Under the direction of William Cutter, the MIT Concert Choir will perform a program of Psalms including: Arvo Pärt, Cantate Dominum Canticum Novum (Psalm 95) for chorus and organ; Mendelssohn, Psalm 98, Op. 91; Randall Thompson, The Peaceable Kingdom; Leonard Bernstein, Chichester Psalms, for harp, organ, and percussion.
Featured performers include:
Mendelssohn - Psalm 98 solo quartet
Laura Treers, soprano
Ru Mehendale, alto
Bhaskar Balaji, tenor
Wonbo Woo, bass
Bernstein - Chichester solo quartet
Laura Treers, soprano
Ru Mehendale, alto
Sin Kim, tenor
Anders Kaseorg, bass
Bernstein - Chichester boy sopranos:
Sam Higgins
Luke van Reijendam
Edan Zinn
Program Notes:
Since the late 1970’s, Arvo Pärt has been composing in his own unique minimalist style inspired primarily by Gregorian chant. Born in Estonia, Pärt’s early musical influences included the neo-classic music of Shostakovich, Prokofiev and Bartok. He then became enamored of serialism influenced by the music of Arnold Schönberg. When his early works in this style were banned by Soviet censors, the composer entered into a period of contemplative silence, during which he studied the choral music from the 14th to 16th centuries. After immersing himself in this early music, he further investigated the roots of Western music as found in plainsong and Gregorian chant. Out of these studies emerged the musical language that we most associate with Pärt – deeply spiritual simple harmonies, unadorned melodies, and often employing the use of Tintinnabuli (from the Latin word for “bell”, tintinnabuli usually consists of 2 types of voices – one that arpeggiates the tonic triad, and the other which moves diatonically in stepwise motion) This is exactly the technique you will hear in his setting of Psalm 95 and 96 where the accompaniment is an arpeggiation of a B flat major triad while the choral voices are stepwise and in mirror (inversions) relationships to one another. The effect is mesmerizing and magical.
Felix Mendelssohn was the most celebrated musician in Europe during his lifetime, and was in great demand as a soloist, conductor and
composer. A prodigy of uncommon ability, he became one of the great virtuosi of his time on both organ and piano. He came into his mature composition like the Octet for Strings at 16 and the Overture to a Midsummer Night’s Dream at 17. He was a proponent of absolute music, yet he created works of great expressiveness and color. At 20 he electrified Europe by mounting a critically acclaimed performance of Bach’s long-forgotten St. Matthew Passion, which kindled a renewed interest in Bach’s music that has lasted to this day.
In 1840, Frederick William IV acceded to the throne of Prussia with great plans of restoring the kingdom’s cultural and religious heritage. He tried to lure Mendelssohn from Leipzig (in neighboring Saxony) to Berlin to take charge of musical affairs. Mendelssohn felt some loyalty to the king who, as crown prince, had prevented then-Kapellmeister Gaspare Spontini from blocking production of the St. Matthew Passion, but he was reluctant to leave Leipzig. He eventually agreed to a trial appointment. His duties were frusratingly ill-defined, but one was to compose music for a new Lutheran liturgy that the king had created. Two of the Psalm settings in this set were written as Introits, opening choral prayers before the service. The king and clergy favored a cappella motets in the style of Palestrina, while Mendelssohn lobbied for orchestral music. Mendelssohn was able to sneak instruments into his setting of Psalm 98 (Singet dem Herrn ein neues Lied), written for the New Year’s Day service in 1844. It opens with an a cappella double chorus, but he works the orchestra in when the text proclaims “sing to the Lord with the psaltery and trumpets and horns.” This evening you will hear only the a cappella double chorus portion of the Psalm setting.
A brilliant tour-de-force of choral writing, the work opens with all of the basses intoning an energetic hymn-like melody which will subsequently become a cantus firmus . A tutti declamation of the same tune, now harmonized in eight parts ensue, followed by antiphonal exchanges between the two choirs. The work concludes with a gentle, triple meter setting of the final comforting words of Psalm 98.
In 1965, Leonard Bernstein took a sabbatical from his post as Music Director of the New York Philharmonic. Freed from the time-consuming obligations of conducting and studying scores, he could now turn his attention to composition. His objective during this conducting hiatus was to compose a Broadway musical based on Thornton Wilder’s The Skin of Our Teeth, in collaboration with director/choreographer Jerome Robbins, with book and lyrics by Betty Comden and Adolph Green.
This turned out to be a challenging time for the composer. In Working with Bernstein, Jack Gottlieb quotes a letter written on November 29, 1964: "Skin is stalled. Life, this agonizing November, is a tooth with its skin stripped off. I don’t know what I’m writing. I don’t even know what I’m not writing... I can’t get over Kennedy or Marc. Life is a tooth without a skin.” The assassination of President Kennedy had occurred a year earlier, and Bernstein’s close friend, the composer Marc Blitzstein, had been murdered in January of that year. Ultimately, the collaboration fell through. In a letter to the composer David Diamond, Bernstein described himself as “a composer without a project."
In early December 1963, Bernstein received a letter from the Very Reverend Walter Hussey, Dean of the Cathedral of Chichester in Sussex, England, requesting a piece for the Cathedral’s 1965 music festival: “The Chichester Organist and Choirmaster, John Birch, and I, are very anxious to have written some piece of music which the combined choirs could sing at the Festival to be held in Chichester in August, 1965, and we wondered if you would be willing to write something for us. I do realize how enormously busy you are, but if you could manage to do this we should be tremendously honoured and grateful. The sort of thing that we had in mind was perhaps, say, a setting of the Psalm 2, or some part of it, either unaccompanied or accompanied by orchestra or organ, or both. I only mention this to give you some idea as to what was in our minds.” The festival united the cathedral choruses of Chichester, Winchester and Salisbury. Dr. Hussey was a noted champion of the arts, having commissioned works by visual artists, poets, and composers. Among these are: an altarpiece painted by Graham Sutherland, stained glass windows by Marc Chagall, a sculpture depicting the Madonna and child by Henry Moore, a litany and anthem by W.H. Auden, and perhaps most notably, the cantata Rejoice in the Lamb by Benjamin Britten.
Despite Dr. Hussey’s initial wish for the setting of Psalm 2, Bernstein responded with a “suite of Psalms, or selected verses from Psalms,” under the working title, Psalms of Youth (Bernstein changed the title because it misleadingly suggested that the piece was easy to perform). Hussey was hoping that Bernstein would feel unrestrained for composing in a more popular vein despite the sacred nature of the assignment. Hussey wrote, “Many of us would be very delighted if there was a hint of West Side Story about the music.”
Bernstein composed Chichester Psalms amid a busy schedule, completing his first work since the Third Symphony, Kaddish, in 1963, written in memory of President Kennedy. Both pieces combine choruses singing Hebrew text, with orchestral forces, but where Kaddish is a statement of profound anguish and despair, Chichester Psalms is hopeful and life-affirming.
Unlike a good portion of the music he composed (but did not complete) during his sabbatical, Chichester Psalms is firmly rooted in tonality. Bernstein commented during a 1977 press conference, “I spent almost the whole year writing 12-tone music and even more experimental stuff. I was happy that all these new sounds were coming out: but after about six months of work I threw it all away. It just wasn’t my music; it wasn’t honest. The end result was the Chichester Psalms which is the most accessible, B-flat majorish tonal piece I’ve ever written
Chichester Psalms juxtaposes vocal part writing most commonly associated with Church music (including homophony and imitation), with the Judaic liturgical tradition. Bernstein specifically called for the text to be sung in Hebrew (there is not even an English translation in the score), using the melodic and rhythmic contours of the Hebrew language to dictate mood and melodic character. By combining the Hebrew with Christian choral tradition, Bernstein was implicitly issuing a plea for peace in Israel during a turbulent time in the young country’s history.
Each of the three movements of Chichester Psalms contains one complete Psalm plus excerpts from another paired Psalm. Musically, Bernstein achieved Dr. Hussey’s wish for the music to remain true to the composer’s own personal style. The piece is jazzy and contemporary, yet accessible. In a letter to Hussey, Bernstein characterized it as “popular in feeling,” with “an old-fashioned sweetness along with its more violent moments.”
Chichester Psalms is tuneful, tonal and contemporary, featuring modal melodies and unusual meters. Through its use of motivic repetition, there is the sense of a hallowed rite. From the time of its sold-out world premiere at Philharmonic Hall on July 15, 1965 conducted by the composer himself, it was apparent that Bernstein had created a magically unique blend of Biblical Hebrew verse and Christian choral tradition; a musical depiction of the composer’s hope for brotherhood and peace.
Randall Thompson was a quintessentially American composer with strong New England roots--he attended Harvard University as an undergraduate, and served as a professor at both Wellesley and Harvard. Although he wrote several symphonies, a pair of operas and two string quartets, he is best known today for his choral music. He collaborated with poet Robert Frost in a seven-movement suite entitled Frostiana, while his most famous work, Alleluia, was written in only five days in July 1940 and premiered at the inaugural concert of the Tanglewood
(Program note in Thompson’s Nov. 16 1954 letter to Royal Stanton) They say there is nothing new under the sun, only new combinations. Toward the end of the 16th century Vecchi and Bancheiri wrote sequences of madrigals, which told a story. These works were like little comedies in music for unaccompanied chorus. It occurred to me that a sequence of choruses of a religious nature might be arranged to convey the import of a religious drama. The particular subject that I chose was the basic story this is told in the Book of Isaiah, the prophecy that the wicked would be destroyed and the good would be saved and enter the New Jerusalem. The work, as you know, was suggested by Hick’s painting called “The Peaceable Kingdom” which was a favorite subject of his. I chose passages from the Book of Isaiah and arranged them in a way that would reflect in the words of the prophet the kind of sermon that Hicks (who was a Quaker) might have preached.
The first and longest movement, “Say ye to the righteous,” is representative of the work as a whole, with open harmonies and textures, and with the chorus often reduced to just a few parts. In addition, illustrating another characteristic of shape-note singing, the main melodic material is frequently heard in both men’s and women’s voices. While much of the music is homophonic, there are also frequent bursts of melismas--but these in turn are likely to be interrupted by a sudden change in mood. The ensuing three movements are brief and violent: “Woe unto them,” with its punctuating shouts of “Woe!” while the remainder of the text is declaimed by individual voices; “The noise of a multitude,” in which each declaimed phrase grows in intensity until the final cry of “flames”; and “Howl ye,” whose short text is endlessly repeated in a maelstrom of denunciation before winding down, utterly spent.
The second half of the work starts with “The paper reeds by the brook,” a slow, meditative movement that recalls the quiet semi-chorus “The trumpeters and the pipers are silent” from Walton’s Belshazzar’s Feast. The finale, “You shall have a song,” represents a final promise to the faithful that they shall have “gladness of heart,” as the text is repeated, like the tolling of bells, throughout the various voices of the chorus before the luminous final chords bring the work to an exultant close.
TEXTS and TRANSLATIONS
PSALM 96 (95) Cantate Domino / Pärt
Sing to the Lord a new song, sing to the Lord all the earth. Sing to the Lord and bless his name: Proclaim his salvation from day to day. Declare his glory among the nations, his wonders among all people. For the Lord is great and greatly to be praised: he is to be feared above all gods.
For all the gods of the nations are idols: but the Lord made the heavens. Honor and majesty are before Him: strength and beauty are in his sanctuary. Give unto the Lord, o kindres of the people, give unto the Lord glory and strength. Give unto the Lord the glory due unto His Name: bring an offering, and come into his courts. O worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness: fear before Him, all the earth. Say among the heathen that Lord reigneth: the world also shall be established that it shall not be moved: He shall judge the people righteously. Let the heavens rejoice, and let the earth be glad; let the sea roar, and the fullness thereof. Let the field be joyful, and all that is therein; Then shall all the trees of the wood rejoice before the Lord; for He cometh to judge the earth; he shall judge the world with righteousness, and the people with his truth.
PSALM 98 Singet dem Herrn / Mendelssohn
Sing to the Lord a new song, for he has done marvelous things: his right hand and his holy arm have worked salvation for him. The Lord has made his salvation known and revealed his righteousness to the nations. He has remembered his love and his faithfulness to Israel; all the ends of the earth have seen the salvation of God.
CHICHESTER PSALMS / Bernstein
1. Psalm 100
Make a joyful noise unto the Lord all ye lands.
Serve the Lord with gladness.
Come before His presence with singing.
Know that the Lord, He is God.
He made us, and we are his.
We are His people and the sheep of His pasture.
Come unto His gates with thanksgiving,
And into His court with praise.
Be thankful unto Him and bless His name.
the Lord is good, His mercy everlasting and His truth endureth to all generations.
2. Psalm 23 – women and boy soprano / Psalm 2, vs. 1-4 - men
The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.
He maketh me to lie down in green pastures,
He leadeth me beside the still waters,
He restoreth my soul,
He leadeth me in the paths of righteousness,
For His name's sake.
Yea, though I walk
Through the valley of the shadow of death,
I will fear no evil,
For Thou art with me.
Thy rod and Thy staff They comfort me.
Why do the nations rage,
And the people imagine a vain thing?
The kings of the earth set themselves,
And the rulers take counsel together
Against the Lord and against His anointed.
Saying, let us break their bands asunder,
And cast away their cords from us.
He that sitteth in the heavens
Shall laugh, and the Lord
Shall have them in derision!
Thou preparest a table before me
In the presence of my enemies,
Thou anointest my head with oil,
My cup runneth over.
Surely goodness and mercy
Shall follow me all the days of my life,
And I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.
3. Psalm 131 / Psalm 133, vs. 1
Lord, Lord,
My heart is not haughty,
Nor mine eyes lofty,
Neither do I exercise myself
In great matters or in things
Too wonderful for me to understand.
Surely I have calmed
And quieted myself,
As a child that is weaned of his mother,
My soul is even as a weaned child.
Let Israel hope in the Lord From henceforth and forever.
Behold how good,
And how pleasant it is,
For brethren to dwell together in unity.
THE PEACEABLE KINGDOM / Thompson
1. Say ye to the righteous (Isaiah 3:10-11, 65:14)
Say ye to the righteous, that it shall be well with him: for they shall eat the fruit of their doings.
Woe unto the wicked! it shall be ill with him: for the reward of his hands shall be given him.
Behold, my servants shall sing for joy of heart, but ye shall cry for sorrow of heart, and shall howl for vexation of spirit.
2. Woe unto them (5:8, 11-12, 18, 20-22; 17:12)
Woe unto them that draw iniquity with cords of vanity, and sin as it were with a cart rope!
Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!
Woe unto them that are wise in their own eyes, and prudent in their own sight!
Woe unto them that are mighty to drink wine, and men of strength to mingle strong drink!
Woe unto them that rise up early in the morning, that they may follow strong drink; that continue until night, till wine inflame them! And the harp, and the viol, the tabret, and pipe, and wine, are in their feasts: but they regard not the work of the Lord, neither consider the operation of his hands.
Woe to the multitude of many people, which make a noise like the noise of the seas!
Woe unto them that join house to house, that lay field to field, till there be no place, that they may be placed alone in the midst of the earth!
3. The noise of a multitude (13:4-5, 7-8, 15-16, 18)
The noise of a multitude in the mountains, like as of a great people; a tumultuous noise of the kingdoms of nations gathered together: the Lord of hosts mustereth the host of the battle.
They come from a far country, from the end of heaven, even the Lord, and the weapons of his indignation, to destroy the whole land.
Their bows also shall dash the young men to pieces; and they shall have no pity on the fruit of the womb; their eyes shall not spare children.
Every one that is found shall be thrust through; and every one that is joined unto them shall fall by the sword.
Their children also shall be dashed to pieces before their eyes; their houses shall be spoiled, and their wives ravished. Therefore shall all hands be faint, and every man’s heart shall melt.
They shall be afraid: pangs and sorrows shall take hold of them; they shall be in pain as a woman that travaileth. They shall be amazed one at another; their faces shall be as flames.
4. Howl ye (13:6, 14:31)
Howl ye; for the day of the LORD is at hand. Howl, O gate; cry, O city; thou art dissolved.
5. The paper reeds by the brooks (19:7)
The paper reeds by the brooks, by the mouth of the brooks, and every thing sown by the brooks, shall wither, be driven away, and be no more.
8. Ye shall have a song (30:29)
Ye shall have a song, as in the night when a holy solemnity is kept; and gladness of heart, as when one goeth with a pipe.
CONCERT CHOIR ROSTER
BIOS (XiXi, boy soprano, maybe the organist?
Dr. William Cutter is Director of Choral Programs at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology where he is conductor of the M.I.T. Concert Choir and Chamber Chorus. A member of the conducting and theory faculty and former Director of Choral Studies at the Boston Conservatory, he currently teaches graduate conducting, harmony and ear training, and is Artistic Director of the Boston Conservatory Summer Vocal/Choral Intensive. He has also held academic posts at the Boston University School for the Arts, the University of Lowell and the Walnut Hill School for the Arts.
He served as music director and conductor of the Brookline Chorus, an auditioned community chorus of eighty voices, for five seasons. and served as Chorus Master and Associate Conductor of the Boston Lyric Opera Company from 2002-2007. For four summers he was conductor of the Boston University Young Artists Chorus of the Tanglewood Institute, and was music director and conductor of the Opera Laboratory Theater Company, as well as founder and music director of the vocal chamber ensemble CANTO which specialized in contemporary choral music.
As assistant to Maestro John Oliver for the Tanglewood Festival Chorus, he has prepared choruses for John Williams and Keith Lockhart and the Boston Pops. In August 2002, Cutter prepared the Tanglewood Festival Chorus for their performance of Beethoven’s Symphony #9 under the baton of Sir Roger Norrington. During the summer of 2009, Cutter was chorus master for “Red Sox Album” CD recorded by the Boston Pops. He also prepared backup singers for a concert with James Taylor at Tanglewood in August 2009 and August 2011. In 2010, Cutter prepared the women of the Tanglewood Festival Chorus for a performance of Holst’s “The Planets” at Tanglewood under the baton of David Zinman. For the 2012-2013 season, Cutter was rehearsal conductor for the Tanglewood Festival Chorus in performances of Poulenc’s “Stabat Mater”, Britten’s “War Requiem”, Verdi’s “Requiem” and Haydn’s “Mass in Time of War”, all with the Boston Symphony Orchestra. For the 2014 season he prepared the Finale of Act 2, “Aida” of Verdi; a concert version of Bernstein’s “Candide”; the choral Finale of Mahler’s 2nd symphony as well as Beethoven’s Choral Fantasie.
In January of 2016, he prepared the women of the Tanglewood Festival Chorus to sing the incidental music to Mendelssohn’s Midsummer Night’s Dream with Andris Nelsons conducting.
Guest conducting appearances include the Intercollegiate Choral Festival (2015 and 2016), the New England Conservatory Chamber Singers (2007),Chorus Pro Musica in Boston (2010), chorus master for the Montreal Symphony Chorus preparing Haydn’s “Creation” for Maestro Kent Nagano (2010) and the Boston Choral Ensemble where he conducted a program entitled “Bang”, music for percussion and chorus, featuring works by Dominick Argento, Leonard Bernstein, Peter Klatzow, and Timothy Takach (2011). His M.I.T. Chamber Chorus performed with the Kronos String Quartet as well as the Bang on a Can All-Stars in a new version of Brian Eno’s “Music for Airports”. In March of 2012, Cutter served as chorus master for a performance of Andrew Imbries “Songs of Then and Now” with the Collage New Music Ensemble and women from the MIT Chamber Chorus.
Dr. Cutter has also served on the faculty of the North Carolina Summer Institute of Choral Art and is in demand as a guest conductor and adjudicator throughout the United States and Canada. In 2002, he was asked to serve as a choral consultant for the Boston Symphony’s educational outreach program.
With degrees in composition, Cutter maintains an active career as a composer with recent performances by the The Chatham Chorale, the Illinois State University School of Music Orchestra, Cantata Singers, PALS Children’s Chorus, Monmouth Civic Chorus, the New Jersey Gay Men’s Chorus, the Boston Pops, the New World Chorale in Boston, Melodious Accord of New York City, and Opera Omaha.
His music is published by E.C. Schirmer, Boston; Lawson and Gould, New York; Alfred Educational Publishers, Los Angeles; Roger Dean Publishers, Wisconsin; Shawnee Press; Pennsylvania; and Warner/Chappell of Ontario, Canada. His primary composition teachers included Pulitzer Prize winning composers David del Tredici and Bernard Rands.
As a professional tenor, he has sung with the premiere vocal ensembles in Boston, including the Handel and Haydn Society, Cantata Singers, Boston Baroque, Emmanuel Music, and the Harvard Glee Club. He has been a featured soloist on the Cantata Singers Recital Series and has been a recitalist on the M.I.T. faculty performance series.
