Myth & Mystics

Sunday, Oct. 5, 2025, 3:30pm
Monday, Oct. 6, 2025, 7:30pm
Ebenezer Lutheran Church, Greensboro, NC

Program Order, Texts & Translations (PDF)

Season Playbill, Directions and More

Program Notes

As a young man untried by life’s larger challenges, I was intrigued by the works of American writer, Joseph Campbell (1904–1987), known best for his work in comparative mythology and religion resulting in his theory of the archetypal hero’s journey (which, by the way, was cited by George Lucas as a major influence on Star Wars!). I became curious about myths and the writings of those who delve into the mysteries of the human condition. My fondness for such topics and authors has abided, and yet I found myself struggling to craft this program: with finding and selecting repertoire, and with creating a program order for the chosen titles. The entire process has been a curious and finicky maturing experience. I can’t help but believe that the angst I feel about our society, our country, and my stage of life has challenged my earlier, perhaps somewhat naive, understanding of this topic.

For me, the repertoire selection process typically begins with words, stories, or images brought to life by masterful wordsmiths. This program includes narrative ballads, selections from sacred texts, and the poems and writings of mystics and authors with tremendous insight into human existence. The composers are masters of the nineteenth, twentieth, and twenty-first centuries. Naturally, the beauty of the musical setting was of equal importance to me. These notes are not in program order but are arranged by similar groupings such as narrative tales, sacred or religious settings, myth/legend/folklore. Some of the titles straddle more than one group. I’ve chosen to group them so that you may consider each work to its full advantage within this program. You may also discover interconnections between works that you may never have considered before.

The Mystics

Featured in this program are three works by two different mystics. Khājeh Shams-od-Dīn Moḥammad Ḥāfeẓ-e Shīrāzī, pen name Hafez, was a Persian mystic who died in the late fourteenth-century. The concert opens with Ivo Antognini’s setting of his poem Every Child Has Known God. This beautiful setting of simple but profound statements describes the God a child knows: NOT a God of names, of don’ts, of “anything weird,” but one who invites the child to “Come dance with me.” Antognini’s setting is a gentle unfolding of each line of text, harmonically rich but transparent.

Dan Forrest’s setting of Hafez’s The Sun Never Says states simply that neither the sun nor moon envies the other “with a love like that, It [sun or moon] lights the whole sky.” Forrest reins in his typically cinematic composing style by simplifying the textures. Still the long lovely melodic lines allow you to live with the text and embrace the poetic message.

Jalāl al-Dīn Muḥammad Rūmī, simply referred to as Rumi, was a thirteenth-century Persian poet. Most frequently, or at least in my experience, his writings on love appear in choral settings. Stephen Barton utilizes a cori spezzati style of composition for the setting of Rumi’s The Universe Is in You. Commonly referred to as the Venetian polychoral style, cori spezzati was often used in the large cathedrals of Venice and employed spatially separated ensembles in a pseudo-dialogue fashion. Choir One sings the first phrase, Choir Two assumes the harmonic sonority at the end of  Choir One’s statement, often overlapping, and repeats that statement with some harmonic adjustments. The message is that you need not be lonely “the universe is within you.”

Narrative

Within this grouping there are folk legends, verses from the Book of Revelation, and narrative ballads. Two of these works also have “redemption” themes. Hugo Wolf’s Der Feuerreiter, with text from a poem by Eduard Mörike, is the most problematic of the two “redemption” works. The main character in Mörike’s poem, the Fire Rider, wields a holy relic to extinguish blazes. The origin legend, however, is quite the opposite. Much like the Marvel cinematic universe’s “Ghost Rider,” the Fire Rider actually appears before the conflagration erupts, then rides his rail-thin horse into the flames and extinguishes the fire. The story as told by Mörike is that the Fire Rider paces madly in his home. Visible to the community through the window they see his fire-red cap flashing back and forth as he paces. The community mill erupts in flames. The Fire Rider dashes to the blaze on his rail-thin horse, and (some say blasphemously) uses a splinter from the very cross of Christ to extinguish it. In the process he and his horse are reduced to ash…until…he reappears, pacing with his red cap once again. Wolf’s mastery of both the story and the late German Romantic compositional style allows for wild and graphic musical portrayals of the events: the incessant “running” in the piano with diminished harmonies and a brisk tempo to build anxiety; the noise and confusion of the townspeople; and the scenic “ruhe wohl” (“rest in peace”) as a funereal ending.

Unlike Wolf’s ambivalent redemption story, Dan Forrest’s three-part Bronze Triptych relays the story of the discovery and mining of copper and tin, forged in fire into weapons of war, then melted down and transformed into celebratory bells. The Swabian folk legend includes a mystic element to the story. During the copper and tin ore forging process the molten elements were “stung” by a ghoulish hornet poisoning the process so that weapons of war came into being. A shaman later provides a remedy thus changing the weapons into bells of celebration. Forrest’s cinematic style paints a canvas in each of the three sections. The final celebration section is set in a mixed meter at a rapid tempo.

The compositions of Andrea Casarrubios are new to me. Antonio Machado’s poem “Caminante no hay camino” (“Wanderer there is no way”) is the source of text for her beautiful Caminante. Casarrubios utilizes only two verses from the extended poem. Using the road as a metaphor for our personal journey, these verses focus on the idea that we choose our paths and once chosen, looking back the path no longer exists. Instead, the wanderer is encouraged to walk life, observe the world, and make choices. Scored for cello and SATB chorus, the composition features the beauty and resonance of the cello to establish the atmosphere as the chorus relays the text. The choral writing is homorhythmic, harmonically straightforward, with subtle dynamics all designed to maintain a self-reflective, inward character.

Sacred or Religious

Mark Templeton sets all sixteen verses of Psalm 91 Yoshayv B’sayser Elyon O you who dwell in the shelter of the Most High. Firmly grounded in historical techniques, including the use of modal melodic and harmonic musical language and the alternation of vocal forces after every fourth verse, Templeton still gives a modern interpretation that builds to full choir at the end.

A notable composer and educator, Charles Wood is remembered as an Anglican church composer and musician. Two of his most notable students were Ralph Vaughan Williams at Cambridge and Herbert Howells at the Royal College of Music. Wood’s Hail Gladdening Light is another work on our program written in the  cori spezzati style. This work builds to beautiful chordal pillars and concludes with a glorious pianissimo ending.

Myth

Mythology provides characters and events that are often clearly painted as either very good or very bad. Such is the case with Prometheus and the Sirens. Kristopher Fulton composed Prometheus on text he created. Fulton portrays Prometheus as a mischievous minx residing on Mount Olympus with the gods. He rushes around, steals fire, and flees Olympus. He falls to earth as fast as he can laughing as he hits the ground and shares the magic of fire with humans. Fulton’s musical setting is rapid fire in tempo and rhythm creating a breathless humorous feeling. Prometheus is a hero on earth and a thief in Olympus.

Lili Boulanger’s languorous accompaniment in Les Sirèns lulls all who hear it into a trance-like state. The delights and beauty of the singing Sirens encourage closer inspection until the final lines of the poem:

The trembling flowers of foam and of mist,
Our fleeting kisses are the dream of the dead!

Boulanger’s musical language is reflective of the French style dubiously labeled Impressionism. Moving away from functional harmonic practices, the French Impressionist composers abandoned the traditional function of chords in favor of creating sonorities that evoke aural affects.

Included with the “Myth” pieces is Brent Wells’s The Four Horsemen. The Book of Revelation 6:2-8 is the source of the text. Each horseman brings tribulation and death: the horseman upon a white horse carries a bow and conquers; the red horse bears a man who takes away peace; the rider of the black horse carries a scale indicating economic instability; and Death rides the pale horse. Quite frankly, I find this story chilling and unsettling. Wells calls on the harmonic and melodic language of the late nineteenth century, including liberal use of diminished sonorities. The rapid tempos and running sixteenth notes create an unsettled, troubled character.

Humanist

What is beautiful resides in us all. In each of the works included in this category the poets and composers provide insights into elements of our character that elevate all of humanity.  All Seems Beautiful To Me, composed by Eric Whitacre on text by Walt Whitman, encourages us to surround ourselves with those who love, cherish, and accept us and to be untroubled by those who do not. Whitacre uses a simplified harmonic language and a homorhythmic textual style. The phrases are conversational.

Stephen Paulus’s Hymn To The Eternal Flame was last heard by Bel Canto audiences in spring 2018. The message of the text by Michael Dennis Browne is that each of us carries the essence of all humanity, and that we all originate from the same benevolent creator. The musical setting is reminiscent of an expanded hymn.

Taken together, these works remind us that myth, poetry, faith, and song are not merely remnants of the past but living voices that continue to shape how we understand ourselves, one another, and the world we share. Shaping this program has been a journey of questioning, discovery, and renewal for me. My hope is that, in hearing these works, you will share in that journey and carry something resonant and meaningful beyond this concert hall. – Welborn Young, Artistic Director