Music Notes 12-8-24

Advent is always a source of contradiction for a church music director, at least as far as the

hymns are concerned. Technically, throughout Advent we should be singing Advent hymns, like

O Come, O Come Emmanuel and Come, Thou Long Expected Jesus. Then, on Christmas Eve,

we can start to sing the Christmas carols during what is, technically, the Christmas season. The

problem is, we are bombarded with Christmas music everywhere we go from Thanksgiving Day

on, and on the day after Christmas, Boxing Day, everything stops and goes back to normal. And

everyone really wants to sing the Christmas carols in the season leading up to Christmas Day.

After that, we’re kinda burned out on Christmas music and we’re ready to hear something,

anything, else. My solution has always been to split the difference and sing the Advent carols

on the first Sunday of Advent, and then schedule the carols everybody wants to sing for the rest

of the season. Then, we can get the last vestiges of Christmas carols out of our systems with a

carol sing on the Sunday after Christmas. I hope no one is too disappointed.

George Frideric Handel (born Georg Friedrich Händel) is known as an English composer, but he

was actually born, raised and trained in Germany. He was born in 1650 in Halle an der Saal, a

city just north of Leipzig (famous for its resident composer J.S. Bach) in what was East Germany

for 45 years, and was the son of a coppersmith. Between the age of 7 and 9, he began training

with the only teacher he would ever have, Friedrich Wilhelm Zachow, who introduced him to

both the traditional music of fugues and counterpoint, and to the newer forms of music,

especially the new Italian art form, opera. By age 9, he was composing entire services of music

for Zachow’s church. After graduating from the University of Halle in 1702, he moved to

Hamburg, a free city with an established opera company, where he took a position with the

Hamburg opera orchestra (playing violin and harpsichord) and began writing operas in the Italian

style (in those days, operatic subjects were always based on Greek mythology). In 1706, he

traveled to Italy at the invitation of the Medicis, who were trying to establish Florence as the

musical capitol of Italy by attracting the greatest talents in the world. He wrote operas in

Florence and sacred music for the clergy in Rome. In 1710, he became Kapellmeister (person in

charge of music-making) to Georg, Elector of Hannover. In 1712, he decided to move to

London, and in a twist of fate, Georg of Hannover became King George I of England in 1714

(Handel had to appease his old/new boss by writing a bunch of music for him, including the

Coronation Anthems, also known as Zadok the Priest, which our choir has sung and has been

performed at every British coronation since). Handel ultimately founded 3 companies to supply

the British nobility with Italian opera, including the opera house at Covent Garden. As financial

returns from opera began to dwindle, he turned to writing oratorios – they were cheaper to

produce since no sets were required and the singers wore their own clothes. Once he began

writing oratorios, he never completely returned to opera. His Messiah was written in 3 weeks in

a burst of energy and debuted in Dublin in 1741. He died on April 14, 1759, and was buried in

Westminster Abbey with full state honors and with 3000 attendees present. O Thou That Tellest

Good Tidings To Zion is #9 in the Messiah and gives the alto soloist a chance to shine, with the

choir coming in afterwards and echoing the tune.

Still, Still, Still is an Austrian Christmas carol and lullaby. The melody is a folk tune from

the district of Salzburg. The tune appeared for the first time in 1865 in a folksong collection

of Vinzenz Maria Süß (1802–1868), founder of the Salzburg Museum. The words describe the

peace of the infant Jesus and his mother as the baby is sung to sleep. They have changed slightly

over the years but the modern Standard German version remains attributed to Georg Götsch

(1895–1956). There are various English translations of the original German. In 1958, American

choral conductor and arranger Norman Luboff took this tune and arranged it for choir and piano.

His translation talks about the silence of falling snow and peace of the baby sleeping. This

arrangement has become a Christmas classic around the world.