by Stephanie Wade
All tracks and albums featured will be added to the PGS Music for Mindfulness playlists on Spotify and Apple Music: please click on the accompanying links for further information.
I know it is hard for everyone at this strange time, but we have all found different outlets and ways of coping with the lockdown stress! For me, it has been following @TheEvensongCup on Twitter where a world cup of canticles, anthems and Amens has been hosted over the first and third lockdown. All the competitions have encouraged me to listen to new choral music that I otherwise may never have heard. The recent world cup of Amens has particularly enticed me - my personal favourite Amen (Geistliches Lied- Brahms) came in second place, but the winner (by only three votes) was an Amen that I had never heard before.
Finzi’s ‘Lo the Full, Final sacrifice’ (the winning Amen) was a happy discovery for me. The fourteen-minute-long piece ends in a relatively short Amen. The Amen is well contrasted from the preceding section of music which is bass-ridden and rather haunting. It begins with treble voices singing a floating melody which is then built on in a fugue-like manner in the alto, tenor and bass parts. It then builds up to a thicker polyphonic texture and quite an unexpected ending. I enjoyed listening to this piece as it is quite different to that of the late romantic and more modern, post-great war era. It follows some of the ‘normal’ style but does seem to have a more unique sound when compared to other pieces from the period.
The Amen of ‘Geistliches Lied’ by Brahms is another that I would like to discuss. The Amen follows nicely with the rest of the piece and begins with monophony from the basses and the organ and quickly moves to a full polyphonic choir. The vocal parts use a mixture of minims, semibreves and breves, meaning that it feels rather relaxed. It also feels very grand and assertive as well, due to the arpeggiated melody that can be seen in the soprano and tenor parts, alongside sustained chordal patterns. In the organ part, a tonic pedal is held throughout the Amen section, along with an arpeggiated sequence in crotchets and ending in held chords in unison with the choir. This is my personal favourite Amen as I think that it feels very grand and relaxed at the same time. It feels fully finished and the use of dynamics within it provide a sense of a swell in the choir and organ before a simple, chordal ending.
The final Amen that I would like to mention is the Amen following the final collect in the (Bernard) Rose responses. As a chorister this is very familiar to me, but I still find it particularly enchanting. It is a lovely ending to a lovely setting of responses, and I think that it deserved to make it past the round of 16 in the cup of Amens! This is a singular Amen and the shortest I have discussed. The choir starts together, moves together in a chordal style and ends together, all unaccompanied. Despite the fact that this Amen seems simple, I think that it is particularly moving and a remarkable ending to the preces and responses.
Amens can often be overlooked as just an ending to a piece of choral music, however I believe they are entitled to their own glory. Common translations of Amen include: truly, let it be so, and, it is true. They nearly always conclude prayers, hymns, responses and blessings; however, they can be used so diversely within music and the composer can use different styles, textures or tonal centres to convey the mood they wish to create.
Recordings and time stamps (from Spotify).
Finzi- https://open.spotify.com/track/3bCFYjJGqyG6MviSbxqC3S 13.07
Brahms- https://open.spotify.com/track/4JiZqyZuPrX821WsLn6gBy 4.12
Rose- https://open.spotify.com/track/03adRNnTEss0TzOqlYl1P2 1.55
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