Michael Gläser - Dirigent / conductor
Theresa Blank - Alt /alto
Anton Rosner - Tenor / tenor
Larissa Kowal-Wolk
The Hour of Happiest Fulfillment
On Sergei Rachmaninoff’s All-Night
Vigil (Vespers) for soli and mixed choir a
cappella, op. 37
Date of composition
January and February 1915 in Moscow
Dedication
To the memory of Stepan Smolenski (1848-
1909), whose efforts in regard to sacred
music cannot be too highly praised
Premiere
March 10, 1915 (without, however, Nos. 1,
13 and 14) in Moscow with the Moscow
Synodal Choir, conducted by Nikolai Danilin,
for a concert benefiting Russian victims
of the war
Composer information
Born March 20 (April 1), 1873 on his family’s
estate Oneg in Gouvernement Novgorod;
died March 28, 1943 in Beverly Hills, California
“Rachmaninoff, the author of works which
are thoroughly bourgeois in their emotional
and spiritual effect, the composer of liturgies,
masses and The Bells [a work for soli,
choir and orchestra in which the chiming
of bells plays an important role], was and
is a servant and tool of the worst enemies
of the proletariat: the world-bourgeoisie
and world capitalism.” This quote, found in
an official resolution from the early 1930s,
documents the animosity towards the composer
that existed in post-revolutionary
Russia and which had caused him to prudently
leave his home after the revolution’s
outbreak. Previously, Rachmaninoff had
been esteemed both in Russia and later
in the West as the composer of epic-narrative
symphonies, late-Romantic piano
music and songlike Romances. In addition,
he had written some excellent sacred music.
These were a thorn in the flesh of the
atheistic rulers, however, who ensured that
Rachmaninoff’s works were banned in Russia
for many years.
It was Rachmaninoff who considered
one of his liturgical works, the opus 37,
as one of his best. It fit so seamlessly and
naturally into the severe Russian Orthodox
liturgical service and also conveyed an intimate,
righteous, prayerful attitude typical
for the Byzantine Rite: a personal dialog
with God.
Among the childhood memories firmly
imprinted on all Russians – including Rachmaninoff
– are the long worship services
with their powerful choral singing. The
Byzantine Rite cannot be imagined without
singing, because except for the sermon,
everything is sung. In the course of Christianization,
which began in 988, Russian
liturgical chant, although incorporating
various folklore elements, developed as a
purely vocal form. Not only does the Byzantine
Church regard musical instruments
as incapable of prayer or praise, it is felt
that because such instruments are used
for dance music, their use in the church
would profane the sacred space. Although
the oldest forms of the liturgy were unison
lines sung by men only, polyphony slowly
entered the arena as well. Women’s voices
gradually came to be accepted also, as
were various Western musical influences.
Despite these changes, the prohibition on
instruments has never been touched.
Western listeners unfamiliar with the
Byzantine Rite, so seemingly filled with
mysticism, often perceive Russian liturgical
music as the portal to another world: foreign,
fascinating, inexplicable. One reason
for this is the texts, so full of meaning, sung
in Old Church Slavonic [which developed
from Old Bulgarian]. Another is the Byzantine
modal tradition based on the eight
church modes, which follow completely
different harmonic rules than the major-minor
system so well known in Western Europe.
The characteristic melodic formulas
comprising the essence and magic of Russian
folk music, including their depth and
melancholy, are likewise found in Russian
liturgical chant. The two musical forms,
folkloristic and sacred vocal music, developed
alongside and mutually influenced
each other, after all.
In summer 1910, Rachmaninoff composed
his Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom,
often considered by music historians to be
a preliminary work for his actual masterpiece,
opus 37. The name of the 1915 work
is Vsenošc¡noe bde¡nie, a designation for the
“All-night Vigil” – a common form of worship
continuing through the night, subdivided
into the vespers at dusk, through the
midnight matins and on into the prime at
dawn. This type of service is still practised
in some cloisters on the eve of high feasts.
Rachmaninoff set the 15 fixed parts of
the liturgy to music. The texts of these pieces
are never changed, but are interspersed
with prayers, readings, litanies and tropes
related to the specific holiday. The evening
service primarily praises the Creator, points
to the compassionate arrival of Christ and
leads believers into the quiet space resulting
from the waning of the day. In contrast,
the morning service engenders hopeful joy
with its message of salvation from the New
Testament.
Traditionally, each number accompanies
a specific liturgical action: No. 1 is a
sort of invitation to the service (Come, let
us pray) when the curtain to the holy ark
is opened, the iconostase is opened in the
middle and the priest silently swings the incense
burner. While Rachmaninoff ‘freely’
set this beginning, composing the melody
himself in the style of traditional chant, the
alto solo in the second number (Praise the
Lord, O my soul) introduces the well known,
moving, ancient Greek melody carrying the
text of a shortened version of the Creation
Psalm (No. 103). This piece is a first high
point of the vespers, and presents believers
with the entire magnificence and grandeur
of the surrounding natural world. Rachmaninoff
lets the solo voice lead; the choir
only supports it with long, sustained tones.
This style, however, was not necessarily
the choice of the composer, but the strictly
laid out liturgical order proscribes even the
solistic or choral means to be used, demonstrating
the strict regimentation of the
Byzantine service.
Rachmaninoff wrote melodies for five
of the pieces (1, 6, 7, 10 and 11) himself, as
opposed to the others, which utilize old,
unison Greek and Russian liturgical chants.
The composer supremely mastered the
task of uniting all 15 numbers to one unified
whole in which there is never a trace of stylistic
discontinuity.
After the beatitude (No. 3), the evensong
hymn (No. 4) refers to the end of the day.
Set according to melodies of the Kiev region,
this is one of the oldest melodies in
the Orthodox Rite and gives the listener
an almost mystical experience, especially
as it is getting dim in the church at the
time the hymn is sung. The piece remains
pianissimo, oscillates stepwise with long
note values, finally putting the listener in a
trancelike state.
The vesper slowly comes to an end with
the canticle of Simeon (No. 5) (O Lord, now
you can dismiss your servant in peace).
Rachmaninoff wished to have this Orthodox
counterpart to the Latin Nunc dimittis sung
at his own funeral, which failed because
the music for it could not be found. But his
desire is a sign that he was highly satisfied
with this movement. The movement did,
however, give the conductor of the premiere
a major conundrum, as Rachmaninoff
himself told: “Towards the end, the basses
have a part, a pianissimo scale which slowly
rises to a B-flat in the high octave. When
I played this part, Danilin [conductor of the
premiere] shook his head and said, ‘For
God’s sake – where will we get basses who
can do this? They’re as rare as asparagus
at Christmas!’ But he found them. I knew the
voices of my fellow countrymen and knew
exactly what one can expect of Russian
basses!” The vesper closes after the Ave
Maria (No. 6), which pays homage to the
mother of God – segueing into the following
number with its magnificent Gloria and
into the prime service. The following two
numbers contain an extensive adoration of
God culminating in alleluias. The mystery
of the resurrection becomes increasingly
insistent. The entire resurrection day is described
vividly in Praise be to you, O Lord
my God (No. 9). Musically, the composition
lives from its alternating combinations of
frequently changing two- and three-part
voice groups and solos. It also conveys the
impression that these voice groups are acting
independently of each other. Number 10
(Christ is risen) is emphatically and meaningfully
sung by the men in unison. This is
the central moment of the liturgy, when
the priest carries the New Testament into
the middle of the church so that it can be
honored by worshipers like an icon; quasi
the countenance of Christ himself. After the
Magnificat (No. 11), the joy about the resurrection
is epochally expressed in two trope
arias before the mother of God is thanked
for having given birth to the Savior.
Critic Alexander Ossowsky once said
about Rachmaninoff’s sacred works, “One
does not have to be a believer or know the
dogmas or rites of the Orthodox church to
perceive the skill, the breadth of expression
and poetry of this music.” But if one
does know the world of the Byzantine belief
system, one perceives the All-Night Vigil –
as Rachmaninoff himself said at the work’s
premiere – as the “hour of the happiest ful-
fillment.”
Translation: Elizabeth Gahbler