A Choral Christmas
Featuring
Prelude, A Spotless Rose, and The Ground by
Ola Gjeilo (1978-)
Dynamic young composer and pianist Ola Gjeilo was born in Oslo, Norway, in 1978. A talented child, he began to play piano by ear when he was three or four. He began taking formal piano lessons when he was seven, as well as studying jazz and composition. He loved improvising and playing piano by ear, so he didn’t learn to read music immediately. He can’t even remember when he began composing. At times, he would write down his improvisations as formal compositions. He had a number of different piano teachers. By the time he reached junior high school, he had one teacher who finally forced him to concentrate on his technique. He began studying organ when he was 17. By 1999, he began to concentrate on composing concert music.
Gjeilo received his Bachelor’s degree from the Norwegian Academy of Music in Oslo, and then attended the Royal College of Music in London, where he received a degree in composition. In 2001, he began studying composition with Robert Beaser at the Juilliard School of Music. He received his Master’s degree in 2006. He composed a variety of works while at Juilliard, and received the Gretchaninoff Memorial Prize, as well as winning the 2005 Juilliard Composers’ Orchestral Work Competition.
In 2006-2007, he moved to Los Angeles to study film composition/scoring at the University of Southern California, following up his interest in film and film music. During this time, he also worked in Los Angeles as a freelance composer and concert recording artist. In 2006-2007, he and fellow composer Asmund Skuterud created a film music company called Nordic Screen Music, based in Oslo and New York. A lover of film, he has created a number of film scores for short films, although no feature-length ones. In addition to film music, he is interested in electronic music and synthesized sounds.
Gjeilo returned to New York soon after 2007, performing as a pianist and continuing his composition work. In 2009-2010, he was Composer-in-Residence for the Grammy-award winning Phoenix (Arizona) Chorale, conducted by Charles Bruffy. At present, he is a full-time composer, based in Santa Monica, California.
Ola Gjeilo has composed over 30 published choral works, both a cappella and accompanied, that have been performed world-wide. He also has composed music for solo piano, instrumental ensembles, and orchestras. He composes jazz, as well as classical music. He has received a number of commissions, from various artists and groups, including American soprano Barbara Bonney, the Phoenix Chorale, Philip Brunnelle, the Edvard Grieg Society, St. Olaf College, Ensemble Mendelssohn, the Choral Arts Ensemble, and Voces Nordicae. His choral music has been performed by the Kansas City Chorale, Conspirare, the World Youth Choir, VocalEssence, Mogens Dahl Chamber Choir, Brigham Young University Singers, Norwegian Soloists’ Choir, and the Swedish Broadcasting Corporation’s Radiokören.
Gjeilo’s music has been performed in over 30 countries, including the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, South Africa, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Hungary, France, and Belgium. His music also has been featured on PBS in the United States, and the major Scandinavian television channels. As a performer himself, Gjeilo has performed all over the world. Many times, he has performed with choral groups presenting his music.
Ola Gjeilo has his own voice and musical language, influenced by classical, jazz, and folk music. He is especially interested in composing vocal, orchestral, and piano music. He notes that he has been influenced especially by Keith Jarrett, Thomas Newman, Howard Shore, Philip Glass and John Adams. To him, the piano often is an equal partner in his compositions. In addition, he also enjoys doubling voices with a string quartet. As he comments in the introduction to his composition, Dark Night of the Soul, “I just love the sound of voices singing chords on ‘Ooh’ or ‘Mmm’. It creates a sound that can be so amazingly evocative and warm, especially when doubled by a string quartet.”
Prelude
Composed in 2006, Ola Gjeilo’s Prelude shows the influence of Gregorian chant and early polyphony. Gjeilo comments, “Named Prelude despite its Latin text, I conceived of this piece as a concert opener, a type of introductory or entrance music. Of simple ABA form, its joyful and celebratory starting and closing sections frame a more serene middle part. Prelude synthesizes ideas from two of my earlier choral works, Nya Vägar and Exsultate, Jubilate. I reworked my favorite parts from each of those compositions and created a new and what I hope is a strong and moving piece of music.” The two outer sections are vigorous in their sounds of rejoicing, while the contemplative middle section speaks of peace and gentle feelings.
Exsultate, Jubilate
O vos animae beatae
Exsultate, Jubilate
Summa Trinitas revelatu
Et ubique adoratur,
Date gloriam,
Date illi gloriam
Summa Trias adoratur,
Date illi gloriam.
Tu virginum corona,
Tu nobis pacem dona.
Tu consolare affectus,
Unde suspirat cor.
Alleluia.
Summa Trinitas revelatu
Et ubique adoratur,
Date gloriam,
Date illi gloriam
Summa Trias adoratur,
Date illi gloriam.
Rejoice, resound with joy.
O you blessed souls,
Rejoice, resound with joy,
The Great Trinity is revealed
And everywhere adored;
Give glory
Give it glory,
The Great Triad is adored,
Give it glory.
You, o crown of virgins,
Grant us peace,
Console our feelings,
From which our hearts sigh.
Alleluia.
The Great Trinity is revealed
And everywhere adored;
Give glory
Give it glory,
The Great Triad is adored,
Give it glory.
A Spotless Rose and Its History
Ola Gjeilo has created a beautiful setting of the German Annunciation hymn Es ist ein Ros’ entsprungen, known to so many Americans as Lo, How A Rose E’er Blooming. Gjeilo uses the text, A Spotless Rose is Blowing, a different translation of the original text. Other composers also have set this melody and text. German composer Hugo Distler includes the hymn in his composition, The Christmas Story. English composer Herbert Howells sets it in A Spotless Rose. Brahms created a chorale fantasy for organ based on the original melody. English lovers of carols know Es Ist Ein Ros Entsprungen as A Great and Mighty Wonder. The text for that carol is taken from a hymn by St. Germanus, instead of the anonymous German text.
Michael Praetorius (1571-1621) and the Original Text
Keyte and Parrott note that both the words and original music of this anonymous folk hymn may have been written in the German diocese of Trier (in the Moselle Valley) during the late 15th or early 16th century, circa 1587. The most familiar setting of Es ist ein Ros’ entsprungen is the one by Michael Praetorius in his 1609 Musae Sioniae. He sets the original folk tune. Praetorius’ setting appeared with 23 verses of text in the 1599 Cologne publication, Alte Catholische Geistliche Kirkengesänge.
Here are the original three verses in German:
Es ist ein Ros’ entsprungen aus einer Wurzel zart,
Wie uns die Alten sungen, von Jesse kam die Art
und hat ein Blümlein bracht mitten im kalten Winter,
Wohl zu der halben Nacht.
Das Röslein, das ich meine, davon Jesaia sagt,
Hat uns gebracht alleine Maria, die reine Magd.
Aus Gottes ewigem Rat hat sie ein Kind geboren
Wohl zu der halben Nacht.
Das Blümelein so kleine, das duftet uns so süss,
Mit seinem hellen Scheine vertreibts die Finsternis:
Wahr’ Mensch und wahrer Gott,
Hilft uns aus allem Leide, rettet von Sünd und Tod.
Ian Bradley comments, “the reference to ‘kalten Winter’ makes this one of the earliest known hymns to give a wintry setting to the Nativity story and shows that it was not just the Victorians who scattered snow on the Christmas scene.”
There are various versions of this hymn. Many of the stanzas differ slightly, and the meaning depends on which version is used. The text also is translated as A spotless rose is blowing, and Ola Gjeilo has set this translation by Catherine Winkworth. He does not use all three stanzas of the poem—only the first two, adding Alleluia as a refrain. Instead of using the original folk-tune melody, Gjeilo composed his own folk-tune like setting.
Catherine Winkworth (1827-1878) and the English Translation
Catherine Winkworth was an English translator, especially of music from the German chorale and German hymn tradition. Born in London, she lived most of her life in Manchester, except for a year that she spent in Dresden, Germany. She studied with the Unitarian minister Reverend William Gaskell and the English philosopher Dr. James Martineau. Her friendship with the German ambassador to England, Chevalier Christian Karl Josias Bunsen (1791-1860), prompted her interest in translating German hymnody. He gave her a copy of Andachtsbuch, a collection of German hymns. Lyrica Germanica, published around 1854, is her first set of German hymns translated into English. In 1858, she followed with a second. In 1863, she published The Chorale Book for England, which had both translations and tunes of German hymns. The work was co-edited by composers William Sterndale Bennett and Otto Goldschmidt. In 1869 she published Christian Singers of Germany, a book of biographies of German hymn writers. The Harvard University Hymn Book, 1964, notes that she “did more than any other single individual to make the rich heritage of German hymnody available to the English-speaking world, through her many translations of German hymns…” In addition to her literary interests, she was deeply interested in women’s rights and higher education for women. She died in Geneva, Switzerland, in 1878.
Winkworth’s 1869 translation is as follows:
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia, alleluia.
A spotless rose is blowing,
Sprung from a tender root,
Ancient seers’ foreshowing,
Of Jesse promised fruit;
Its fairest bud unfolds to light
Amid the cold, cold winter,
And in the dark midnight.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia, alleluia.
This stanza refers to Jesse, the father of King David and an ancestor of Jesus. It describes Jesse as the tree from which Jesus’ line springs. The rose is Mary, the Virgin Mother.
The rose which I am singing,
Whereof Isaiah said,
Is from its sweet root springing,
In Mary, purest Maid,
(Solo) The Blessed Babe she bare us,
In a cold, cold winter’s night.
(Chorus) Through God’s great love and might,
The Blessed Babe she bare us,
In a cold, cold winter’s night.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia, alleluia.
Theodore Baker (1851-1934) and the American Translation
Most Americans probably are most familiar with Theodore Baker’s English language translation. Baker (1851-1934) was an American musicologist, organist, and literary editor for Schirmer Publishing Company. He moved to Germany in 1874 to study business, turned to music instead, and received a doctorate at Leipzig in 1882. His dissertation was about the music of the Seneca Indians, the first major publication to deal with the music of the American Indian. He returned to the United States in 1891, employed as a literary editor for Schirmer. He translated many books and texts into English. Lo, how a rose e’er blooming dates from 1894. Baker wrote many articles for Schirmer’s Musical Quarterly magazine. He was the first editor of Baker’s Biographical Dictionary of Musicians (1900), also a Schirmer publication. Nicholas Slonimsky edited later editions.
Lo, how a rose e’er blooming,
From tender stem hath sprung.
Of Jesse’s lineage coming,
As men of old have sung;
It came, a flow’ret bright,
Amid the cold of winter,
When half spent was the night.
Isaiah ’twas foretold it,
The Rose I have in mind,
With Mary we behold it,
The virgin mother kind;
To show God’s love aright,
She bore to men a Savior,
When halfspent was the night.
The floweret, so small
That smells so sweet to us
With its clear light
Dispels the darkness.
True man and true God!
He helps us from all trouble,
Saves us from sin and death.
Peter Hognestad (1866-1931) And The Norwegian Translation
Gjeilo also has used his beautiful melody for Peter Hognestad’s 1921 Norwegian translation of that hymn. Hognestad was a Norwegian theologian, writer, translator, and Lutheran bishop, known especially for his 1921 translation of the Bible into Nynorsk, the 19th-century-created New Norwegian language, as contrasted with Bokmal, an older Danish language also used in Norway.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia, alleluia.
Det hev ei rose sprunge
Ut av ei rot så grann,
Fedrane hev sunge,
Av Isais rot ho rann;
Og var ein blome blid midt i den kalde vinter,
ved mørke midnattstid.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia, alleluia.
Om denne rosa eine, er sagt Jesajas ord,
Maria møy, den reine, bar rosa til vår jord
(Solo) Det hev ei rose sprunge,
som var i spådom sagt,
(Chorus) Og Herrens miskunnsmakt,
det store under gjorde,
som var i spådom sagt.
Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia, alleluia.
The Ground
The Ground is based on a chorale in the last movement of Gjeilo’s Sunrise Mass for Choir and String Orchestra (2008), using the text of the concluding part of his Mass: Benedictus and Agnus Dei. Gjeilo’s Mass is in four movements:
The Spheres (Kyrie)
Sunrise (Gloria)
The City (Credo)
Identity (Sanctus) & The Ground (Benedictus/Agnus Dei)
The Ground is divided into three sections, using the same melodic structure, but changing keys and increasing in intensity from section to section. The composition ends with a quiet setting of the plea for peace, Dona Nobis Pacem. Gjeilo comments, “The chorale, beginning at Pleni sunt caeli in that movement is the culmination of the Mass, and it’s called Identity & The Ground because I wanted to convey a sense of having ‘arrived’ at the end of the Mass; to have reached a kind of peace and grounded strength, after the long journey of the Mass, having gone through so many different emotional landscapes.” He wanted to make this chorale available as a separate work, and notes, “So, here is a version with piano and optional string quartet accompaniment, including a new intro and epilogue that mainly features the piano, with accompaniment from the choir and strings. In those sections, the choir functions almost like a string orchestra, as a bed of warm and evocative sound. I love the sound of choir and strings doubling each other!”
Walton Music Publisher printed the full score and string parts specifically for the San Francisco Lyric Chorus performance of this work. They are otherwise unpublished.
Pleni sunt caeli et terra gloria tua.
Osanna, Osanna in excelsis.
Benedictus qui venit in nomine Domini.
Benedictus qui venit.
Osanna, Osanna in excelsis.
Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccata mundi,
Agnus Dei qui tollis peccata mundi,
Dona nobis pacem.
Heaven and earth are full
of thy glory.
Hosanna, hosanna in the highest.
Blessed is He who comes
in the name of the Lord.
Blessed is He who comes.
Hosanna in the highest.
Lamb of God,
who takest away the sins of the world,
Lamb of God,
who takest away the sins of the world,
Lamb of God,
grant us peace.
Performances
Saturday, December 3, 2011, 7pm
Mission Dolores Basilica
3321 16th Street at Dolores, San Francisco
Parking in schoolyard, entry on Church Street
Sunday, December 4, 2011, 5pm
St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church
66 Saint Stephens Drive, Orinda
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