettingen Te Deum.
Kenneth Leighton (b.1929) represents a more contemporary phase of the Second Renaissance, characterized by greater harmonic and rhythmic innovation, and integration of musical theory that departs from the tonal framework in which Stanford and Ireland were grounded. The anthem Let All the World in Every Corner Sing was written in 1965 for St. Matthew's Church Northampton, and suggests the vibrancy and energy of Anglican church music in our own time.
— David Henry
(Music Notes will resume in September.)
Sir Charles Villiers Stanford (1852-1924) played a key role in this renaissance, and could even be seen as the one who gave it its initial impetus. Born and educated in Ireland, he entered Queens College Cambridge at the age of 18. The college granted him leave to study abroad, and during this time he mingled with leading musical figures such as Brahms and Saint-Saëns, and literati such as Joachim and von Bülow. Thus it was with anything but the insularity of 19th-century England that Stanford returned there to begin his life's work in earnest. He became a renowned teacher - formidable, unyielding and demanding, yet sought after by virtually every composer in England. So great was his reputation as a teacher, that it overshadowed his work as a composer, with the result that his music has only recently been given the attention it deserves. Today's service setting, drawn from the Mass in C and Mass in F, is a fine example not only of Stanford's lyrical style and sure command of musical language, but also of his sensitivity to liturgical considerations such as clarity and continuity of text, and brevity of the individual movements.
The Te Deum in F is part of a Morning Service composed by John Ireland (1879-1962) for St. Luke's Chelsea, where he was organist and choirmaster from 1904 to 1926. Like his teacher Stanford, Ireland established himself as a leading composer and teacher of his generation, though his personality was entirely different from Stanford's. He was shy and introspective, and was plagued throughout his life by feelings of insecurity and inadequacy. None of this is evident in his splendid setting of the Te Deum, a lengthy text that has proven oddly resistant to effective musical treatment in any form but Gregorian chant. Perhaps Ireland succeeds here by setting this text as a prayer, as in the beloved Mode III chant, rather than as a triumphalist extravagence, as in Handel's Dettingen Te Deum.
Kenneth Leighton (b.1929) represents a more contemporary phase of the Second Renaissance, characterized by greater harmonic and rhythmic innovation, and integration of musical theory that departs from the tonal framework in which Stanford and Ireland were grounded. The anthem Let All the World in Every Corner Sing was written in 1965 for St. Matthew's Church Northampton, and suggests the vibrancy and energy of Anglican church music in our own time.
