Theology in Music

A blog considering theology as illustrated by Western Art Music

Uncategorized

  • From dangerous modernism to the status of ‘classic’

    There is a popular myth – no less mythical for its popularity – that Palestrina composed his Missa Papae Marcelli to address concerns that polyphonic music obscured the import of religious texts, thereby ‘saving’ artistic music in Catholic liturgy after the Catholic Reformation associated principally with the council of Trent. Hans Pfitzner’s operatic retelling of… Read more

  • Coequal in the Father’s light

    In 1892 the director of the Paris Conservatoire is supposed to have said of a dangerously modern candidate for that institution’s professorship of composition ‘Never! If he’s appointed, I resign.’ In 1896 that same candidate took up the professorship under a different director, and in 1905 became director himself in turn. Many years before, while… Read more

  • Lilies floating among the stars

    This week saw Michaelmas, not only the start of a traditional academic year (in at least some ancient universities), but the feast of St Michael and All Angels. It seemed obvious to me, therefore, that this instalment of the blog should consider some musical evocation of angels. Though there are several one might have chosen,… Read more

  • Seen with scornful wonder

    In 1866 one Samuel Stone, curate at Windsor, published Lyra Fidelium, twelve hymns on the articles of the Apostle’s Creed, usually understood to have been in response to dissention in the Church of South Africa about the teachings of a Bishop J W Colenso. Of this set, the most famous and most often still sung… Read more

  • As the Host is lifted up

    In the nineteenth century one, and only one, woman was made a professor of the Paris Conservatoire. Professor of piano, Louise Farrenc – née Jeanne-Louise Dumont (her husband had been a flautist, but settled down to become a music publisher, and Éditions Farrenc had significant success). She, herself, developed from a child prodigy of an… Read more

  • A heart capable of strong feeling

    I have only recently been introduced to the less secular music of the composer probably best known musically for his scores for the early carry-on films, and arguably even better known as a detective writer under his pen name of Edmund Crispin. R. Bruce Montgomery was, however, a former Oxford organ scholar, and wrote church… Read more

  • The light of His countenance

    I have, occasionally, been accused of various sorts of musical snobbery – and anyone who has read much of this blog will understand that it is written by someone with taste tending usually towards the high-brow. So, to go counter to type, let us consider John Rutter and his anthem ‘The Lord bless you and… Read more

  • The Mystery of Faith in Sound

    In 2003 the French and Lebanese organist and composer Naji Hakim wrote, to a commission of Leo Abbott of Boston, a former student of his, a piece in memoriam Theodore Marier, noted teacher and advocate for Gregorian plainchant. That inspiration, together with Hakim’s extensive practice as a liturgical improviser, leads to no surprise that the… Read more

  • The sweet song of the healing Word

    The 20th of August 1724 was a Sunday, and as was his wont the cantor of the Thomaskirche in Leipzig – someone you may well have heard of, J Sebastian Bach – had composed a cantata based on an existing chorale which had resonances with the readings of the day, in this case the parable… Read more

  • An early tribute to Charlemagne and Ockeghem

    It has been said that the first printed book of music dedicated to works by a single composer was a 1502 publication by Petrucci containing five settings of the ordinary of the Mass by Josquin des Prez. By the time they were composed (though the actual date of composition is difficult to pinpoint) the tradition… Read more