2024 Winter Pops Program
The Chorale’s February 25th program is divided into three segments: Nature, Childhood Playfulness, and Friends. This issue of Choral Notes focusses on the middle section’s four pieces; two of contemporary vintage are from “Five Childhood Lyrics” by John Rutter (first performed in 1973), one is based on a Gospel piece from the 1800s, and the fourth, “O-la! o che bon eccho!” (The Echo Song) is by the 16th century Franco-Flemish composer, Orlando di Lasso.
“O-la! o che bon eccho!”
In English:
For most of his life, di Lasso lived in Munich in the service of Albrecht V, Duke of Bavaria and later, his son William. He composed more than 2,000 pieces of music, ranging from religious to secular and in a variety of languages, e.g., Latin, Italian, French, and German. His “popular” music contained elegance and wit, spanning a gamut from dignified to bawdy. One of the most famous of di Lasso's drinking songs was used by Shakespeare in Henry IV, Part II, Act V, Scene iii in which a drunken Justice Silence sings de Lasso’s French “Un jour vis un foulon qui fouloit” in English. [Loosely translated as “One day I see this grape presser pressing grapes, while staring at me. I tell him to stop his staring and ‘Press, press, press.’”]
Though his services were sought by Emperor Maximilian II, Pope Gregory XIII, and the King of France, Charles IX, he was thoroughly enjoying his life in Albrecht’s court. When offered a position in Dresden, he wrote to the Duke of the Electorate of Saxony, "I do not want to leave my house, my garden, and the other good things in Munich."
John Rutter’s Five Childhood Lyrics
Rutter wrote, "The Five Childhood Lyrics are a kind of 'homage' to the world of children. I chose for my texts some of the rhymes and verses remembered from my earliest years, and set them to music as simply as I could—though the last of the five, which uses a familiar nursery tune, contains a certain amount of tongue-in-cheek elaboration."*
Though Rutter’s music is familiar to Chorale audiences, the selections included in the Pops 2024 concert from his Five Childhood Lyrics have a uniquely youthful spirit.
*https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five_Childhood_Lyrics
”The Owl and the Pussy-cat”
First published in 1871, the nonsense poem, “The Owl and the Pussy-cat,” was written by Edward Lear (1812 - 1888). At four years old and the youngest of 21 children, Lear went to live with his oldest sister. If not for his talent in drawing and painting, his future could have been bleak. But, he became the young Queen Victoria’s drawing instructor and then came to the attention of the future Earl of Derby. He was able to travel, write poetry, and produce wonderful illustrations. The fantasy worlds and anthropomorphic characters he created had significant impact on younger contemporaries such as Lewis Carroll and Beatrix Potter.
Sample lines:
The Owl and the Pussy-cat went to sea
In a beautiful pea-green boat,
They took some honey, and plenty of money,
Wrapped up in a five pound note
They sailed away, for a year and a day,
To the land where the Bong-tree grows,
And there in a wood a Piggy-wig stood
With a ring at the end of his nose, his nose, his nose,
With a ring at the end of his nose.
"Dear Pig, are you willing to sell for one shilling your ring?"
Said the Piggy, "I will"
So they took it away, and were married next day
By the Turkey who lives on the hill.
And hand in hand, on the edge of the sand.
They danced by the light of the moon, the moon, the moon,
They danced by the light of the moon.
Edward Lear’s “The Owl and the Pussy-Cat” read by Judi Dench and recorded during “I Remember It Well” on July 3, 2022 at the Gielgud Theatre, London.
Rutter’s “The Owl and the Pussy-Cat” sung by The Cambridge Singers (2019)
”Sing a Song of Sixpence”
One research source says, “During the Medieval times, there were occasions when the cook in the house of a wealthy knight did indeed put live birds (often pigeons, but I'm sure it could just as easily have been blackbirds) inside a huge pastry crust, on his own initiative. This was seen as a great joke and the cook would usually have a real pie waiting to bring in when the birds had been released."**
**https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/supernaturalearth/believe-it-or-not-facts-meanings-of-nursery-rhymes-t772.html
Another, perhaps less believable option is that the musical rhyme was a coded message used by pirates to recruit new crew members.***
***https://www.museumoflondon.org.uk/families/rhymes-in-time/sing-a-song-of-sixpence
Sing a song of sixpence,
A pocket full of rye,
Four and twenty blackbirds
Baked in a pie.
When the pie was opened
The birds began to sing—
Wasn’t that a dainty dish
To set before the king?
The king was in the counting-house
Counting out his money,
The queen was in the parlor
Eating bread and honey,
The maid was in the garden
Hanging out the clothes,
There came a little blackbird
And snapped off her nose.
“Sing a Song of Sixpence” performed by The Cambridge Singers (2020)
The Animals a-Comin
In 2015, the Pearland High School Kantorei Choir, one of the six choirs in this Texas high school, performed a version arranged by Marshall Bartholomew of this well-known Gospel piece. This is the arrangement, transcribed by Steven Lipsitt for SATB that will be presented at this season’s Pops concert.
January’s “Spreading Joy”
“Music does bring people together. It allows us to experience the same emotions. People everywhere are the same in heart and spirit. No matter what language we speak, what color we are, the form of our politics or the expression of our love and our faith, music proves: We are the same.”
― John Denver
Box Office Open
Visit the Chorale’s Online Box Office to make ticket reservations and get more information about Pops 2024.