Transformative Encounters in the Splendor of 1596 Gröningen
A fringe event for the 2021 Boston Early Music Festival
Canto Armonico's online streamed program on the evening of June 16th transports the viewer back to the summer of 1596 to the principality of Braunschweig-Lüneburg, ruled by bishop and duke Heinrich Julius, a staunch Lutheran. (Extended Program Notes supplement the slide show.)
Biographical Sketches of the Players
You have heard that 54 organ builders and players have been invited to a magnificent gathering in a lovely country castle. It's to last a week and all expenses are paid by the duke. Amid the mingling, marveling at the castle's grand decorations, and certain frivolity, their duties are primarily to test the new, enormous state-of-the-art organ built for the young Duke Heinrich Julius. You’ve heard stories of the duke’s wealth and ambitions. He has transformed the local landscape with grand and striking buildings, including a new university, and then there’s that huge wine cask that some say is the biggest in the world.
But the lure of the meeting is the chance to mingle with colleagues from all over the German realms as they probe the delights of the new instrument. It will be fascinating to hear about the virtuosic stars young and old, and what the other organ builders think of the instrument, and certainly to hear the perspective of the Hasslers from southern Germany. Both Hans Leo and his older brother Kasper are known to be expert organ testers, and Hans Leo has not only published some very interesting vocal music recently in the new Italian styles, he’s also supposedly written new types of keyboard music.
We have read that Bach, 
130 years later, was sought for organ testing, a fairly standardized procedure in which outsiders improvised music to try out various parts of the mechanism, inspect the power and stability of the winding system, and hear the speech and varied tone qualities of the pipes. In June during the all-virtual Boston Early Music Festival, Canto Armonico will recreate a portion of the Gröningen meeting as four of the invited players show off their improvisational prowess — Hieronymus Praetorius, Johann Steffens, Michael Praetorius, and Hans Leo Hassler — together with the uninvited Dutch organist from Amsterdam, Jan Pieterszoon Sweelinck, whose music-making was creating waves across Europe.
The job of organist at the castle might be up for grabs. Word has it that the duke is fed up with the village musician and is sending him up to Hamburg to study with Hieronymus Praetorius and learn some discipline, for starters. Among the group of 54, there are quite a few 30-somethings who might be interested in moving to Gröningen, if the duke likes them. But then there’s that young Michael Praetorius, already in the neighborhood. He’s barely 25. Is he really a possibility?
Music in the Time of Trial
- The sea is calm to-night,
- The tide is full, the moon lies fair
- Upon the straits; -- on the French coast, the light
- Gleams, and is gone; the cliffs of England stand,
- Glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay.
- Come to the window, sweet is the night-air!
- Only, from the long line of spray
- Where the ebb meets the moon-blanch'd sand,
- Listen! you hear the grating roar
- Of pebbles which the waves suck back, and fling,
- At their return, up the high strand,
- Begin, and cease, and then again begin,
- With tremulous cadence slow, and bring
- The eternal note of sadness in.
from Dover Beach by Matthew Arnold
We navigate rough, menacing, even terrifying waters in these days of pestilence. During Holy Week, let music from Canto Armonico offer solace and hope, keeping us afloat so that we can marvel at the sea, stars, heavens, and all the fascinating beauty of the universe. May Mary, Star of the Sea and Mother of God, keep serene watch over all of us as we persevere and await the glory that is to come.
Franz Liszt: Ave Maria, gratia plena
Leopold, Holy Roman Emperor: Ave Maris Stella
Christopher Theofanidis: God Picks up the Reed-Flute and Blows
Hassler at Gröningen 1596
- Thursday, June 14th at 3 pm
- First Lutheran Church, 299 Berkeley Street
- Admission: $20 general, $10 students
The striking, state-of-the-art (in late renaissance Germany) organ by David Beck in the court chapel of Duke Heinrich Julius in Gröningen was ready to be played in August, 1596 after four years of work by Beck and his group of assistants, artists, painters and sculptors. The duke wouldn't take anything less; magnificence and his reputation for achieving it were on the line. So he invited 54 highly regarded organists and organ builders throughout the lands to come for a week to test and perform on the organ, all expenses paid. They would spread the fame of the organ far and wide, and his name with it.
Hans Leo Hassler was the one of the special guests, with reputed dazzling proficiency on the organ. And having studied composition with Andrea Gabrieli in Italy with four volumes of vocal music in exciting new styles to discuss with his peers, he was deemed well worth the extra expense to bring him northwards. His position on the list of performing organists was also a test: how would he stack up against the great Hieronymus Praetorius, Johannes Stephani, and Michael Praetorius, all highly respected in the north?
Come and hear Nicola Procaccini, recent winner of the Buxtehude Organ Competition in Lübeck, playing some of Hassler's amazing organ works, and Canto Armonico singing several of Hassler's motets and songs for the duke, and revel in the sounds of Gröningen, 1596.
Marian Music at St. Barnabas Church, Falmouth on Cape Cod
- Saturday, August 11th at 6 pm
- Freewill offering
Our program of music in honor of Mary, the mother of God, proceeds in chronological order from the Annunciation of Jesus's birth to her Assumption into heaven. To say that the repertory of music commemorating Mary is rich would be an understatement. In the liturgical calendar the feasts of the Annunciation and the Assumption occur on March 25th and August 15th, but with the addition of the season of Advent and the various ceremonies attendant to Jesus' birth such as the Circumcision and the Purification, in which Mary plays a substantial part, much of the year provides numerous opportunities for composers writing in the catholic tradition to pay homage to her, in music that is by turns reverential, exuberant, sorrowful, serene, festive, entreating, solemn, joyful, and ravishingly beautiful.
Marian music has been sung regularly in the catholic churches since at least the early middle ages. Lutherans and Anglicans hold weekly evening services that always feature the Magnificat, Mary's joyful consent to bear God's son. The music can be as simple as chant or much more extended, as in orchestral, multi-movement works like Bach's Magnificat. Likewise, Marian devotional music can range in length and complexity depending on the number of feasts referenced. In the Roman Catholic tradition, Mary's role as intercessor is acknowledged formally at the conclusion of mass, by the spoken "Ave Maria," Hail Mary, or, during the weeks following Easter, the "Regina Coeli Laetare," Queen of Heaven, Rejoice. Settings of these two prayers are abundant in works of the great renaissance master Orlandus Lassus, more than eight for "Regina Coeli Laetare" alone. Our program contains two "Ave Maria" settings with different texts, one of "Regina Coeli Laetare," a Magnificat interweaving chant and florid polyphony, and Marian hymns and motets for her various feasts, by composers from the time of Guillaume Dufay up to that of the great Elizabethan musician, William Byrd.
Boston Bach Birthday on March 17th
For our first-ever appearance in First Lutheran's annual celebration of Bach's Birthday -- this year being his 333rd, or the CCCXXXIII -- we sing his motet "Der Geist hilft unsrer Schwachheit auf" for two choirs. Professor Arvid Gast, head of church music at the Musikhochschule Lübeck and chair of the jury for the forthcoming Boston Bach International Organ Competition, will be in town to direct this performance. For many years he served as Leipzig University Organist, with regular appearances at the two inner-city churches where Bach performed his music, St. Thomas and St. Nicholas. We look forward to working with Prof. Gast for this special appearance!
In a break with local tradition, our accompaniment will not use the accustomed chamber organ, rather opting for theorbo with support from harpsichord, 16' violone, and baroque cello. Bach's continuo group seems to have used a much larger positive organ for accompaniments, one that would also provide obbligato solos on occasion. As an example, see the front cover of Laurence Dreyfus' Bach's Continuo Group: Players and Practices in his Vocal Works (1987).
First Lutheran Church has presented the Boston Bach Birthday (BBB) on Saturdays nearest to March 21st for 10 years now. The event is co-sponsored by the Boston chapter of the American Guild of Organists, with short organ concerts by members of the Boston community interspersed with instrumental (solo and chamber) and choral music by Bach, with a homemade "Bachs Lunch" at 11:30 and ending with a Bach Vespers at 5 pm. Canto Armonico's appearance will take place at 12:50 during this year's program.
Celebrating Telemann in December with Simon Carrington
Concerts in Boston and Falmouth
On tap for the weekend of December 1st and 2nd is a joint orchestral-choral concert with Simon Carrington! We welcome him back to Boston and feature his first Cape Cod appearance with Canto Armonico in music by Bach's contemporary Georg Philipp Telemann. Telemann, more highly regarded than Bach in his day, produced church music, chamber and orchestral music, and opera in abundance and with great enthusiasm.
Telemann's "Water Music" overture, a delightful suite of dances, pays homage to the gods of the sea and wind, with one section depicting the ebb and flow of tides around Hamburg -- just as in Boston Harbor or Vineyard Sound. Equally appealing are his Paris Quartets, and the combined forces join to hail the beginning of December with Telemann's German Magnificat and cantata "Nun komm der Heiden Heiland" for Advent Sunday.
Come hear us:
- at First Lutheran Church in Boston on Friday, December 1 at 8 pm
- or at John Wesley Methodist Church in Falmouth on Saturday, December 2 at 8 pm
Tickets at door: $20 general admission, $10 students/seniors, children under 14 free
Summer 2017 with Canto Armonico
We performed the program "Vanished Glories Across the Channel" at the Church of the Messiah in Woods Hole on August 26th and a portion of the same program the next day in Hyannis Port, then headed across the Atlantic for more appearances in Germany! From our base in Lübeck, we headed to Preetz up in Schleswig-Holstein on September 1st, and on the following day down to Hamburg/Bergedorf, where "Vanished Glories" sounded glorious indeed in a church built in the early 1500s, just at the time the music on the program was written. The audience loved it all, giving us not just one but two standing ovations! The following morning, we sang four pieces during the service at Lübeck's historic St. Jakobi church. Our organist Jonathan Wessler, never having set foot on German soil before, played accompaniment and postlude on the Jakobi's magnificent instruments without having had practice time on either!
The program for these concerts, 
entitled "Vanished Glories Across the Channel," combines English Reformation-era music with Italian music from the Counter-Reformation and the years preceding it. The centerpiece is William Byrd's powerful "Infelix Ego," to words by Girolamo Savonarola (1452-1498), an Italian friar deeply and sincerely opposed to the religious hypocrisy around him in Florence. His calls for reform rattled the Medici in power. In return, he was burned at the stake, yet he is memorialized on the Reformers' Statue in Worms, the city where Martin Luther made his famous "Here I stand" speech in front of emperor Charles V.
Reformation Music for the 2016-2017 Season
Reformation Jubilee Vespers in Dresden, June 16
At First Lutheran Church, 5 pm: Dr. Ulf Wellner returns to direct Canto Armonico in music of Schütz, Scheidt and Praetorius, based on a description of the Jubilee events at Dresden's Hofkapelle beginning on October 31, 1617. Michael Praetorius, acting Kapellmeister at the time, was not given leave to attend by his superior in Wolfenbüttel, so chapel organist Schütz directed all the music instead, and got promoted to Kapellmeister shortly afterwards! This concert is given during the Boston Early Music Festival.
Christmas music on December 9 in Boston, and December 10 in Stonington, Connecticut
Canto Armonico performs music of German Reformation-era composers such as Michael Praetorius and Heinrich Schütz with modern German and English counterparts Hugo Distler, Benjamin Britten, and William Walton, at First Lutheran Church, Boston (Friday, 8 pm) and at the La Grua Center in Stonington, Connecticut (Saturday, 5 pm).
Both programs feature Praetorius' Magnificat super Angelus ad Pastores with interpolated old German carols, six in all. The interpolated Magnificat at Christmastide is a practice that Praetorius encouraged during vesper services, as it invited the congregation to participate using contemporary spiritual songs, some of them very jaunty in character, whether in German or Latin!
September 2016 Concert Tour in Central Germany featured Reformation-era Music
September brought a singular honor to Canto Armonico: an invitation to perform in the annual Praetorius-Tage in Michael's native town of Creuzburg, in central Germany near Eisenach. Held over the second weekend in September in the church where Michael Praetorius was baptized, the festival brought in a large and enthusiastic crowd. It was a magnificent opportunity for Canto Armonico to perform in this famous old building with Martin Luther's portrait prominently displayed within! Earlier in the day, many of the singers climbed up and toured the nearby Wartburg castle where Luther translated the New Testament during his confinement there. Our program in Creuzburg, entitled "Vesper zum Johannisfest mit Musik von und um Michael Praetorius," featured psalms, motets and a two-choir Magnificat by Michael Praetorius and his contemporaries, interspersed with chant sung in 17th-century Lutheran style by Director and Kantor Dr. Ulf Wellner. The entire program was broadcast live on Saturday, September 10th, by Wartburg Radio in Eisenach. We were delighted to perform the same program for two other congregations in historic churches in Minden and Celle, north and west of Hannover. In Minden we were treated to a tour of the over 1000-year-old church by Pastor Christoph Ruffer, including a climb up into the sturdy bell tower where we were indeed transported backward in time! We were joined in the concerts by Christoph Seehase, lute, and Isabel Walter and Christine Vogel, gambas.
In separate programs, we sang Tudor Reformation music in smaller churches in Hämelschenburg and Erfurt. Again, we were greeted with large and most appreciative audiences eager to hear our Reformation-themed programs and, in turn, were amazed by the ancient artwork and historical objects on display in even the smallest buildings. We plan return visits in 2017.
Celestial Harmonies, Divine Inspiration: Vespers Music for the Tudors
July 20th at 5 pm, St. Christopher's Church, Chatham, a program of Tudor church music
In the early 1600s the Separatists came to Cape Cod to practice their faith free of the restrictions imposed by the Church of England. In due time, Anglicans followed. St. Christopher's in Chatham is the setting for a program of Anglican and English Catholic music from the early years of the reformation (ca. 1540-1590), by three of England's greatest composers active during those tumultuous times: John Sheppard, Thomas Tallis, and William Byrd.
Our First Recording Appears on Hungaroton/Naxos!
Chorales of Michael Praetorius, Heinrich Schütz, Johann Hermann Schein, and Samuel Scheidt
Now available from Hungaroton and iTunes, a new recording of Bach's monumental Clavierübung III by Bálint Karosi, with Canto Armonico performing the chorales that provide the basis for Bach's organ settings.
In this recording Canto Armonico is directed by Cheryl Ryder, artistic director and manager of Canto Armonico, and Ulf Wellner, former Kantor at Lübeck's Jakobikirche and now Kantor at the Martinikirche in Minden, Germany. Professor Markus Rathey of Yale University has written the liner notes.
Most current recordings of the Clavierübung III feature the organ chorale versions only, but this new recording immerses the listener in the 17th-century world of the young Bach and fellow composers, and demonstrates how central the sung chorale was to these German composers' lives. They would have known not only the simple versions of the chorales from church hymnals, but also many of the polyphonic settings published and sung by boys in the Latin school curriculum. Canto Armonico records a sampling of these polyphonic chorale settings alongside their simpler counterparts, as follows:
- Kyrie, Gott Vater in Ewigkeit: chant from the Leipziger Gesangbuch, polyphonic setting by Heinrich Schütz
- Allein Gott in der Höh sei Ehr: chorale from Scheidt's Görlitz Tabulaturbuch, polyphonic setting by Michael Praetorius
- Dies sind den heilgen zehn Gebot: chorale from Schein's Cantional, duet for basses by Michael Praetorius
- Wir glauben all in einen Gott: chorale by Michael Praetorius, polyphonic setting by Samuel Scheidt
- Vater unser in Himmelreich: chorale from Schein's Cantional, double chorus setting by Samuel Scheidt
- Christ unser Herr zum Jordan kam: chorale from Schein's Cantional, duet for tenors by Michael Praetorius
- Aus tiefer Not schrei ich zu Dir: chorale from Schein's Cantional, accompanied duet for sopranos by Johann Hermann Schein
- Jesus Christus, unser Heiland: chorale from Schein's Cantional, double chorus setting by Michael Praetorius
The settings by Praetorius for two tenors and two basses, in particular, merit special attention as they demonstrate how adept the composer was at writing music for whatever forces were at his disposal! We recorded the chorales in September and October under the direction of Dr. Ulf Wellner, a specialist in the music of Michael Praetorius, who directed our June 2013 performance of the St. John the Baptist vespers service during Boston's Early Music Festival.
Lutheran Vespers Music by Canto Armonico
Jakob Handl: Emitte Spiritum
Michael Praetorius: Der heil'ge Geist von Himmel kam
Michael Praetorius: Komm, heiliger Geist
Heinrich Schütz: Becker Psalm 104: Herr, wie gross sind deine Werk
Hieronymus Praetorius: Psalm 100: Jubilate Deo
Giovanni Rovetta: Psalm 117: Laudate Dominum
Heinrich Schütz: Psalm 115: Nicht uns, Herr