2022 Swan City Piano Festival

A lecture I had the privilege of delivering on the opening night of the 2022 Swan City Piano Festival here in Lakeland, FL. It highlights the performances of Robert Fleitz, John C. O'Leary, and Hannah Sun, and celebrates the good work of the festival.

 

Welcoming Presentation 

Swan City Piano Festival - June 9, 2022

Charles Hulin

 

“I like it but I don’t understand it.” Those are the heartbreaking words people sometimes say about musical performances. Somehow the idea that one needs specialized knowledge to really enjoy classical music can get into our minds and stand in the way of own experience.

 

As someone who spends a lot of time thinking about music, I want you to know that the way music moves us is a mystery. And a mystery in this sense is not something to be understood. It is something to be experienced. We don’t measure a mystery. We enter into a relationship with a mystery. And that is an invitation to know our own sense of joy.  

 

John C. O’Leary, (jazz pianist and neuroscientist who you will be hearing Saturday) has this to say about that mystery: “Art can create a space where dialog can occur.” And so it is this evening that I am thinking of the space that music creates and I’m starting the dialog in hopes that we might all be able to fully experience the musical wonders of these days. 

 

Over the next hour, I will share many specifics about the music in this series of concerts, but first I would like to speak generally in case anyone is struggling with that sense of just not knowing enough. If, over the course of the concerts, that thought starts to creep in, I encourage you to do what you would do in any good relationship: keep listening. Listen for a melody you could sing. Listen for a rhythm to which you might move. Observe the pictures the music paints. Tune into whatever emotion the sounds stir within you. Seek to enjoy being with the music wherever it goes. And I will let you in on a secret. Whatever you discover as you listen, that’s what we musicians want to know. That is the valid experience as far as we are concerned.

 

Tomorrow night, Robert Fleitz will be presenting a recital touching on the topic of home. We define home in many ways: our place of origin, our sense of belonging, rootedness . . . and across the generations, musicians have processed a great deal about what home is because the nature of our field has often required that we leave home to study, to find work, to travel and to perform.

 

Robert is so good about loving his Lakeland home and contributes to its musical culture in wonderful, sustained ways. He is also very at home in the world of new music.  He makes me think of one of our Juilliard teachers, Joel Sachs. Dr. Sachs said he woke up one morning and realized that, through his research, he was so involved with a day in the life of Schumann 100-plus years ago that he was missing out on living now. He went on to say that there are Schumanns living today, and how exciting and meaningful it can be to involve ourselves with those living geniuses and their work.

 

In that tradition, what Robert has planned for us shows us a bit of what has happened but will focus mostly on what is happening. To put an exclamation point on the whole idea, he will go on to show us what he is making happen by inspiring and commissioning composers to write music that will be heard for the first time right here. 

 

In terms of what has happened, Robert’s recital will feature some well-known names from the past. For example, the concluding work of his program will be a piece by Manuel de Falla which evokes the spirit of the people of de Falla’s home region in Spain through gestures of Flamenco music including fanfares and laments, suggestions of guitar strumming and castanet clicking, and maybe even some heel stomping.

 

I mention that concluding work because it seems to me to be the repertoire starting point for the real action of the evening. By that I mean de Falla’s imaginative way of portraying sounds and scenes outside the traditional world of piano music is one reasonable root for the music of the more recent composers on the program. That is not to suggest that any of the other composers were thinking of de Falla as they were writing but that their musical approaches might seem closer to his than to those of the earlier composers we will hear, Grieg and Chopin. To me, Grieg and Chopin seem more like prehistory to what’s going on in Robert’s program. They are like the Garden of Eden - a world that once was - ‘In the beginning, Chopin!’

 

And when it comes to longing for home, Chopin’s life and death are the stuff of legend.  He spent most of his adulthood in France but always considered himself a Pole and arranged on his deathbed for his heart to be smuggled into Poland and interred in a pillar of Holy Cross Church in Warsaw.

 

Now regarding what is going on, Robert will share a veritable rainbow of colorful works by living composers. We would do well to note that his programming reflects the fact that the voices of women have become a much more overt part of the musical conversation in these last fifty years. We will be strangely soothed by the vaguely bluesy work “Homesickness” by Emahoy Geubrou, a 98-year-old Ethiopian nun who spent her formative years in exile.  We will be stirred by Asha Srinivasan’s eclectic “Mercurial Reveries.” Srinivasan, a professor at Lawrence University, seeks to put “old and new musics together on stage.” In “Mercurial Reveries” she does this by filtering aspects of Hindi music through techniques reminiscent of Bartok and Copland. And we will hear performance artist Meredith Monk’s minimalistic “Railroad” which I think is the product of a beautiful creative process she has described. She says writing a piece of music is a like cooking a soup. You have your materials – in the case of a soup these are carrots and potatoes and broth and so forth. You let those materials be the materials. You trust them. You don’t judge them.  You slowly boil them. You refine them. And eventually there comes a time to put them into a form that brings out their essence. “Follow that,” she says. Follow that essence.

 

And so we arrive at those composers who know Robert and write music for him to play here first.

 

In 2020, Liliya Ugay wrote “Raqs” for the Swan City Festival. Raqs means dance in Arabic, and the piece is an interesting programming parallel to the Flamenco-informed music of de Falla. Liliya’s dance inspiration comes from her homeland of Uzbekistan and I encourage you to google Uzbek dance between now and tomorrow night so you can see the sometimes lyrical/sometimes dramatic style of dance that develops from small movements of the fingers, expands through the arm, and ultimately includes the whole body twirling in climactic passages. To my ear, Liliya’s music is permeated by those sorts of progressions; and in playing it, it seems even the pianist’s body is drawn into expressing a similiar choreography.

 

[Brian Dozier Brown’s “Lacustrine” is this year’s commission to be discussed at its premier tomorrow.]

 

Finally, I want to comment on an especially bright spot in my preparation for this lecture, and that was my first experience of the music of Krists Auznieks. Robert will be playing his “Pathmarks” which reaches deep into a prehistory of Bach through the more recent rooting of composers like Stravinsky. No doubt you will hear many layers in this music moving at different paces and playing out expanded ideas of counterpoint. And that is one side of what struck me as so beautiful about this work. Its structure is so intelligent and substantive at the same time that it generates an affect of genuine warmth and joy. That’s such a difficult balance to strike!

 

View Auznieks "Pathmarks" here.

On Saturday, as I referenced earlier, John C. O’Leary will be with us. A musician and a scientist, he is concerned about communication. In discussing a recent project, he noted that there is often a lack of communication between science and society. One element in the struggle for communication has to do with the means by which the information is communicated. Sometimes the words are too technical, the presentation too dense, the framing disorienting, and so forth.

 

While I don’t know exactly what John will play on Saturday, one thing I admire about his work is the way it communicates so clearly. We might think of the texture of a piece of music in terms of a continuum from transparent to opaque. Some pieces make their composers’ choices immediately and disappointingly apparent. Other works are so thick we almost wonder if there was an organizing hand at play at all. I think what John’s music offers is a very satisfying version of translucency. There’s light to see a lot of what’s going on in his music. We can almost narrate it as it unfolds: There’s a groove that’s making us move. And now what’s going on with that bass line? Wait! It feels like there’s an extra beat in these measures! Oh, and here comes that sweet series of chords again. Sounds a little like Schumann.

 

As John improvises, he takes us by the ear and makes sure we hear the choices he wants us to consider. It’s almost as if the music is its own interpretation. But when and how those choices arise remains a mystery. To use a different metaphor, John has a way of making us feel at home as he leads us through unfamiliar terrain. 

 

I’m going to let you in on another secret. Just in case you are not already a jazz enthusiast, you might be intrigued to know a lot of us classical pianists really enjoy listening to jazz. There’s something about composing happening more or less in real time that fascinates and inspires us. It’s one of the most creative things. 

 

John C. O'Leary plays "Blackbird" here.

 

Now, about Sunday. If I were to give Hannah Sun’s program a title, I would call it “Transformations.” Transformation was a quintessential concern for Romantic-Era composers, and I think the desire for transformation might be one of our most deeply human traits.

 

Hannah’s program will begin with a master of transformation, a composer with the Midas touch, the legendary Chopin. And while I described his music as the prehistory of Robert’s program, Hannah’s program positions us to be awed by the vast and exquisite nature of the musical world that was his.

 

The brightness of that world will suddenly appear when Hannah plays the first of Chopin’s 24 Etudes. You’re likely to think, “My goodness, a human hand can do that!” Like Bach before him, Chopin initiated his magnum opus with a piece in C major that is basically hymn-like harmonies energized by rolling chords. The description sounds simple, but the effect is stunning. For the sake of comparison, I will play the first few measures of Bach’s prelude and the opening phrase of Chopin’s last etude, the so-called “Ocean Etude,” in which he uses the same strategy as in the etude Hannah will be playing.

 

For nearly two centuries, Chopin’s etudes have provided the fundamental technical training of professional pianists. With them, Chopin revolutionized the very way we touch the instrument, and he elevated the etude form from a mere study to a concert-worthy demonstration of sweeping musicality. It is this transformational quality that typifies Chopin’s genius. Whatever he turns his hand to, he imbues with an expressiveness than had not been imagined before. We will experience that most compellingly in the juxtaposition of two nocturnes, the first by the inventor of the form and the second by Chopin.

 

The Irish pianist John Field created the nocturne, by combining a singing melody with a flowing accompaniment. His nocturnes provide a reposeful setting for his rather impressive skill at manipulating melodies. I will play a portion of the nocturne Hannah has programmed to give us both a sense of the nighttime tone of his music as well as the quality of his melodic gift. I want to point out that he varies the melody in such enchanting ways that we could easily not even realize we are hearing the same melody twice!

 

Field did that all so nicely within the boundaries he had set for the form, but Chopin knew so much more was possible. As I say to my students, anything that can happen at night can happen in a Chopin nocturne: a lovely dream, a nightmare, an obsessive thought, a bout of insomnia, an asthma attack . . . and always the hope of a coming sunrise. You can sense the range even in the words Chopin writes on his scores. The story of one of his nocturnes can be tracked through his expressive directions: Larghetto, appassionato, cresc., con forza, smorz., sotto voce, pianississimo, forte poco stretto, fortissimo, legatissimo, rallentando e dolcissimo.

 

Hannah will follow up her performances of Chopin and Field with her own essay in transformation, a work called “Plastisphere.” We will see and hear that she transforms the instrument into a harp, a wave, and an ocean with the songs of birds above and whales below. With those transformations she creates a space where dialog can occur about the way we treat the oceans and the creatures that call them home. As a composer, I especially appreciate that this music resonates with the piano writing of Ravel and Debussy without ever becoming derivative. That’s also hard to do!

 

Hannah Sun plays her "Platisphere" here.

 

After her own music, Hannah will treat us to one of the golden treasures of the standard piano repertoire, Beethoven’s 30^th sonata, Opus 109. Beethoven’s music functions as a hinge connecting the Classical and Romantic periods, and he is arguably the source of all things transformational since that time. The thing that moves me so much about Beethoven’s way of being transformational is that he takes the humblest materials – simple scales and triads – and turns them into the noblest and most enduring of musical expressions. It’s like alchemy. And how he does it also reminds me of another Juilliard professor, one of Hannah’s teachers, Jerome Lowenthal, who would sometimes describe a piece of music as the story of interval (an interval being a very simple measurement between two notes). In this Sonata, Beethoven begins with a third that grows ever so gently into a fourth. And it happens again and again all along the path of a descending scale. That interval takes a little journey and begins to be transformed. Next it broadens as the drama of the music starts to be revealed. That passage is so sweet and intense, but in another way, it’s just a matter of rising and falling through the notes of a scale. Fast forward to the second movement and the mood has become very stern, but the materials are the same only now the third is falling. I won’t continue to outline how Beethoven generates a complete range of characters from those basic materials but please know as you listen that the expressiveness of all you hear in this piece arises from his insight into the possibilities of those intervals and that scale.   

After Beethoven, Hannah will share a selection of Rachmaninoff preludes, preludes in which Rachmaninoff continued Chopin’s work of transforming the form.  Suffice it to say Rachmaninoff’s preludes are always gratifying to hear and to play. The improvisatory and discursive qualities traditionally associated with the prelude form make it a perfect match for some of Rachmaninoff’s most intimate musical impulses. And the heroic B flat prelude is a positively oceanic tour de force

 

Hannah has chosen to conclude her recital with one of Franz Liszt’s Hungarian Rhapsodies, and in doing so, she brings this season of the Festival full circle. Like de Falla and Liliya Ugay, Liszt transformed his piano writing with an infusion of dance music from back home. When the piece starts, we will immediately know we have entered a new soundscape conditioned by the instruments of the Gypsy (Romany) orchestra. Shimmering cimbalom tremolos and reckless fiddle tunes will evoke moods from the mournful to the menacing, the proud and the nostalgic. This music is just one of many signs of how fully Liszt entered the space of dialog. Liszt took numerous opportunities to spend time with the Romany people trying to understand their culture and their music-making. His own introduction to the Hungarian Rhapsodies grew into a two-volume work reflecting on those experiences. But he went even further, involving himself in their lives by assuming responsibility for the welfare and education of a promising young Romany violinist who later named his own son after Liszt.

To conclude this whirlwind tour of the festival performances, I would like to reference a philosophy put forward by the former president of Juilliard, Joseph Polisi. Throughout his tenure at the school, Dr. Polisi developed and promulgated an approach to the role of the artist that he called “artist as citizen.” It can be briefly outlined with two quotations from his book by the same name. In the preface, he writes, “I have formed the conviction that artists must become active members of their communities, working effectively and methodically to ensure that the arts are a vital element in the fabric of society. Performing artists must no longer believe that their ‘work’ stops at the end of the performance. Active involvement of artist-citizens who are well-informed about the political, economic, and social components of our world will be the only way to realize the positive impact of the arts on our schools, organizations, and this world as we move forward in the twenty-first century.” In the epilogue, he concludes, “My messages in this volume reflect an optimism about the decades ahead because of my faith in the Juilliard tradition, a tradition that instills in its practitioners a love for life, a dedication to the highest levels of the artistic profession, and a belief that artists bring a positive and transformative element to our society. With that belief in mind, I know the future is in good hands.”

 

In so many ways, the Swan City Piano Festival epitomizes this artist-as-citizen model. As we see over these next few days how local institutions are involved, children are engaged, masterclasses are provided, interdisciplinary work is commissioned and presented, musical wonders are made accessible, and we are all challenged to consider the world’s cultures and creatures, I think we might join in Dr. Polisi’s optimism in recognizing that the future of the arts is indeed in good hands.

 

 

Christmas Carols and the Gospels

I posted the little study below several years back and wanted to share it again with a new preface.

In the original post, I referenced inflatable bears, elves, and so forth being added to the nativity scenes in neighbors' yards. I usually start this carol discussion with my students by asking what non-biblical characters they've seen added to such scenes in our town. 

Flamingos joining the animals? 

Frosty adding his voice to the angelic choir? 

Yoda bowing in the direction of the manger? 

(These have all been sighted!)

This year, it occurred to me that such light-hearted additions to the creche actually serve as a witness to a profound truth: We live in the time between the most intimate manger scene of Bethlehem and the universal worship of Revelation. Just as a number of our carols begin with the holy family, expand to include shepherds then magi, finally putting us in the scene, the Kin-dom of God expands inexorably through the worship of our own time on its way to that final future peace of full communion between God and all Creation.

 

During this Christmas season, it has occurred to me that it would be a good devotional exercise to survey the commonly sung Christmas carols in terms of their Gospel content. That is, to take note of which carol is based on which Gospel narrative of the nativity. I’m sure may others have already done this, but I’ve enjoyed doing it for myself.

 

Sometimes we carry around a mental version of the nativity that is essentially St. Francis’s beautiful manger scene with everyone in attendance (Mary, Joseph, the baby Jesus, animals, shepherds, wise men, and angels). The cast of characters grows in the yards of neighbors as inflatable polar bears, elves, and dinosaurs join the scene. But that’s a different story.

 

The gospel writers, however, chose specific details to make their points about Jesus. (Don’t we all?) Their separate versions seem to have been written to stand alone and don’t particularly need to be combined.   

 

In addition to the fact that my little survey might enhance someone’s biblical literacy (mine, at the very least) I also think it is a valuable exercise for raising awareness of what is actually in these carols. Details of the familiar go by almost completely without notice and it’s possible that many of us had a joyful moment with “Joy to the World” or experienced a serene mood as we sang “Silent Night” without registering the richness of these texts yet again this year.

 

If you are intrigued by the whole concept, maybe you should undertake such a survey yourself before reading on. Or at least do a quick check of the carols you have in your head with your memory of the Gospels.

As I did my survey, I realized that the categories I thought I would use are not as clear-cut as I expected. That’s pretty much how these sorts of things usually go. For clarity’s sake, though, I’ve still basically sorted the carols as being based on Matthew, Luke, or a combination of the two.

 

That said, some carols seem to have an overlay of language that might be drawn from John 1. I didn’t try to keep track of that. 

 

Another potential subcategory would be the carol that is clearly about one Gospel but has some general reference from the other that colors it but doesn’t rise to the level that would make the carol a full-blown combination of the two.  For example, “Brightest and Best” and “As with Gladness Men of Old” both reference the manger (Luke) but they are primarily about the wise men (Matthew).  “O Come Little Children” and “Silent Night” both mention a star (Matthew) but are otherwise firmly rooted in Luke.

 

Yet another type is the carol that briefly references something from a Gospel but ultimately amounts to a theological discussion using that reference as a starting point. “It Came upon a Midnight Clear” and “Good Christian Men Rejoice” follow this pattern.

 

Here’s a brief summary of some features that differentiate the Gospel nativity narratives:

 

Matthew

Angel talks to Joseph

Isaiah reference to Immanuel

Guiding star

Wise men visit where the Christ-child lives

Flight into Egypt

 

Luke

Angel talks to Mary

Angel chorus proclaims the birth

Shepherds visit the baby Jesus who is in the manger

 

John

Word becomes flesh

 

And now for my sorting:

 

Matthew

As with Gladness Men of Old

Brightest and Best

We Three Kings of Orient Are

 

Luke

Angels We Have Heard on High

Away in a Manger

Child in the Manger

Go Tell It on the Mountain

Good Christian Men Rejoice

Hark! The Herald Angels Sing

How Great Our Joy

Infant Holy, Infant Lowly

It Came upon the Midnight Clear

O Come, All Ye Faithful

Oh Come, Little Children

O Little Town of Bethlehem

Silent Night

 

Combination of Matthew and Luke

Angels, from the Realms of Glory

Gentle Mary Laid Her Child

Rise Up, Shepherd, and Follow

Sing We Now of Christmas

The First Nowell

There’s a Song in the Air

What Child Is This

 

Other

Joy to the World – Psalm 98

 

P.S. Those who worship in liturgical churches are probably pretty aware of all this as your services tend to follow one Gospel or the other in a given year.  Those of us who organize and play Christmas concerts might find an impetus for some new creative work in those liturgical traditions and present events based on one Gospel's version or the other.

Department of Music

During the fall semester, I wrote the following for our College of Arts and Media magazine, Précis. It gives a sense of the convictions that have shaped our department over the decades.

 

 

 

I recently had the very meaningful fun of reflecting with Ed Bryant on our own experiences in music education and on how those experiences relate to what makes Southeastern’s Department of music distinctive.  As a faculty member for 21 years, and as our current chair, Mr. Bryant has a seasoned perspective on our department’s past, present, and future.

 

As soon as I asked what makes music instruction at Southeastern unique, Mr. Bryant said, “the faith aspect.” As he framed it, “We see what we do in the light of God’s creation.” We model moving beyond culturally assigned labels of secular and sacred to recognize that, whether or not an artist chooses to give glory to God, the very act of creating bears witness to a presence in our lives that is both constructive and caring. As he put it, “When we create, we are being like our Father.”

 

Following from this premise, we have not been afraid to engage different styles of music. A great many departments focus on the supposedly learnèd traditions of classical music while neglecting the musical practices through which today’s students are most likely to build their careers. And in some Christian settings, there is a narrow emphasis on music designed explicitly  for church use which leaves students at a loss regarding the larger conversations of genius and achievement in the professional realm. Decades ago, the vision was set for our department to serve not only the worship needs of Christian communities but also to prepare students to pursue musical work with excellence wherever a Christian witness is needed.

 

Toward that end, we provide degrees in music business, education, and performance in addition to church music. And this makes for an exciting dynamic keeping with Southeastern’s general trajectory of holding to small-university values while making large-university opportunities available. So it is that, in a department which has been able to maintain roughly a 12 to 1 student-professor ratio, students regularly participate in courses and ensembles as diverse as Marching Band Techniques, Hip Hop and American Culture, Worship Lab, String Quartet, Jazz Band, and Concert Choir.

 

Pursuing such an inclusive educational vision requires a stance of perpetual innovation as well as access to resources, and it is very much to Southeastern’s credit that, over the years, provisions have been made for the creation of such possibilities. High-quality learning spaces have been built, scholarships have continued to grow, and crucial investments have been made in technologies that will be key to the careers of the future. In the post-pandemic world, more music will be made on-line than ever before, and in the present day, a radical rethinking is required to continue our department’s wide-ranging offerings. This fall, we welcomed several new faculty members who bring “a world of experience,” as Mr. Bryant describes it, to bear on these realities. 

 

As we wrapped up our talk, we agreed that one of our most fulfilling joys is to see what alumni take from their time with us to create fresh witnesses in the world whether that is Dr. Seth Pendergast mentoring music educators at Colorado State, Carlos Santiago performing on the Netflix show Sing On!, Aldyn Broach and Erika Winter teaching music in the schools of Duval County, Evan Eliason doing production at the Vanguard Room, or Tatiana-Myriam Nicoleau leading worship for a congregation of Facebook followers . . .

A Christmas Vision

I wrote the following devotion ten years ago and share it with my theory students each Christmas. 

January 1, 2011
by Charles J. Hulin IV



The times were tedious

And the people were oppressed.



Mary and Joseph, a contemplative and a visionary,

Wrapped in the Holy Spirit,

Gave birth to a humble child –

A heavenly child.



A star illuminates the scene,

Then and now.



Each new year I begin without my parents, I think more deeply about the
ways in which they shaped me as a person and an artist.


By being my mother’s son, I absorbed a sense of aesthetics. She painted,
planted, and played to fill every space and moment with beauty. This was
at no time more evident than at Christmas when visiting our thoroughly
decorated home could be a spiritual experience akin to visiting the most
ornate and thoughtfully-designed chapel.

When free to do so, my mother turned to thoughts of lines to sketch,
colors to coordinate, meals to prepare, and always, the elegant work of
her favorite singer, Jose Carreras. At one point, she lost sixty pounds
by walking four hours a day and dieting. She found the energy to keep
going during those otherwise drab hours of plodding along by listening to
Carreras on headphones. On returning from her walks, she often played a
single word or phrase from a recording for me, expressing some detail of
how beautiful the sounds were. In addition to listening while walking, she
also deprived herself of listening to Carreras while dining so that her
aesthetic desires could help her stand against her physical appetite.

My mother committed to this health regimen after her mother developed a
heart problem. My mother thought of her fear of losing her own mother and
wanted to be around for me for many years. She never hesitated to feel and
reflect in such a way as to bring about godly change in her own life.

Thank you, Mom.


My father was an orator. He had many gifts as a pastor – compassion,
commitment, and “no ulterior bone in his body” as my mother once put it.
But his passion was preaching.

He was focused on scripture and interpreting it “with the spirit and with
understanding.” He could see life-giving words in many passages that
others could not see, and he proclaimed those words with an urgency and
earnestness that matched both their gravity and joy. His great theme was
God’s love, and on that theme, he was unwavering.

Not only was he a great communicator in the pulpit, but his heart and
delivery matched the meaning of his message in every context in which he
spoke. He was loving with little children, fun with family, humble in
apologizing, and thoroughly honest in dying.

We need many more like him.



The gifts my parents gave me were very great. I pray that each one of you
can see the riches of personality and wisdom with which you have been
blessed through families and mentors, especially while those people are
still in this world with us.



Thanks to these thoughts on my own parents, I have started to see Mary and
Joseph differently this season.


The outstanding detail of Mary’s personality that I always remember being
explicitly stated in scripture is that she pondered things in her heart.
There is a warmth and sweetness about that, and I’ve always recognized it.
But might not this pondering go beyond the preciousness we sometimes
assign to it? Might not Mary have been a true contemplative?

Mary pondered things in her heart. She stayed connected with her
experiences and kept them growing within her. She was mental and
emotional. She felt and thought her way down paths where more light was
shed because she committed her effort to the most important things of
life. She could burst forth in inspired song because she dwelt in the
place of inspiration.


To me, Joseph’s behavior seems to have been that of a visionary. That is,
he was able to see, articulate, and pursue new ways of being. He was
willing to take the radical step of taking Mary as his wife and accepting
her child as a miracle. And when the time came to leave familiar land and
culture behind, he did not hesitate to take his family to Egypt.


And all of Mary’s contemplations and Joseph’s visions were tuned to God’s
purposes by their trust in the Holy Spirit.



As 2011 dawns, and as we are each poised in a moment in which our energies
might be gathered for moves in new directions, I want to suggest a
Christmas vision for our lives as artists that proceeds from these
thoughts.


As performers, I think we all need to be contemplatives AND visionaries. I
believe we already are. Maybe these words will help us to articulate our
nature and the nature of our work more consciously.


Surely we are contemplatives. We study scores, recordings, performances,
acoustics, audience responses, and even our selves. Particularly our
selves!
But we do not always recognize the holiness of these studies.

The actual moments of performance are rather brief. The musician’s life is
really about these studies, about practicing, about developing engagement
with pieces of music through an ever-growing relationship with them in the
practice room and the rehearsal hall as well as in quiet and informal
moments in which we find ourselves daydreaming about the unique character
of some melody that has become intertwined with who we are.

We need all of this contemplative activity because it opens us to
inspiration as well as to more nuanced thought and feeling. And we need
all the other more traditional contemplative activities for the same
reasons and for the health of our hearts – quiet things like prayer we
share only with God and looking for life-giving words on the pages of
scripture as well as more jubilant things like sharing in the diversity of
worship with a community of believers.


We must also be visionaries. I believe that any time we perform music, we
proclaim and model an eternally fresh and better way - a way in which
human emotion and the desire for order come together to create beauty, not
chaos; a way in which each part finds its true purpose functioning within
the whole; a way in which conflicts are resolved without destruction; a
way in which we all journey together and live up to the creative image of
God.

But to most actively engage in this proclamation, we need to believe in
our purpose and respond to it with our whole lives. We cannot play
beautifully but behave badly and expect God’s message to make it through
with clarity. Performer and listener alike need to be intentional about
integrating the sublime new way of the music into our living. Time and
again I feel that the gifts of art are squandered if we do not condition
ourselves to leave the concert hall in a spirit of prayer and goodwill
towards all people.

Another word I need to hear regarding being a visionary is that I must
communicate well. While it is not good to manipulate with emotion, it is
good to feel and to match one’s energy to that of the music at hand. While
I should not forget that there is an audience with me with whom I am
speaking though music, I should be honest about myself and my involvement
with music.

At the end of all my experiments with faith and music and all my
ruminations, after the occasional performance in which I feel that this
has truly been as it should be, I see that the only thing that will ever
be good enough is for me to be myself. Clear communication requires that.
Healing connection requires that. Love requires that.



This raises a question to which I think we probably need to return
throughout our lives – Who am I?


My intuition is that we are each probably more and less than we think we are.

Who we really are is definitely going to be good enough. All the voices
that say otherwise are not us.

At the same time, all the pushing we do and that we convince ourselves is
part of our personalities is not us either. In many ways, finding who we
are is a matter of removing notes that don’t belong in the music of our
lives.


Lately, I have had a fresh feeling about many passages of scripture with
which I have been familiar for a long time. As I thought about my
identity, it occurred to me that the words of scripture that exhort us to
do things might tell us things that children of God would be good at,
things that might just show us who we are.

For instance, “Be not conformed . . . but be ye TRANSFORMED . . .” I do
not do well when I push myself into molds, and others do not do well when
I seek to make them conform. But I can be transformed by what goes on in
my mind.

Or “LOVE the Lord your God . . .” I may struggle with how to behave, but
I might live better by seeing my whole life as an expression of love to
the Lord.

Many other words ring out as I quickly survey the parts of passages that
are in my mind – “COMMIT,” “REST,” “BEAR,”“GIVE,” “REJOICE,” “SING.”




In conclusion,

may we come to our work this year from the grounded-ness of contemplation.


May we communicate simply as the visionaries we were designed to be.

And may we learn how to do it all through the guidance of the Holy Spirit.



Then, maybe we, too, can bring something heavenly into the world.

Psalm Devotion: Psalm 137 and "I Love Thy Kingdom, Lord"

Psalm Devotion
May 13, 2020

I hope this evening finds you very well. I'm doing okay myself and am appreciating the shift into the summer schedule that we teachers enjoy and need!

I am also appreciating this weekly check-in and reminder of our community of folks who have studied the Book of Psalms together sharing some specifics of our own journeys along the way. I am reminded of our discussion of what psalmists do which is to process the human condition in the presence of God. May we all always be psalmists in that sense, and may this check-in be a reminder of that vital orientation.

Tonight's psalm-paraphrase selection is another familiar hymn, "I Love Thy Kingdom, Lord" and, even more than some of the looser paraphrases we've studied, it takes a tiny bit of a psalm and a general idea of that psalm as a launch pad for making what might be considered a completely different point.

The author, Timothy Dwight, was the grandson of the very famous Jonathan Edwards. He was engaged in emphasizing that the natural expression of the faith of the regenerated believer took place in the church. And his hymn, "I Love Thy Kingdom, Lord" extols the wonders of that institution and that faith expression. For comparison, Psalm 137 speaks of joyless Israel in Babylon, cut off from Jerusalem, the location of her true worship.

One specific bit of psalm language seems to have captivated Dwight and shows through in a portion of his text, all of which I have copied below:

"If I forget you, Jerusalem, may my right hand forget its skill.
May my tongue cling to the roof of my mouth if I do not remember you,
if I do not consider Jerusalem my highest joy."
Psalm 137:5-6

I love Thy kingdom, Lord,
The house of Thine abode,
The Church our blessed Redeemer saved
With His own precious blood.

I love Thy Church, O God!
Her walls before Thee stand
Dear as the apple of Thine eye,
And graven on Thy hand.

If e’er to bless Thy sons
My voice or hands deny,
These hands let useful skills forsake,
This voice in silence die.

Should I with scoffers join
Her altars to abuse?
No! Better far my tongue were dumb,
My hand its skill should lose.

For her my tears shall fall
For her my prayers ascend,
To her my cares and toils be given
Till toils and cares shall end.

Beyond my highest joy
I prize her heavenly ways,
Her sweet communion, solemn vows,
Her hymns of love and praise.

Jesus, Thou Friend divine,
Our Savior and our King,
Thy hand from every snare and foe
Shall great deliverance bring.

Sure as Thy truth shall last,
To Zion shall be given
The brightest glories earth can yield
And brighter bliss of Heaven.

Psalm Devotion: Psalm 72 and "Jesus Shall Reign"

Psalm Devotion
May 6, 2020

I hope this breezy evening finds you well and peaceful. I am feeling more okay than sometimes and am glad we get to share a little psalm time tonight.

As always, I invite you to pause and breathe and take stock of where you are emotionally and spiritually. Perhaps something is weighing on you that you had not noticed. Or maybe someone else's concerns have been drawing your focus. Now is a good time to become aware, to acknowledge, and direct ourselves to the Divine however God is present.

We return to the work of Isaac Watts for this evening's psalm-paraphrase hymn. You will recall that Watts applied the ideas of psalms much more flexibly than some of the earlier writers who translated psalms into metrical poems in English, and he also brought a strong Christological perspective to his paraphrasing. This is seen immediately and powerfully with the first word of his text, "Jesus," claiming that he is the true king of Psalm 72.

Along these same lines, Watts eliminates the Psalm's references to Sheba, Seba, Tarshish, and Lebanon. (In Watts's original text, he actually replaced those references with Europe and Persia and India, all areas that were bringing a sort of tribute to England's King George and through which some spirit of Christianity was expanding.)

For your meditation, I am copying the text below as it appears in our hymnal with the psalm references associated with each stanza. In comparing them myself, I was especially moved by the way Watts gives the psalm text greater specificity that I think could suggest some of his concerns about the time in which he was living. As you will see, the needy and weak and oppressed of the psalm become infants and prisoners and the weary in his vision of the struggles of the world.

Psalm 72:5,8,17

Jesus shall reign where'er the sun
does its successive journeys run,
his kingdom stretch from shore to shore,
till moons shall wax and wane no more.

Psalm 72:15


To him shall endless prayer be made,
and praises throng to crown his head.
His name like sweet perfume shall rise
with every morning sacrifice.

Psalm 72:10-11


People and realms of every tongue
dwell on his love with sweetest song,
and infant voices shall proclaim
their early blessings on his name.

Psalm 72:12-14


Blessings abound where'er he reigns:
the prisoners leap to lose their chains,
the weary find eternal rest,
and all who suffer want are blest.

Psalm 72:19


Let every creature rise and bring
the highest honors to our King,
angels descend with songs again,
and earth repeat the loud amen.

Psalm Devotion: Psalm 84 and "How Lovely Is Thy Dwelling Place"

Psalm Devotion
April 29, 2020

Hello, All, and welcome.

It's Wednesday already again, again. Time for a midweek breath and a thought of each other.

Our psalm-paraphrase hymn selection for this week is "How Lovely Is Thy Dwelling Place" which is on page 517 of our hymnal.

If you compare the text, which I will copy below, with Psalm 84 in the King James Version, you will find a number of differences which the author of the paraphrase introduces to enhance our meditation.  I am placing some of those key words in bold print and underlining them so their specific meanings might sink in with us tonight.

How lovely is thy dwelling place, O Lord of hosts, to me!
My thirsty soul desires and longs within thy courts to be.
My very heart and flesh cry out, O living God, for thee.

Beside thine altars, gracious Lord, the swallows find a nest.
How happy they who dwell with thee and praise thee without rest.
And happy those whose hearts are set upon the pilgrim's quest.

Is it not the case that one of our deepest experiences is that of a thirsty soul?

And the author shifts the psalm's references to God from third person to second person. How much better it is to talk to God than about God!

Again, the hymn author restates the psalmist's idea of blessedness with the word "happy." That connotes gladness to me and a particularly enlivening sort of blessing.

Finally, there is the reference to the pilgrim's quest which seems to me often to be that which quenches the deep thirst of the soul. We travel from God, with God, and to God.

May you find peace with the Spirit within as you contemplate this hymn and its psalm inspiration.

Psalm Devotion: Psalm 103 and "Praise to the Lord, the Almighty"

Psalm Devotion

April 22, 2020

Another week has gone by and it's Wednesday night again.

I'm having a hard time feeling settled and am sometimes not feeling peace from the sources I normally do, at least not to the usual degree. So that's my confession tonight, and perhaps some of you identify with it.

I'll take a moment now for a breath and to recall that I am a soul and so are you. And I'm also a body living in this world where we are susceptible to the things we fear and to the things we wish were just different. 

Now, may we take a moment to lift each other up because we share that same human condition.

Our hymn tonight is "Praise to the Lord, the Almighty" which was inspired by the opening lines of Psalm 103 and has the overall theme of all creation praising as is expressed in Psalm 150. 

This hymn is probably the loosest paraphrase of a psalm that we've studied, and it has almost entered some other category. Not so much a creative restatement of any one psalm, it is more an exploration of key ideas in those two psalms along with hints of Psalms 17 and 26.

Those key ideas are speaking to me tonight. The Lord is the strength of my soul (Psalm 103), and he is the King praised by his Creation (Psalm 150). We're part of that, so not only are we not alone in our human condition but we are members of his praising Creation. 

I'll include words from both psalms and two verses of the hymn below for your meditation. I'm hoping we can all feel grounded in this whole world of God's making now that the sun has set on this Earth Day. 

Psalm 103 excerpt

1 Praise the Lord, my soul;
all my inmost being, praise his holy name.
2 Praise the Lord, my soul,
and forget not all his benefits—
3 who forgives all your sins
and heals all your diseases,
4 who redeems your life from the pit
and crowns you with love and compassion,
5 who satisfies your desires with good things
so that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.

Psalm 150 excerpt

1 Praise the Lord.
Praise God in his sanctuary;
praise him in his mighty heavens.
2 Praise him for his acts of power;
praise him for his surpassing greatness.
. . .
6 Let everything that has breath praise the Lord.
Praise the Lord.

"Praise to the Lord, the Almighty" verses 1 and 4

Praise to the Lord, the Almighty, the King of creation!
O my soul, praise him, for he is your health and salvation!
Come, all who hear; now to his temple draw near,
join me in glad adoration.

Praise to the Lord! O let all that is in me adore him!
All that has life and breath, come now with praises before him.
Let the Amen sound from his people again;
gladly forever adore him.

Psalm Devotion: Psalm 91 and "On Eagle's Wings"

Psalm Devotion
April 15, 2020

Good evening, Everyone.

My plan has been to keep being in touch on Wednesdays until in-person classes start back up. I'm not sure how far off that might be or whether or not many of us will feel comfortable gathering even then. But for now, we can keep being present to one another in this way.

I've been thinking of our practice of gathering our selves, opening both to what is within us individually as well as to what is in each other. No doubt we are full in these times, and maybe also empty as we have never faced anything quite like these days before.

I have extended that practice to my music time here at home and am playing through something of Bach each morning as "a benediction on the house" as the great cellist Casals would say. I find purely instrumental Bach to be so rich that it seems always to resonate with my feelings, whatever they are. So I am gathering and processing myself each morning with a little Bach.

I would imagine most of us have some similar practice near the beginning of the day, some way of clearing and rising and orienting. Perhaps it's a matter of consciousness about breathing, or a ritual of morning coffee. Maybe the first words with a spouse or a friend. Or maybe sacred moments of memory. Whatever the case, I encourage us all to take a little time for our selves while we are alone so much.

And now about psalms.

I looked back over the famous psalm paraphrases we've been considering and was appreciating what cornerstones of the hymn repertoire they are:

"O God Our Help in Ages Past"

"Joy to the World"

"A Mighty Fortress"

Today I'd like to share another that has become so well known in many Christian communities, and I imagine many of us have encountered it although I don't know that I've heard it at All Saints'. But its composer has been to All Saints'! A few years back, Father Michael Joncas presented an Epiphany lessons and carols at our church. Kathy and I hosted him for the day and learned what a lovely, delightful, and kind human he is. So it's a pleasure to share his work.

He wrote "On Eagle's Wings" in response to the death of a friend's father through a sudden heart attack. He wanted to give his friend something prayerful and comforting. It was sung first at the wake and has since become an anthem of hope in times of grief from services following the Oklahoma City bombing to the funeral of Luciano Pavarotti.

If you don't know the song, I'd recommend the video below for a sense of its uplifting blessing.
Father Joncas is deeply concerned to express scripture through his music and has been involved in creating music to follow the Lectionary readings for years. In "On Eagle's Wings" Joncas based his refrain on the famous words of faith at the end of Isaiah 40:

"... those who hope in the Lord
will renew their strength.
They will soar on wings like eagles;
they will run and not grow weary,
they will walk and not be faint."

And the verses very closely follow all these words from Psalm 91 which I encourage you to read as you listen to the song. Interestingly, he omits verse 6 of the psalm which references pestilence and plague. But what he includes from verse 7 is the assurance that such fearful things will not come near us. I've crafted a blessing for us using verse 7 and Joncas's refrain which you can find at the very bottom of this message below the video.

1 Whoever dwells in the shelter of the Most High
will rest in the shadow of the Almighty.
2 I will say of the Lord, “He is my refuge and my fortress,
my God, in whom I trust.”
3 Surely he will save you
from the fowler’s snare
and from the deadly pestilence.
4 He will cover you with his feathers,
and under his wings you will find refuge;
his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart.
5 You will not fear the terror of night,
nor the arrow that flies by day,
 ...
7 A thousand may fall at your side,
ten thousand at your right hand,
but it will not come near you.
...
11 For he will command his angels concerning you
to guard you in all your ways;
12 they will lift you up in their hands,
so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.





Though pestilence stalks in the darkness,
May we be borne on the breath of dawn.
Though plague destroys at midday,
May we shine like the sun.
Let us make the Most High our dwelling
And be held in the palm of God's hand.

Psalm Devotion: Psalm 22

Psalm Devotion
April 9, 2020

Hello All!

I am sorry I wasn't in touch last night but I trust you are all availing yourselves of the various spiritually nurturing on-line opportunities All Saints' is providing during this Holy Week.

Once again I am reminded as I write of the importance of slowing down, taking a breath, and remembering I have a soul. I'm more than meets the eye and so are you!

So I invite you to take a few moments now to consider your concerns.

And then to consider what might be your deeper concerns.

And then maybe even concerns beyond those.

And then to recall each other and how we all have layer upon layer of concern during this time.

That might not be so comforting, but I think it's grounding and reminds us we are in this together regardless of how isolated we might feel.

And that brings me to a psalm.

One psalm stands out in stark relief as we approach the passion of Jesus, and that is Psalm 22.

On the cross, he says, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" Taken out of context, those might be disturbing words. But the context is a setting and a gospel steeped in knowledge of the Jewish scriptures. Those words about being forsaken are a way of bringing to mind Psalm 22 for Jesus' hearers at the cross, the original readers of Matthew, and also us.

I encourage you to read through that psalm several times these days, and as you do, remember Bonhoeffer's thesis that Jesus is THE ONE who can fully pray these psalms. Note that the psalm begins with an outcry of isolation from the very source of being but works its way through honest acknowledgements of suffering to a place of faith, exhortation, and even hope for the future.

May these be meaningful days of spiritual light wherever you find yourself.

Psalm Devotion: Psalm 46 and "A Mighty Fortress Is Our God"

Psalm Devotion
April 1, 2020

I miss our gatherings more each week but plan to continue sending some words every Wednesday until we can meet again.

As always, I invite you to spend a few moments now as you are reading to pause, to see how you yourself are doing, and to welcome your own soul. You might discover you're breathing a little better after you do so.

And then, think of your fellow pilgrims from our class.

Their joys.

Their fears.

Their memories.

Their struggles.

It is my prayer that the Spirit bind us together and deepen our worship in fresh ways as we face whatever the future is.

Tonight's psalm-paraphrase hymn is another that is very well known to us, Martin Luther's "A Mighty Fortress Is Our God." It is a paraphrase of Psalm 46, and I encourage you to read over the psalm which I have copied below before looking at the hymn text again.

Much like Isaac Watts in "Joy to the World," Luther brings the Christ to the foreground in his adaptation. (I just realized the whole Trinity makes an appearance with the first verse beginning with God, the middle verses focusing on Jesus, and the last verse referencing the Spirit.) In addition, Luther paints quite a strong picture of Satan. Neither Jesus nor Satan makes an appearance in the psalm itself.

And that brings me to what feels important on this particular evening: Luther's contrast of the Christ and Satan. His hymn tells us Satan is very strong, is armed with hate, and is bent on our destruction. But it goes on to say the name of Jesus is stronger and the Lord of Hosts can do nothing but win the battle. I need to hear this as we face this virus. Corona's way of working is cruel and it preys on the most vulnerable. It can only be from Satan.  But God is always stronger.

May peace find you as evening falls.

Psalm 46, New International Version
1 God is our refuge and strength,
an ever-present help in trouble.
2 Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way
and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea,
3 though its waters roar and foam
and the mountains quake with their surging.
4 There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God,
the holy place where the Most High dwells.
5 God is within her, she will not fall;
God will help her at break of day.
6 Nations are in uproar, kingdoms fall;
he lifts his voice, the earth melts.
7 The Lord Almighty is with us;
the God of Jacob is our fortress.
8 Come and see what the Lord has done,
the desolations he has brought on the earth.
9 He makes wars cease
to the ends of the earth.
He breaks the bow and shatters the spear;
he burns the shield with fire.
10 He says, “Be still, and know that I am God;
I will be exalted among the nations,
I will be exalted in the earth.”
11 The Lord Almighty is with us;
the God of Jacob is our fortress.

Psalm Devotion: Psalm 98 and "Joy to the World"

Psalm devotion
March 25, 2020

Good evening, Everyone!

Tonight we continue our meditations on hymns that are paraphrases of psalms.

But first, I invite us all to gather our selves as we read this email. I’ll confess to concerns about all that is happening in our world and also to a sense of denial about the coming of this virus to our own nation.

I am thinking of the anxieties that we must all be feeling. And I offer my prayer that those who have power to make a difference might be moved to cooperate well so as to save lives.

I am pausing for a few moments of silence now and I invite you to do the same.

Amen.

Our meditation this evening focuses on another extremely familiar psalm paraphrase: “Joy to the World!” by Isaac Watts.

You might like to read over the portion of the psalm the carol is based on to notice the similar themes.

“Make a joyful noise unto the Lord, all the earth: make a loud noise, and rejoice, and sing praise. Sing unto the Lord with the harp; with the harp, and the voice of a psalm. With trumpets and sound of cornet make a joyful noise before the Lord, the King. Let the sea roar, and the fullness thereof; the world, and they that dwell therein. Let the floods clap their hands: let the hills be joyful together. Before the Lord; for he cometh to judge the earth: with righteousness shall he judge the world, and the people with equity.” Psalm 98:4-9

As is typical of Watts, the psalm text is presented as finding its fulfillment in the coming of Jesus.
Musically, the tune to which we sing this text is an amalgam of motifs from Handel’s Messiah put together by Lowell Mason. Mason was an important figure in 19th century Boston who contributed a great deal both to church music and music education. He advocated for the music of the European masters, and in this carol, it seems that he is referencing both the chorus “Lift Up Your Heads” and the tenor solo “Comfort Ye.”

A final devotional thought inspired by this carol - Watts envisions not just the coming of the baby Jesus in the past but also the Jesus who will come in the future to set the world aright. Perhaps we can hear in this psalm paraphrase a plea for a fresh presence of Jesus at every level throughout our world in the days and months ahead.

Yours truly,

Psalm Devotion: Psalm 90 and "O God, Our Help in Ages Past"

I have been teaching a course this spring at All Saints' on the Book of Psalms. These last few weeks, we have not been able to meet in person but I have continued to connect with participants in the study through weekly email devotions about hymns that are paraphrases of psalms. I plan to share the first few of those here the next several evenings and future ones as they are written.

Psalm Devotion
March 20, 2020

Hello!

I will miss us meeting together these next few Wednesday nights but I plan to send a little psalm-based devotion each of these Wednesdays to continue our journey together though we are
apart.

I invite you first to think of our practice of gathering our selves together. From our meetings so far, we know something of each others' struggles and joys. Please take a breath and a moment to remember those.

Now I suggest we all consider both our own anxieties and activities this very day and to lift each other as we pass through this time.

My prayer: May we know we are not alone but be heartened by the blessings of fellowship we have known and the presence of the Christ wherever we are right now.

According to our schedule, this evening's study deals with All Saints' Psalms, and by that I was referencing hymns we frequently sing that are actually paraphrases of specific psalms. With that in mind, I would like to direct our attention to one of the best-known psalm-based hymns, "O God, Our Help in Ages Past."

Isaac Watts was a master of paraphrasing and incorporating wide-ranging biblical language and references in his spiritually strengthening texts.

A great many hymns from earlier times originally had many more verses than what we find in our modern hymnals. You might find it to be edifying to read the complete text Watts wrote which you can find at this link: https://www.poetryfoundation.o...

It seems to me that the less well-known verses emphasize the passing and precarious nature of our lives which I think is very much on our minds now. Watts comforts us by closing the circle in that last verse and asserting again that God has been our help, will be our hope, and is our eternal home.

A number of these verses are rooted in the first five verses of Psalm 90. I encourage you to read the hymn and the psalm side by side and ponder which verses connect and note how Watts states those biblical expressions.

Goodnight, All.