When I was at school, I found, in the Oxford Book of Carols (1928 edition), a song which confused me. It was headed ‘The Kings’ and appeared to consist of a rather angular melody, with seemingly random piano/organ chords accompanying, usually, just the second half of each phrase. I didn’t understand it at all!
It was only rather later that I realised what a beautiful piece Peter Cornelius’s ‘Three Kings from Persian Lands afar’ actually is – and that those ‘random chords’ were actually the sixteenth-century hymn ‘How brightly beams the morning star’ and were intended to be sung alongside the elegantly twisting and turning baritone solo, telling of the visit of the Magi and ending with the memorable phrase: ‘Offer thy heart!’.
I think that somehow the memory of that Epiphany piece, combining a well-known and appropriate chorale melody with a solo line in faster moving notes, and moving near the end to a beautiful climax as the last line of the chorale melody slowly descends by step, must have been at the back of my mind when I wrote, just over ten years ago, what I felt to be the climax of my cantata ‘O Come Emmanuel’.
My cantata is based on the plainsong hymn ‘Veni Emmanuel’ (‘O Come, o come, Emmanuel’) whose verses take us on a journey through Advent as we wait and watch for the coming of the Lord – and at this point in the cantata, near the end, we hear the melody complete, sung by the lower voices of the choir, while the sopranos sing, above it, in faster moving notes, a setting of a rather beautiful poem by the Victorian poet Dora Greenwell. This poem begins:
And art thou come with us to dwell, Our prince, our guide, our love, our Lord?
And is thy name Emmanuel, God present with the world restored?
As with Cornelius, the high point of the last line of ‘Veni Immanuel’ (Rejoice, rejoice, Emmanuel shall come to thee) gives the opportunity for the high point of the soprano line too, to the words The world is glad for thee, the heart is glad for thee – finally subsiding to a quiet cadence. I’ve only realised this week that there is that similarity, reminding me that there is nothing (or very little) that is new under the sun…
The whole cantata was written for Selwyn College Choir, director Sarah MacDonald, and I was delighted that they sung this movement, And art thou come with us to dwell, towards the end of their beautiful Advent service last Sunday, December 1st, in their wonderfully ornate Victorian chapel. You can watch the whole service here: it is a fine service, full of delights: but if you just wanted to skip to my anthem it’s at 44’10”. Alternatively, you can see and hear a scrolling score here, with the same choir (the 2014 vintage) and conductor. The music is published by Oxford University Press, and the cantata is recorded by Regent Records.