Handel, but also Ukraine and Bach

Tonight I finished a piano dress rehearsal at Benaroya Hall. It is the first time that my choir has sung there since December 2019, due to the Covid pandemic. The last time we sang there was Handel's "Messiah" with Matthew Halls as the guest conductor, and it seems fitting that our choir is coming back to Benaroya to perform another Baroque concert with Matthew Halls again. He is a delightful person with an inspiring passion for music, and I remember feeling like I had a once-in-a-lifetime experience when I sang the "Messiah" under his direction. I feel very lucky to get to sing Baroque music with him again, and it truly feels like a special, unforgettable gift.

We are singing two Baroque pieces, with the major piece being Handel's Ode for Saint Cecilia's Day. There are some really amusing and clever things that happen in this cantata, and it's fun to sing the words "the double double double beat" in the tenor soloist's aria (see 20:52 in this clip when the tenor sings it for the first time). We repeat words like "charge, charge, charge, charge" and "hark, hark, hark" in that number, which also is fun. Our chorale director Joe rolls his eyes and thinks that Handel's lacking in some creativity here, but I think all of the repetition and diction-heavy words creates a lively song.

I also like how the imagery of our first number ("From Harmony, From Heavenly Harmony") is related to the creation of the world, as if the world was created through music and harmony (a fitting concept, since Saint Cecilia is the patron saint of music). And at the end choral piece ("As From the Pow'r of Sacred Lays") has some interesting imagery of music "untuning the sky" as if the end of the world will also be brought about by music, as part of a divine plan. It also is fitting to have music "untune" as a great finale to the cantata. It is a fun piece to sing and Handel is predictable enough that I feel like I'm getting a chance to sing something akin to the "Messiah", which I haven't been able to sing for the past two holiday seasons. There is even a trumpet solo to make me feel right at home with this new Handel piece.

All this being said, tonight I feel like joy of singing again, especially the sheer pleasure to sing Baroque music under a talented conductor, is also bittersweet. And it's not because we have to sing wearing masks. I realize that singing is a luxury which many do not have right now, although I'm not thinking about Covid but the conflict in Ukraine. Tonight Maestro Halls was talking to our choir about how the timing for our second piece, the motet Der Gerechte kömmt um by Bach, is especially perfect and appropriate given the suffering and darkness in the world right now. This song, which uses the text of Isaiah 57:1-2, speaks of how those who are innocent will die and the world doesn't seem to care ("no man lays it to heart" and "none considering"). Matthew Halls even pointed out how the word "Unglück" that refers to evil and destruction, is associated with bad luck or "the unlucky." This is the translation:

Der Gerechte kömmt um

Der Gerechte kömmt um,
und niemand ist der es zu Herzen nehme;
und heilige Leute werden aufgerafft,
und niemand achtet drauf.

Denn die Gerechten werden weggerafft vor dem Unglück;
und die richtig vor sich gewandelt haben
kommen zum Frieden
und ruhen in ihren Kammern.

The Righteous Perishes

The righteous perishes,
and no man lays it to heart;
and merciful men are taken away,
none considering

that the righteous is taken away from the evil to come;
And those who walk in their uprightness
enter into peace
and rest in their beds. 

I certainly feel like this text, especially the first part, can relate to the innocent people of Ukraine. I have been following the news on the war with a heavy heart, but today my heart has felt particularly weighted down with the news that a Russian airstrike attacked a maternity hospital in Ukraine. Those mothers, who either are expectant or just gave birth to a child, are experiencing terrible trauma - even death - at a time that should have been one of the most wonderful moments of their lives. It's gutting. Is "none considering" the plight of these poor people and the evil that is inflicted on them?

I will be thinking of Ukraine when we perform this weekend. I feel very powerless in this situation and don't feel like I have many options for helping, besides offering financial support for humanitarian aid. But this weekend I will also lift my voice in song - an elegiac song.