BERNSTEIN: Chichester Psalms / On the Waterfront

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a b Serotsky, Paul (2003). "Leonard Bernstein / On the Waterfront / Chichester Psalms (1965) / On the Town". musicweb-international.com . Retrieved October 14, 2021. The last movement opens with a dissonant orchestral Prelude recalling both the opening of the work and the Psalm 23 tune, then settles into a setting of Psalm 131 ('Lord, my heart is not haughty, nor mine eyes lofty...') marked peacefully flowing. This is in a steady 10/4 rhythm (which is really pairs of 5/4) and is as richly melodic as any Broadway number. This segues into the final section, the first verse of Psalm 133, 'Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity,' sung by unaccompanied choir. There is a final pianissimo 'Amen'. The first performance in London took place on 10 June 1966 in the Duke's Hall of the Royal Academy of Music. Conducted by Roy Wales and performed by the London Academic Orchestra and London Student Chorale, it was paired with Britten's Cantata academica. It was published in 1965 by Boosey & Hawkes. [1] The music of Chichester Psalms is essentially American, incorporating within its core 'classical' style elements of Bernstein's beloved jazz, blues and Broadway music. When commissioning the work the dean of Chichester Cathedral mentioned that 'many of us would be delighted if there was a hint of West Side Story about the music'. Bernstein duly obliged.

The work was commissioned for the 1965 Southern Cathedrals Festival at Chichester Cathedral by the cathedral's Dean, Walter Hussey. [2] However, the world premiere took place in the Philharmonic Hall, New York, on 15 July 1965 with the composer conducting, followed by the performance at Chichester on July 31, 1965, conducted by the cathedral's Organist and Master of the Choristers, John Birch. [3] [2] In an effort to emphasize that he was not seeking a more narrowly liturgical piece in the traditional sense, nor a conservative work of more typically reverential High Church aesthetics, he encouraged Bernstein to write freely, without inhibitions. He even expressed the wish that the music might incorporate some of the composer’s Broadway side, telling Bernstein, “Many of us would be very delighted if there was a hint of West Side Story about the music.” You spread a table for me in full view of my enemies; You anoint my head with oil; my drink is abundant. Chichester Psalms was Bernstein's first composition after his 1963 Third Symphony ( Kaddish). These two works are his two most overtly Jewish compositions. While both works have a chorus singing texts in Hebrew, the Kaddish Symphony has been described as a work often at the edge of despair, while Chichester Psalms is affirmative and serene at times.

He had this goal all his life to bring people together regardless of their religions, origins, generations, and aspirations in life,” Nézet-Séguin said. “Bernstein showed all of us the way many decades ago. And now, all of the world, this is what we’re trying to do in the symphony orchestras, in opera houses, and concert presenters is to break boundaries.” Daniel Oren The next song, 'Little Smary', is a bedtime story that the composer, as a child, often heard from his mother, Jennie Bernstein. The music alternates between the bright, cheerful tone of the mother telling a tale of 'lost and found' and the deep emotions of the listening child. In early December 1963, Bernstein received a letter from the Very Reverend Walter Hussey, Dean of the Cathedral of Chichester in Sussex, England, requesting a piece for the Cathedral’s 1965 music festival: “The Chichester Organist and Choirmaster, John Birch, and I, are very anxious to have written some piece of music which the combined choirs could sing at the Festival to be held in Chichester in August, 1965, and we wondered if you would be willing to write something for us. I do realize how enormously busy you are, but if you could manage to do this we should be tremendously honoured and grateful. The sort of thing that we had in mind was perhaps, say, a setting of the Psalm 2, or some part of it, either unaccompanied or accompanied by orchestra or organ, or both. I only mention this to give you some idea as to what was in our minds.” The festival united the cathedral choruses of Chichester, Winchester and Salisbury. Dr. Hussey was a noted champion of the arts, having commissioned works by visual artists, poets, and composers. Among these are: an altarpiece painted by Graham Sutherland, stained glass windows by Marc Chagall, a sculpture depicting the Madonna and child by Henry Moore, a litany and anthem by W.H. Auden, and perhaps most notably, the cantata Rejoice in the Lamb by Benjamin Britten. Despite Dr. Hussey’s initial wish for the setting of Psalm 2, Bernstein responded with a “suite of Psalms, or selected verses from Psalms,” under the working title, Psalms of Youth (Bernstein changed the title because it misleadingly suggested that the piece was easy to perform). Hussey was hoping that Bernstein would feel unrestrained for composing in a more popular vein despite the sacred nature of the assignment. Hussey wrote, “Many of us would be very delighted if there was a hint of West Side Story about the music.”

Then comes 'Greeting', first written in 1955 after Bernstein's son Alexander was born and revised in 1988. 'Every time a child is born, for the space of that brief instant the world is pure.' This simple, calm, reflective song is a complete contrast to what follows. Chichester Psalms juxtaposes vocal part writing most commonly associated with Church music (including homophony and imitation), with the Judaic liturgical tradition.Here they are together, right after the performance, live from Jerusalem. It was the first thing transmitted on the Israelian TV overall. Daniel Oren sings the boy soprano solo in Chichester Psalms with Bernstein. (Courtesy of Oren) Marjory Klein: Once in a Lifetime

a b Roberts, Stephen (May 22, 2012). "John Birch obituary". The Guardian . Retrieved October 14, 2021. The music for the beginning of the second movement is taken from sketches from Bernstein's unfinished The Skin of Our Teeth. The men's theme was adapted from material cut from West Side Story.Raise a shout for the Lord, all the earth; worship the Lord in gladness; come into His presence with shouts of joy. A one-of-a-kind musician, Bernstein’s creativity spanned musical theatre, film scores, large-scale symphonies and operettas. Here are 10 of his all-time best... In 1965, Leonard Bernstein took a sabbatical from his post as Music Director of the New York Philharmonic. Freed from the time-consuming obligations of conducting and studying scores, he could now turn his attention to composition. His objective during this conducting hiatus was to compose a Broadway musical based on Thornton Wilder’s The Skin of Our Teeth, in collaboration with director/choreographer Jerome Robbins, with book and lyrics by Betty Comden and Adolph Green. Bernstein outlined his concept in a poem he submitted to the New York Times on October 24, 1965: When it came time to sing it in front of the Maestro in rehearsal for the first time, I was petrified and could barely squeak out my part. He was very encouraging, even for the short time I sang. At a break, I was bold enough to ask to speak with him about the solo. He was kindness and patience itself, giving me a mini-coaching on each note of my little snippet. This whole experience was just icing on the cake of the already mountaintop experience of singing under his baton for this amazing concert. Pope Paul VI: After Hearing Chichester Psalms at the Vatican, 1973 The offer of the Chichester commission came during Bernstein’s sabbatical year from the New York Philharmonic, just as he was in the throes of disappointment over the miscarriage of a project on which he had been working, a Broadway musical show based on Thornton Wilder’s play The Skin of Our Teeth. “The wounds are still smarting,” he wrote to fellow American composer David Diamond in the beginning of 1965. “I am suddenly a composer without a project.” He thus welcomed the opportunity the Chichester commission provided, and he proceeded to compose the work in New York in the spring of that year. The result appears not only to have leaned melodically and rhythmically on its composer’s Broadway proclivities, but, as Dr. Hussey had assured him would be welcome, on actual moments of his earlier stage music. As Bernstein’s biographer Humphrey Burton and others familiar with Bernstein’s theatrical music have observed, the second movement contains, in the lower voices, an adaptation of a passage from the Prologue to West Side Story, which is heard now to the words of Psalm 2 ( lama rag’shu goyim ul’umim yeh’gu rik?). And material derived from his recently shelved drafts and sketches for the aborted Skin of Our Teeth project was recycled and accommodated to Psalm verses in all three movements. Moreover, Burton demonstrated that Bernstein’s choice of specific Psalms and verses was informed by their potential adaptability to the rhythm and cadence of lyrics that had already been written for that musical show by the celebrated team of Betty Comden and Adolph Green.

Have a look at the text here, as handwritten by Bernstein, courtesy of the Library of Congress, Music Division: Chichester Psalms, p1. (Credit: Library of Congress, Music Division) Chichester Psalms, p2. (Credit: Library of Congress, Music Division) Chichester Psalms, p3. (Credit: Library of Congress, Music Division) Chichester Psalms, p4 (Credit: Library of Congress, Music Division) The introduction (presented in the score as part of movement one) begins gathering energy. Word painting is used in that the dissonant sevenths present in every chord sound like clanging bells, indicating that we are being told to awaken in a deep and profound way. In the first measure, Bernstein also introduces a leitmotif in the soprano and alto parts consisting of a descending perfect fourth, ascending minor seventh, and descending perfect fifth. The motif is also found with the seventh inverted as a descending major second. It conjures up images of tuning the harp and psaltery (especially the use of perfect fourths and fifths). This leitmotif is found elsewhere in the work, including the end of the first movement ("Ki tov Adonai," m. 109–116), the third movement prelude, and in the soprano part of the final a cappella section of movement three ("Hineh mah tov," m.60), with a haunting reintroduction of the material in the harp on unison G's during the "Amen" of m. 64.Commissioned by the Very Rev. Walter Hussey, Dean of Chichester Cathedral, Sussex, for its 1965 Festival, and dedicated, with gratitude, to Cyril Solomon” a b c "Bernstein, Leonard / Chichester Psalms (1965)". Boosey & Hawkes. 1965 . Retrieved October 15, 2018.