In the Mood

At the time, In the Mood was something of a departure from our established pattern. In the past, we’d focussed largely on music from the Renaissance or performed music applicable to some anniversary or other, like Better Times for Armistice Day the year before. The programme had some Renaissance music (of course), but included music from other eras too – from composers born in the early 16th century to one or two born in the 1980s.

The Programme was divided into two halves, sacred and secular, with a short interval.

If Ye Love Me by Thomas Tallis is from the reign of Edward VI (one of the protestant Tudors). Tallis wrote at a time when the Christian landscape of England was shifting with each successive monarch. He found himself writing music in Latin, then English, then Latin again, then English again. Rejoice in the Lord alway, a setting of the fourth chapter of St. Paul’s letter to the Philippians, was used as an anthem at the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II. It is sometimes attributed to a contemporary of Tallis, John Redford, who died in 1547. However, the rhythms make it apparent that the words originally set were from the 1594 Prayer Book. From the same time period, Hans Leo Hassler's Dixit Maria sets a Latin verse from the narration of the Annunciation.

Skipping two centuries, the next pieces come from the Romantic period. Felix Mendelssohn spent much time in England and was friendly with Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. Zum Abendsegen (To the Evening Service), published in 1842 in both German and English, is a setting of the Responses to the Commandments from the Anglican Book of Common Prayer. Der Jäger is a setting of a German folk-poem focussing on Mary. It is part of the Marienlieder, a cycle of such songs with texts from Des Knaben Wunderhorn written by Johannes Brahms in about 1862.

Déodat de Séverac, a relatively unknown but talented composer, was a contemporary of Debussy, Fauré, and Ravel. He served in the First World War, and his duties and redeployments reduced his output to a handful of mostly insignificant works. After the War, he went back to composition, but he died at the relatively young age of 49 in 1921.  His Tantum Ergo was written within two years of the end of the War.

All My Trials, a spiritual from the Bahamas, speaks directly to the social inequality inherent in the society of the time. More commonly associated with the southern United States, spirituals arose amidst the diverse cultural influences of the slave plantations. Slave plantations also existed in the Caribbean Islands, though the emancipation of the slaves came somewhat earlier (in 1834).

A-J Bethke is someone who needs no introduction in Grahamstown | Makhanda. During his time as Director of Music at the Cathedral, he wrote three settings of the Magnificat and Nunc Dimittis for use in evensongs, two of which are well-known and widely performed. The Mag and Nunc in F, of which we sang the Magnificat in this performance, was written towards the end of his tenure at the Cathedral and has only ever been performed once before – by this group.

The second half begins with madrigals.

Madrigals frequently made use of sexual themes and innuendo, and Fair Phyllis by John Farmer, though cheeky, is actually very subtle and polite compared to some of the activities described in lurid detail in madrigals from Italy and France.

Dindirín is a villancico from the Cancionero de Palacio (the Palace Songbook), a collection of popular tunes made into courtly pieces for King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella. It tells the story of a young woman who goes out into a meadow one morning to send a nightingale (a ruiseñor) to her lover to tell him that she cannot see him anymore, as she is now married.

Pierre Passereau's Il est bel et bon, finds a group of women discussing their husbands. One says: ‘My husband is great: he does all the housework, he never beats me, he feeds the chickens, and leaves me to do whatever I want.’ In the background to this madrigal, we hear the clucking of chickens, or perhaps the women themselves.

The Russian U Vorot, Vorot (At the Father’s Gate) is typical folk song stuff: children playing games, people playing music underneath trees, and being told to get married. The melody was used by Tchaikovsky in his 1812 Overture, and the arrangement we use, by Alexander Katalsky, omits several verses. The ones at the end read: ‘Take an old woman, keep her atop the stove in the corner, feed her with custard and quench her thirst with milk; she shall be merry when eating custard, and milk shall make her young.’

Star of the County Down is a ballad set in County Down, Northern Ireland with words written in the late 19th century by Cathal McGarvey. A poet and songwriter, from County Donegal, McGarvey established a tobacconist and pub in Dublin in the 1890's. His reputation spread quickly, and soon, people were coming at night to hear him tell stories, smoke, and promote the Irish language. McGarvey’s literary capabilities, anti-British attitude and magnetic personality attracted a mix of a literary and pro-nationalist audience, and public functions including poetry readings and literary discussions, sometimes ended with early-morning Pro-Independence rallies. The melody is an old one that crops up all over England and Ireland in various folk-song settings and is used as a hymn tune under the title ‘Kingsfold’.

The last section of this programme features more recent music.

I Got Rhythm, written in its familiar form in 1930 by George Gershwin, with lyrics by Ira Gershwin, has become a jazz standard. It came from the musical Girl Crazy, which also included two other hit songs: Embraceable You and But Not for Me.

Glen Miller’s popular hit, In the Mood (an arrangement by Joe Garland based on an existing melody), sat atop the U.S. charts for 13 straight weeks in 1940, the year after its recording. Andy Razaf added lyrics. In 1999, National Public Radio included the 1939 Glenn Miller recording in its list of ‘The 100 most important American musical works of the 20th century’. We added our own twist to the arrangement, using Kazoos to accompany some versed toward the end, which came as a great surprise to an audience used to seeing much more serious performances from us.

Drums in the Night is much more recent. It was written by our bass, Ben, in 2012 for acoustic guitar, and subsequently arranged for the group by Glyn. It looks at the destructive nature of alcoholism and its effect on relationships. The chorus, in particular, explores the personal journey of dependence and how overwhelming it can be when those we love are suffering – the metaphor of ominous and relentless battle drums in the darkness – and how recovery is a constant fight against relapse.

At the end het ons ’n bietjie van ’n Kaapse draai gevat. Daar kom die Alibama is one of the most well-known Afrikaans folk songs and refers to a ship, the CSS Alabama, which was part of the Confederate States Navy during the American Civil War. The Alabama was a privateer attacking Union shipping that put into Cape Town to restock and drop off prisoners in 1863 and again in 1864 She apparently made enough of an impression for the song to have been written about the occasion. This arrangement includes snippets of other Afrikaans folk songs; Hou Djou Rokkies Bymekaar and Vanaand gaan die volkies koring sny.