"The First Elegy" by Einojuhani Rautavaara

The last work of the first half for Leap of Faith is Die Erste Elegie by Finnish composer Einojuhani Rautavaara. While Einojuhani Rautavaara may not be as familiar a name as other contemporary choral composers such as Eric Whitacre, Bob Chilcott or Morten Lauridsen, he is well known In choral circles. Rautavaara's Die Erste Elegie is based on the poetry of Rainer Maria Rilke (1875-1926), a Bohemian-Austrian, who the Poetry Foundation regards as 'one of the most lyrically intense German-language poets'. Make sure you reserve your tickets to hear Luminous Voices tackle this gorgeous work!

Einojuhani Rautavaara
(1928-2016)

About Einojuhani Rautavaara

Einojuhani Rautavaara was born in Helsinki in 1928. His father was an opera singer and cantor, and his mother was a doctor. Both of his parents died before he reached his 16th birthday, and he went to live with his aunt in a Helsinki suburb.

Rautavaara studied at the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki under Aarre Merikanto from 1948 to 1952. He first came to international attention when he won the Thor Johnson Contest for his composition A Requiem in Our Time in 1954; the work prompted Jean Sibelius to recommend him for a scholarship to study at the Juilliard School in New York City. At Juilliard, he was taught by Vincent Persichetti, and he also took lessons from Roger Sessions and Aaron Copland at Tanglewood. He graduated from the Sibelius Academy in 1957.

Rautavaara composed prolifically. His compositional output includes eight symphonies, 14 concertos, sonata for various instruments, string quartets and other chamber music, biographical operas, and numerous choral works. He wrote in a variety of forms of styles. Many of his works reflect his fascination with metaphysical and religious subjects and texts, including his Die Erste Elegie.

Rainer Maria Rilke
(1875-1926)

Rautavaara on Die Erste Elegie

Program notes translated into English by Andrew Bentley

My youthful encounter with the poetry of Rainer Maria Rilke turned out to be quite a discovery, not only in literary terms but also for the development of my world view. I still associate it strongly with the mysticism surrounding the ruins of post-war Vienna. It was there that I composed my Fünf Sonette an Orpheus, and two years later in Cologne I started writing the song cycle Die Liebenden to Rilke's texts. From that time onwards, I continued to carry with me - both mentally and in my suitcase - the Duino Elegies, Rilke's seminal work. Over the years I would take it out, finding myself particularly drawn to the first elegy, whose angel figure took on the role of a personal 'animus'. My orchestral works Angels and Visitations, Angel of Dusk and Playgrounds for Angels are all musical personifications of this figure.

Only as recently as 1993, however, when the international choral body 'Europa Cantat' wanted to commission a large-scale choral work from me, did I feel that the time had come to set of angel elegy. It had evidently matured in my subconscious in the interim, since the process of composing the work was swift, eager and fluently self-assured. The basic pitch material is derived from four triads which together form a twelve-note row. The way this material is applied, however, stands in considerable contrast to methods usually used for atonal music. In consequence, the tone of the work is mellow even at its most dramatic; poetic, yet expressive.

An Analysis by Timothy Shantz

How would you describe the compositional language of Einojuhani Rautavaara? What makes his Die Erste Elegie so interesting to program in a concert?

Timothy Shantz: Rautavaara's music is full of mysticism. He really knows how to write for the voice. His love of Rilke poems reveals his own existential questions.

The musical style of Die Erste Elegie sits somewhere between late Romanticism and the Serialism of Schoenberg. The music will be heard in a tonal way with plenty of pedal notes to provide harmonic context. Having sung this work many times I can say that the dramatic ascent of the final pages is unforgettable for both performer and audience!

The ingenuity of Leonardo da Vinci

Another of the works on our Leap of Faith program is Leonardo Dreams of His Flying Machine by Eric Whitacre. But rather than focus on Whitacre, we thought we'd look a little bit into da Vinci himself. To hear Luminous Voices sing this fantastic work by Whitacre, be sure to arrange your tickets to Leap of Faith today!

Leonardo da Vinci
(1452-1519)

"The" Renaissance Man

Born in 1452 to a couple out of wedlock, Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci would be regarded by historians and scholars as the prime exemplar of the so-called "Renaissance Man", an individual of "unquenchable curiosity" and "feverishly inventive imagination". He is widely considered one of the most diversely talented individuals ever to have lived. His body of work includes the fields of invention, architecture, science, music, mathematics, engineering, anatomy, geology, botany, writing, history, and cartography. Of course, he is also widely considered one of the greatest painters of all time.

Leonardo lived a full life, dying at the age of 67 in France.

A "Divine" Painter

By the 1490s, da Vinci had been heralded as a "Divine" painter. His technique is characterized by the following unique attributes:

• how he laid on the paint
• his detailed knowledge of anatomy, light, botany and geology
• the way humans register emotion in expression and gesture
• his use of subtle gradation of tone

Leonardo's paintings are among the most celebrated in history, including his Virgin of the Rocks (1483-86), The Last Supper (1495-98), and La Gioconda, also known as the Mona Lisa.

Anatomy and physiology

One of Leonardo's teachers, Andrea del Verrocchio, demanded his students develop a deep understanding and appreciation for human anatomy. As a successful artist, Leonardo was given permission to dissect human corpses hospitals in Florence, Milan, and Roman, which helped his understanding for this field of study.

Leonardo made more than 240 detailed drawings and wrote about 13,000 words towards a treatise on anatomy. His anatomical drawings include many studies of the human skeleton and its parts, and of muscles and sinews. He drew the heart and vascular system, the sex organs and other internal organs, making one of the first scientific drawings of a fetus in utero.

Leonardo also studied and drew the anatomy of many animals, dissecting cows, birds, monkeys, bears, and frogs, and comparing in his drawings their anatomical structure with that of humans. He also made a number of studies of horses. For much of his life, he was fascinated by the phenomenon of flight; he produced many studies on the subject, including Codex on the Flight of Birds (c. 1505), which begins by examining the flight behaviour of birds, and proposes mechanisms for flight by machines.

Engineer and Inventor

During his lifetime, Leonardo was valued as an engineer. When he fled to Venice in 1499, he worked as an engineer and devised a system of moveable barricades to protect the city from attack. He also had a scheme for diverting the flow of the Arno river. Leonardo's journals include a vast number of inventions, including a mechanical knight, hydraulic pumps, reversible crank mechanisms, finned mortar shells, and a steam cannon. He even had plans for several flying machines such as a flapping ornithopter and a machine with a helical rotor.

Of course, Leonardo also invented musical instruments, including the viola organista. It uses a friction belt to vibrate individual strings (similar to how a violin produces sounds), with the strings selected by pressing keys on a keyboard (similar to an organ). However, no extant instrument constructed directly from Leonardo's incomplete designs is known. In fact, many of Leonardo's ideas were well ahead of their time. During his lifetime, relatively few of his designs were feasible, let alone constructed, because the modern scientific approaches to metallurgy and engineering were only in their infancy during the Renaissance.

Eric Whitacre on Leonardo Dreams of His Flying Machine

(Source: EricWhitacre.com)

Eric Whitacre
(b. 1970)

Charles Anthony Silvestri is not only a brilliant poet, teacher and historian, he is a consummate choral singer blessed with a beautiful tenor voice. When Dr. Gene Brooks called and asked me to write the 2001 Raymond C. Brock Commission, I could think of no other author whose words I would rather set.

We started with a simple concept: what would it sound like if Leonardo Da Vinci were dreaming? And more specifically, what kind of music would fill the mind of such a genius? The drama would tell the story of Leonardo being tormented by the calling of the air, tortured to such degree that his only recourse was to solve the riddle and figure out how to fly.

We approached the piece as if we were writing an opera brève. Charles (Tony to his friends) would supply me with draft after draft of revised ‘libretti’, and I in turn would show him the musical fragments I had written. Tony would then begin to mold the texts into beautiful phrases and gestures as if he were a Renaissance poet, and I constantly refined my music to match the ancient, elegant style of his words. I think in the end we achieved a fascinating balance, an exotic hybrid of old and new.

Watch composer Eric Whitacre conduct the VocalEssence Ensemble Singers in a performance of Leonardo Dreams of His Flying Machine on March 22, 2009 in Minneapolis, USA.

Brahms' Five Songs Op 104

Johannes Brahms
(1833-1897)

Johannes Brahms composed his Fünf Gesänge Op 104 in 1888, as a 55-year old bachelor. At this age in his composing career, the themes for his music were reflective and nostalgic. For this five-song cycle for mixed chorus a cappella, Brahms chose texts that centre on lost youth, summer turning into fall and, ultimately, man's mortality. The sombre nature of the texts coupled with intense soaring melodies and complex harmonies make it quite a demanding work for any choir.

1. Nachtwache I (poetry by Friedrich Rückert)

The musical writing reflects the frail beatings of a heart awakened by the breath of love about which the text speaks. Listen for how the dynamics alter swiftly from the soft to the very strong, which emulate the actual breathing of the narrator who seeks an answer to his love.

Gentle sounds of the soul,
inspired by the breath of love,
blow tremblingly forth,
if you open an ear,
open a loving heart,
and if none opens to you,
let the night wind carry you sighing back to me.

Leise Töne der Brust,
geweckt vom Odem der Liebe,
Hauchet zitternd hinaus,
ob sich euch [öffn']1 ein Ohr,
Öffn' ein liebendes Herz,
und wenn sich keines euch öffnet, 
Trag' ein Nachtwind euch seufzend in meines zurück.
 

2. Nachtwache II (poetry by Friedrich Rückert)

Listen for a more confident and reassuring tone in the music as well as in the text. The repeated calls of "Ruhn sie?" in all six voices is an imitation of the horns of the night watchmen, telling their listeners to confidently put out their lamps and let themselves be enveloped by the peaceful night.

Are they resting? the horn of the watchman calls from the west,
and from the east the horn calls a reply:
they rest.
Do you hear, apprehensive heart,
the whispering voices of angels?
Extinguish the lamp confidently,
and cover yourself in peace.

Ruh'n sie? rufet das Horn des Wächters drüben aus Westen, 
Und aus Osten das Horn rufet entgegen:
Sie ruh'n!
Hörst du, zagendes Herz,
die flüsternden Stimmen der Engel? 
Lösche die Lampe getrost,
hülle in Frieden dich ein.

3. Letztes Glück (poetry by Max Kalbeck)

Winter is coming; dead leaves from the trees are falling on each other—a picture wonderfully recreated in the music with its swiftly changing chords. These are followed by long and sad melodies in all parts. The piece temporarily switches to the major mode as the narrator experiences a feeling of hope that spring will swiftly come again, but this is quickly crushed by the image of the "late wild rose". But what -- or who -- is the "late wild rose"?

Leaf upon leaf floats lifelessly,
quietly and sadly from the trees;
its hopes never satisfied,
the heart dwells in dreams of spring.

Yet a sunny glance still lingers
in the late-blooming rose bush,
like one last bit of happiness -
a sweet hopelessness.

Letztes Glück
Leblos gleitet Blatt um Blatt
Still und traurig von den Bäumen;
Seines Hoffens nimmer satt,
Lebt das Herz in Frühlingsträumen. 

Noch verweilt ein Sonnenblick
Bei den späten Hagerosen,
Wie bei einem letzten Glück,
Einem süßen, hoffnungslosen.

4. Verlorene Jugend (Slovak folksong, translated into German by Josef Wenzig)

This is the most lively and boisterous song in the series. Listen for how the song has two verses, both of which can be divided into a fast and slow part. Once more, the aging of man is contrasted with nature, particularly in the end.

The mountains all bluster,
the woods murmur all about,
my days of youth,
where have you so soon gone?

Youth, precious youth,
you have flown from me;
o lovely youth,
so heedless was my mind!

I lost you regrettably,
as when one takes a stone
and flings it away
into a stream.

Sometimes a stone can be reversed in its course and return from the deep flood -
but I know that youth
will never do the same thing.

Brausten alle Berge, 
Sauste rings der Wald, 
Meine jungen Tage, 
Wo sind sie so bald? 

Jugend, teure Jugend,
Flohest mir dahin;
O du holde Jugend,
Achtlos war mein Sinn! 

Ich verlor dich leider,
Wie wenn einen Stein
Jemand von sich schleudert
In die Flut hinein. 

Wendet sich der Stein auch
Um in tiefer Flut,
Weiss ich, dass die Jugend
Doch kein Gleiches tut.

5. Im Herbst (poetry by Klaus Groth)

This is where the mixed emotions of the previous songs come together to form an impressive climax to the song cycle. The parts are repeatedly intertwined and small intervals apart, which creates an image of the inevitability of man's own autumn that heralds death. Listen for the pitch and dynamic contrast for the third verse, and the quiet, meditative way Brahms ends the cycle.

Somber is the autumn,
and when the leaves fall,
so does the heart sink
into dreary woe.
Silent is the meadow
and to the south have flown
silently all the songbirds,
as if to the grave.

Pale is the day,
and wan clouds veil
the sun as they veil the heart.
Night comes early:
for all work comes to a halt
and existence itself rests in profound secrecy.

Man becomes kindly.
He sees the sun sinking,
he realizes that life is
like the end of a year.
His eye grows moist,
yet in the midst of his tears shines
streaming from the heart
a blissful effusion.

Ernst ist der Herbst. 
Und wenn die Blätter fallen,
sinkt auch das Herz
zu trübem Weh herab.
Still ist die Flur, 
und nach dem Süden wallen
die Sänger, stumm,
wie nach dem Grab.

Bleich ist der Tag,
und blasse Nebel schleiern
die Sonne wie die Herzen, ein.
Früh kommt die Nacht: 
denn alle Kräfte feiern, 
und tief verschlossen ruht das Sein.

Sanft wird der Mensch.
Er sieht die Sonne sinken,
er ahnt des Lebens
wie des Jahres Schluß.
Feucht wird das Aug',
doch in der Träne Blinken,
entströmt des Herzens
seligster Erguß.

Listen to the world-famous Monteverdi Choir, conducted by John Eliot Gardiner, perform this marvellous song cycle.

Artist Spotlight: Green Banana Flute Studios

Luminous Voices is excited to collaborate with Sara Hahn and Sarah Gieck -- also known as Green Banana Flute Studios -- when we take to the stage for Leap of Faith on Sunday 25 February! They will be showcased in the world premiere of Sea Dreams by Peter-Anthony Togni, which was commissioned by both Luminous Voices and Sara Hahn, with support from Paul Brown and the Canada Council for the Arts.

Sara Hahn & Sarah Gieck

Green Banana Flute Studios is a partnership of world class flutists who recognize the need for a new perspective in the music industry, and strive to provide classical music products, education and live performances that prioritize and promote well-being in the pursuit of musical excellence.

After around a decade of separate, successful professional music careers, Sara Hahn and Sarah Gieck decided to join forces to create a new approach to learning, teaching and performing music. Together they have created a thriving flute studio in Calgary, with plans to launch a wellness-based flute retreat, and chamber music festival this summer in Nanton, AB. See www.gbflutes.com for details.

Sara and Sarah have performed as a duo throughout Alberta, performing concerts with the University of Lethbridge, the Instrumental Society of Calgary, and in countless outreach concerts. They recently recorded Pathways by Efrain Amaya and Curmudgeon and Lark by Albertan composer Arthur Bachmann for Sara Hahn’s debut album, to be released in September of 2018.

Luminous Voices to premiere 'Sea Dreams' by Peter-Anthony Togni

The centrepiece of our next concert, Leap of Faith, is the WORLD PREMIERE of a work by Halifax-based composer Peter-Anthony Togni for two flutes and double mixed chorus. The ensemble will perform Sea Dreams, commissioned by Luminous Voices and Sara Hahn, with support from Paul Brown and the Canada Council for the Arts.

COMPOSER NOTES

Peter-Anthony Togni

My family and I have been living in Nova Scotia, Canada, for almost 20 years. From the back of our house we can see the Atlantic Ocean, cargo ships moving slowly and the Halifax Shipyard. I cross the Macdonald Bridge into the City of Halifax almost everyday, and everyday the ocean seems slightly different; even when it's still and looks like glass, it's never truly calm. The water is deep, dark, and commands respect!

Sea Dreams is a work that reflects my relationship to the ocean and my thoughts about a journey of faith, a journey full of questions, fears, longings, hopes, dreams, and the gifts of disappointment. One has to be open; in the words of the Buddhist meditation master Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche, to be open means 'giving up your demand .... learning to trust in the fact that you do not need to secure your ground, learning to trust is your fundamental richness.'

Much of my inspiration comes from T.S. Eliot's 'The Dry Salvages' from The Four Quartets. The central image is water and sea. Eliot suggests that if we just accept the idea of drifting on the ocean, we will end up broken upon the rocks. The water becomes a metaphor for life and how humans behave. One has to trust that the buoy or bell that seems to ring in the distance can often be closer than we think. The prayer to the Virgin Mary in the poem is there to help guide the metaphorical sailors to their harbours of safety.

I scored Sea Dreams for two mixed choirs and two flutes. Each choir represents a ship on the water; they pass in the night but are deeply connected because they are on the same sea, both looking to the stars, a beacon of light, or a bell for direction and safety. Each ship has a seagull following it; these gulls represent the passage of time, angels, flowing thoughts, emptiness, ghosts, hope, and the Holy Spirit.

There are times in the piece where there is a letting go, the music behind the music, whispered sounds, and chords that almost melt into themselves. One ceases to hear the text, almost sound for the sake of sound, a dream-like state that reminds us we can live with the sea but will never master it. Getting into a boat or on a ship is a kind of leap of faith: we can only pray and trust that the journey will be successful.

BIOGRAPHY

Peter-Anthony Togni is an award-winning composer, pianist, organist, conductor and former CBC broadcaster. He has toured internationally, performs currently as part of Blackwood, and his recordings are broadcast worldwide. Togni's Responsio, performed by Luminous Voices in May 2016, won the 2014 Nova Scotia Masterworks Arts Award. In 2016, Peter's opera Isis and Osiris premiered to critical acclaim in Toronto. Togni teaches at Acadia University and is the organist and choir master of the Principle Choir at St Benedict Parish in Halifax. For more information, visit www.petertogni.com.