First Sunday Music

This Sunday is known as both Palm Sunday and Sunday of the Passion. In the Tridentine period, these two themes were ascribed to separate Sundays, but since the Second Vatican Council, they have been merged into a single liturgy. Thus, on Palm Sunday, we not only commemorate Jesus entering into Jerusalem, riding on a donkey, but we also perform a full reading (indeed, a slightly dramatic chanting) of the Passion story from Matthew’s Gospel.

It is in this context that the choir will present a multi-movement cantata by the 20th-century British composer Kenneth Leighton (1929-1988), set for chorus, organ, and tenor or soprano soloist. The text of its four movements are by two 17th-century English poets: Patrick Carey (1623-1657) and Phineas Fletcher (1582-1650), the latter of whom had a connection to Cambridge University, where Leighton served as a faculty member.

These texts, especially those by Carey, serve as a meditation on Christ’s incarnation, suffering, and death. The first two parts contrast the rather vivid image of Jesus freezing as a child, ostensibly in a cold cave, and glowing with the ‘heat’ of his rejection in the Garden of Gethsemane. The third part brings these two indignities together by asking the question: Why did he suffer so? The answer is simply ’twas for thy sake’. Finally, Fletcher’s ‘Hymn’, a well-known text often set to music, acts as a personal reflection on the crucifixion, ‘Drop, drop, slow tears.’

This work utilizes Leighton’s most chromatic and dense harmony to emphasize the cruelty of Christ’s death, and the emotional, spiritual, and physical suffering he endured. This is turgid, tearing, raw music with an intense atmosphere. The soloist functions as a sort of ‘Evangelist’ similar to a traditional passion setting, while the choir responds with various exclamations.

The final a cappella hymn is one of the great moments in English choral literature. Leighton weaves a beautiful, revolving, placid music of introspective quality and we are allowed to contemplate the meaning of Christ's death for ourselves.

Hear bits of Leighton’s Crucifixus Pro Nobis here (the ‘Hymn’ is at the beginning and end of this video) and a couple of other extracts.

—Justin Appel, Director of Music