May 21, 2012

Bringing A Biblical Tale to Life in Music: An Interview with Dr. Lawrence Herz, of the Boston Cecilia

March 8, 2011

 

 

The biblical tale of Jeptha has intrigued and disturbed readers, scholars and even composers, including Handel. In this interview, Dr. Lawrence Herz of the Boston Cecilian talks about some of the themes explored in this piece of music, and the different ways that audiences have experienced them.

 

 

NVR: For our readers who might not have heard of the Boston Cecilia, can you tell us a little about the history of this musical organization and what first inspired its creation?

 

Yes, I’d be pleased to. This group was born informally in 1874 as a choral adjunct to the Harvard Musical Association, and became an independent choral society in 1876. It was charmingly named The Cecilia, after the patron saint of music. It often performed with the Boston Symphony Orchestra, presenting Boston or American premieres of masterpieces such as Brahms’ Requiem and Stravinsky’s Symphony of Psalms. Since 1968, the group has been under the musical and artistic leadership of Donald Teeters, the first Boston choral conductor to champion historically informed performance, including period instruments for pre-19th c. works. In 1982, Teeters and the [renamed] The Boston Cecilia began a comprehensive survey of Handel’s major dramatic choral works, to critical and popular acclaim. The chorus are all amateur musicians – those who participate for love, not salary.

 

 

NVR: On Sunday, March 13th, the Boston Cecilia will present a performance of Handel’s Jephtha at Jordan Hall in Boston – can you tell us a little about what inspired the Cecilia to choose this piece to perform, and what those in the audience can expect to hear?

 

Since we performed this oratorio in 1995, our appreciation has grown. The audience will hear the indignation of Israel in the throes of rebellion against the Ammonites, the clash of battle, Jephtha’s shock thrust from triumph into grief, the agony of the people, and the grace of the (questionable) angelic deliverance. Oh, also musical depictions of flying angels, an infant sacrifice ceremony, and a storm on the shore. Handel was a master of emotional depiction. Teeters says Jephtha “moves from breathless melancholy through regret, to philosophical reflection and finally to a profound but unquiet acceptance.” Finally, when all is put right, Israel’s relationship with God is restored and reaffirmed musically. And of course, the music is at every stage sublime.

 

 

NVR: How does this particular work, by Handel, fit in with the rest of his compositions? Are there things about Jephtha that make it special or unique in some way?

Handel had studied opera in Italy, and had some success as an operatic composer. But in England, after an initial twenty or so years of operatic success, he found an increasingly popular medium in oratorio. Biblical stories were well-known and adaptable to both political needs and the popular passion for drama. He composed Jephtha when he was 66 years old and failing in health, especially vision. After the first section of the chorus “How dark, O Lord, are Thy decrees”, he scribbled on the score: “…Had to quit because of the deterioration of sight…” Jephtha was Handel’s last oratorio, in some ways his darkest and most mature. When Maestro Teeters contemplated his retirement, he chose Jephtha and next year’s St. Matthew Passion as the anchor-pieces for his last two years with the group. As a singer in the group, I asked if Teeters finds Handel’s dark insight sympathetic as he prepares to move on after 44 Cecilia seasons. He replied, “Not at all.” He says he’s retiring from Cecilia, not from music, and that both the institution and he will profit from new musical directions.

 

 

NVR: The story of Jeptha, which involves the killing of a daughter by her own father, is one of the Tanakh’s more disturbing narrative threads – is this something that has been discussed among the musicians and musical directors of the organization? Can you tell us a little about what inspired Handel to tackle such disturbing events and figures from the Tanakh?

Handel was not afraid of emotional tumult – as an operatic composer, he had become skilled at portraying varieties and depths of human passion while his contemporary, J.S. Bach, kept to pietistic emotions. The central tension of the piece is Jephtha’s dilemma after promising a sacrifice which turns out to require violating the Mosaiclaw. Teeters says, “Jephtha suffers the consequences of his attempt to bribe God, and there is no appeal of the verdict.” But Handel was not alone; in 1948, the scholar W.O. Cypherd found over 100 oratorios written about this particular moral crisis.

 

 

NVR: In the libretto for Handel’s work, the libretto (written by the Reverend Thomas Morell in 1554) some key changes have been made to the original (Jewish text) – namely, the daughter in the story escapes death – do you have any sense as to what the thinking behind these changes may have been? How do you think Handel intended his audiences to experience this piece of music? Do you think that he intended for both Christians and Jews to listen to this piece, or was he only thinking of his Christian audience?

 

By Handel’s time, biblical scholars were wondering about the traditional interpretation of this pledge: “whatever comes out of the doors of my house to meet me, when I return in peace from the people of Ammon, shall surely be the Lord's, and I will offer it up as a burnt offering". The italicized and may in fact have originally signified or, as in consecrated to the Lord if human, or a burnt offering if a goat. Whether Handel knew of the controversy or not, he was writing musical theater for a popular and religiously righteous public. He could summon sublime music and emotion, summon trauma and doubt, but the audience had to have a catharsis.

  

The position of Jews in London society was much discussed during Handel’s years there, including controversy over a naturalization law. He can hardly have been unaware of this, yet may not have had the Jewish religious vantage-point much in mind when presenting his oratorios (including The Messiah).

 

 

NVR: Can you tell us a little about your own background and how you first became involved with the organization? Are you a musician yourself?

 

When my grandmother was chastised by the local rabbi for her children’s indifferent schul attendance, she told him: “As for religion, they will have to make up their own minds. My religion is music.” Music is a huge part of my spirituality. I pray, experience awe, receive consolation, and place myself in existential context musically. All that without any instrument other than voice, Bose, and car radio. I’ve always been in exciting choral groups – for example, the Harvard Glee Club when Renaissance polyphony was its thing. Singing in The Boston Cecilia (for 30 years!) is like playing tennis on a ladder of one’s betters – it’s humbling and elevating.

 

 

NVR: Can you tell us a little about some of the other people involved with this performance? What other pieces will the Boston Cecilia be performing in the coming months?

 

This will be a star-studded event. The full baroque orchestra will be led by Concertmaster Daniel Stepner. At the keyboard will be the amazing Barbara Bruns, our accompanist. The soloists will include some very exciting performers in the emerging stages of their careers. They include tenor Aaron Sheehan, who sings the title role, and include soprano Teresa Wakim, mezzo Deborah Rentz-Moore, countertenor Martin Near and baritone Ron Williams, whose son, the already well known treble Ryan Moore, who sings the role of the Angel. He sang the role of the Angel also in The Boston Symphony’s performance of Mendelssohn’s Elijah earlier this season.

 

 

NVR: Is there anything else you would like to add?

 

Art in Boston is amazing. This concert exemplifies what is right about serious music here, and I’m proud to be involved. The performing arts aren’t doing very well in this economy, but they are essential to our culture. As Karl Paulnak (Director of the Music Division at New England Conservatory) said of the music composed in the Nazi death camps, “…in a place where people are only focused on survival, on the bare necessities, the obvious conclusion is that art must be, somehow, essential for life. The camps were without money, without hope, without commerce, without recreation, without basic respect, but they were not without art. Art is part of survival; art is part of the human spirit, an unquenchable expression of who we are. Art is one of the ways in which we say, ‘I am alive, and my life has meaning.’

 

 

Copyright the New Vilna Review 2011.