to start my week with
osanna in excelsis
leads me to worry …

Readers of this blog know that I listen to Classic FM, an online radio station from London.

I tell folks I like it as it is five hours ahead in London so I know that somewhere in the world, someone has indeed made it through the next five hours.

This morning, I got all plugged in and turned on my speakers to hear the Osanna from Bach’s Mass in B minor. A 3 minute chorus where the lyric is nothing but the combination of the words Osanna in excelsis.

According to Wikipedia, The composition was completed in 1749, the year before Bach’s death, and was to a large extent based on earlier work, such as a Sanctus Bach had composed in 1724. Sections that were specifically composed to complete the Mass in the late 1740s include the “Et incarnatus est” part of the Credo. It is structured in four major sections and scored for five soloists, a choir that is five-part in many sections and divided in the “Osanna”, and a Baroque ensemble including brass and wind instruments.

Imagine my shock when I found that Mr. Bach had used this music is something titled, Preise dein Glücke, gesegnetes Sachsen (Praise your good fortune, blessed Saxony) that was first performed in 1734 with a lot more words …

Preise dein Glücke, gesegnetes Sachsen,
Praise your good fortune, blessed Saxony,

Weil Gott den Thron deines Königs erhält.
since God upholds the throne of your king.

Fröhliches Land,
Joyful land

Danke dem Himmel und küsse die Hand,
thank heaven and kiss the hand

Die deine Wohlfahrt noch täglich lässt wachsen
which from day to day makes your prosperity increase

Und deine Bürger in Sicherheit stellt.
and establishes your citizens in safety.

BE THAT AS IT MAY … the music was a great way to start my work week,

BUT THAT BEING SAID, in my ear a warning that the old saying goes A Bad Beginning Makes a Good Ending.

I don’t know what it means when your week has a good beginning, does that make for a bad ending?

It leads me to worry.

Maybe I don’t want to stick around to find out.

as at the moment
one is sure that all is lost,
look at what is gained!

… he had barely started to turn away from the house when Roxane Coss closed her eyes and opened her mouth. In retrospect, it was a risky thing to do, both from the perspective of General Alfredo, who might have seen it as an act of insurrection, and from the care of the instrument of the voice itself. She had not sung in two weeks, nor did she go through a single scale to warm up. Roxane Coss, wearing Mrs. Iglesias’s slacks and a white dress shirt belonging to the Vice President, stood in the middle of the vast living room and began to sing “O Mio Babbino Caro” from Puccini’s Gianni Schicchi. There should have been an orchestra behind her but no one noticed its absence. No one would have said her voice sounded better with an orchestra, or that it was better when the room was immaculately clean and lit by candles. They did not notice the absence of flowers or champagne, in fact, they knew now that flowers and champagne were unnecessary embellishments. Had she really not been singing all along? The sound was no more beautiful when her voice was limber and warm. Their eyes clouded over with tears for so many reasons it would be impossible to list them all. They cried for the beauty of the music, certainly, but also for the failure of their plans. They were thinking of the last time they had heard her sing and longed for the women who had been beside them then. All of the love and the longing a body can contain was spun into not more than two and a half minutes of song, and when she came to the highest notes it seemed that all they had been given in their lives and all they had lost came together and made a weight that was almost impossible to bear. When she was finished, the people around her stood in stunned and shivering silence. Messner leaned into the wall as if struck. He had not been invited to the party. Unlike the others, he had never heard her sing before.

The priest knew he committed the sin of pride and still he was overjoyed at having been able to play a role in bringing in the music. He was still too dizzy from the sound of Roxane’s voice to express himself properly. He looked to see if the windows were open. He hoped that Manuel had been able to hear a line, a note, from where he stood on the sidewalk. What a blessing he had received in his captivity. The mysteries of Christ’s love had never been closer to him, not when he said the mass or received communion, not even on the day he took holy orders. He realized now he was only just beginning to see the full extent to which it was his destiny to follow, to walk blindly into fates he could never understand. In fate there was reward, in turning over one’s heart to God there was a magnificence that lay beyond description. At the moment one is sure that all is lost, look at what is gained!

From the book Bel Canto by Ann Patchett. New York, Harper Collins, 2001.

What a blessing he had received in his captivity.

The mysteries of Christ’s love had never been closer to him, not when he said the mass or received communion, not even on the day he took holy orders.

He realized now he was only just beginning to see the full extent to which it was his destiny to follow, to walk blindly into fates he could never understand.

In fate there was reward, in turning over one’s heart to God there was a magnificence that lay beyond description.

At the moment one is sure that all is lost, look at what is gained!

What words about music have been more true?

I loved this book.

I don’t know that I could have ended it the way it ended but I can’t imagine it could have ended any other way.