Tag: Hertford College Oxford

Campra Requiem

On By Gareth Gilbert-HughesIn LiturgyLeave a comment
Hertford College, Oxford: performance of Campra's Requiem
Hertford College, Oxford: performance of Campra’s Requiem

Last night, I had the great privilege of celebrating our annual requiem mass here at Hertford College Chapel, Oxford. The Chapel Choir, Soloists and Players, conducted by Senior Organ Scholar Ed Whitehead performed André Campra‘s Messe de Requiem. Listen to the recording below.

Because of it themes of death and mortality, risen life and immortality, many composers have set the liturgical texts of the requiem to music. The requiem takes its name from the first line that is sung in the service: Requiem æternam dona eis, Domine, ‘Give them eternal rest, Lord’. The second line is et lux perpetua luceat eis, ‘and let light perpetual shine upon them’, and Campra focuses on the repetition of luceat, ‘shine’, as his keyword for the entire work. These two lines begin the introit, or entrance antiphon, but are repeated at various points in the service.

André Campra (1660–1744) was variously maître de musique in Toulon, his home town of Aix, Arles, Toulouse, Montpellier, Notre Dame de Paris and the chapelle royale of Louis XV. He excelled in composing opéra-ballets, and this musical style influenced his sacred music, much to the ire of his ecclesiastical patrons.

Campra’s Requiem is scored for a baroque chamber orchestra, choir and at vocal trio consisting of haute-contre, tenor and bass. Its movements include the usual ‘ordinary of the mass’: the Kyrie, Sanctus and Agnus Dei. Alongside these staples, he set the four proper antiphons for a requiem mass: the Introit, Gradual, Offertory and Communion antiphons. Strikingly, Campra omitted music for the lengthy requiem sequence Dies Iræ, with its fire-and-brimstone vision of the day of judgement, which had come to be seen as pastorally inappropriate. Neither did he set an excerpt from it, such as Lacrimosa or Pie Jesu. Instead, Campra’s glorious Offertory antiphon — the Domine Jesu Christe — takes centre stage, with surging, uplifting music as the priest goes to the altar and prepares bread and wine.

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Passion Carols by Hertford College Chapel Choir

On By Gareth Gilbert-HughesIn ChristianityLeave a comment

Here at Hertford College, Oxford, we sing Passion Carols on the last Sunday of term before the Easter vacation (Sunday of 8th Week of Hilary term, in Oxford-speak). We call them ‘Passion Carols’ because we insist that ‘carols’ are more than ‘Christmas carols’, and that Lent and Passiontide have elicited much popular devotional music on the suffering and death of Jesus Christ. Below, you can listen to the five choral pieces sung at that service. During the last piece — the African-American Spiritual Were you there? — the clergy remove their white robes and strip the altar and sanctuary of all furnishings and decoration.

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Recording of Rachmaninoff Vespers by the Hertford College Chapel Choir

On By Gareth Gilbert-HughesIn Christianity1 Comment
baptism_icon
Icon of the Baptism of Christ in Hertford College Chapel, painted by Silvia Dimitrova-Potter.

The Hertford College Chapel Choir performed the sublime Vespers (Op. 37: Всенощное бдение All-night Vigil) by Sergei Vasilievich Rachmaninoff (1873–1943) to a packed chapel at a late-evening service on Tuesday 12 February 2013. Vespers was written in Moscow in 1915. It is considered to be some of his finest work, combing his musical genius with scholarly treatment of the chant traditions. It was conducted by our senior organ scholar, Edmund Whitehead.

Below is the live recording of five movements from the Vespers:

  1. Свете тихий Svete tikhiy (Φῶς ἱλαρόν Phōs hilaron),
  2. Ныне отпущаеши Nyne otpushchayeshi (Nunc dimittis),
  3. Богородице Дево Bogoroditse Devo (Ave Maria),
  4. Слава в вышних Богу Slava v vyshnikh Bogu (Matins responses),
  5. Благословен еси Blagosloven yesi (Resurrection troparion).

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Carols from Hertford College, Oxford

On By Gareth Gilbert-HughesIn Christianity, MusicLeave a comment

nine-lessonsking-carols

We have ended term in Hertford College, Oxford, with joyous song and a couple of carol services. We squeeze Advent and Christmas into the last week of term, even though it is still November. For your edification and jubilation, here is a sample recording of five modern carols performed by Hertford College Chapel Choir.

  1. Gardner Tomorrow shall be my dancing day
  2. Whitacre Lux aurumque
  3. Allain In the bleak mid-winter (world première)
  4. Sandström Det är en ros utsprungen
  5. Leighton Lully, lulla, thou little tiny child

 

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