nate-resolve

how i Handel the holidays...

i live a pretty tradition-free life. there's the once a year Lanfest with my GeezerGamer boyz (woot!), there's leading Christmas carols one sunday in december at my church...that's about it, i guess. well, add one to the short list.

this is my 4th time in five years of attending the Do-It-Yourself Messiah at the Civic Opera House here in Chicago. i went with my sister, Georgia, this year. (you can read her take on it HERE).

it's fairly well known that despite my 6'3", 240 lb, manly frame, i'm a softie at heart. i can tear up at a commercial for coffee (i DO really love coffee...maybe that's why). add to THIS to the mix and you'll pretty much know how i feel about Messiah by Handel.

If you're not familiar with the story of Messiah, and how it came to be, i encourage you to read about it. the back story is very interesting. it took just 24 days to compose this complex and moving baroque masterpiece.

it's divided thematically into three parts. the first is christmas, or advent. the next would be the passion section, concerning the death and resurrection of Jesus. and the last part concerns itself with the return of Jesus, or 2nd coming, as it's often called. i have heard and read these stories in the Bible for as long as i can remember. i connect deeply to them, mostly during the seasons in which the first two are celebrated, and in remembering my father and others who have passed away trusting in the truth of each part. maybe it's due to being an artist, but much like the film, The Passion of the Christ, did in fleshing out the realities of those days in Jesus' life, Messiah often brings me to the place where i cannot even sing due to my emotional response.

it's more than one thing that causes this in me. as the post i wrote about music shows, i cannot listen to such music ambivalently. classical music is my favorite style, which gets me going upon simply seeing the orchestra. Messiah is often in minor keys, and is often in 3/4, 3/8, and 6/8 time...more things that draw me into it. and while the choral parts are 1/4 and 1/8 note nightmares to sightread, (see "And He Shall Purify"), and probably 30% of the people at this DIY Messiah have no ability to do so, when we DO know the song (e.g. Hallelujah chorus), or Handel gives our brain to vocal chord neural pathways a break (e.g. Since By Man Came Death or Worthy Is The Lamb) it's an amazing thing to hear an orchestra and three thousand people bring a little bit of what the angels probably sound like (i'm assuming they don't have pitch problems).

there's the especially beautiful moments of music, too. when the Overture ends and the orchestra starts into Comfort Ye My People...it's pretty nearly perfect...and then the tenor makes it completely so as he begins to sing. then there's the choral piece, For Unto Us A Child Is Born...and i have the same thoughts that Chopin's music often causes..."who thinks like this?" the movement and melody and counter-melody. to write something like that with the help of music software seems near impossible. paper and pen? it's almost like Handel had multiple personality disorder and each of them were singing a part in his head at the same time. the way "the kingdom of this world...is become..." starts so quietly after a rather enthusiatic entrance to the song (Hallelujah chorus) and crescendos into "THE KINGDOM OF OUR LORD AND OF HIS CHRIST...AND OF HIS CHRIST!"...to move it so far in so short a time without it feeling awkward or herky-jerky (a highly technical composer term)...it's so sweet. the soprano's beautiful melody on "I Know That My Redeemer Liveth", the matching of music to lyrics in "The Trumpet Shall Sound" and the feeling like there's millions of voices just out of earshot singing along in "Worthy Is The Lamb"...each of these musical points is my favorite moment in the entire Messiah...whichever one is currently happening.

but it's not only that deep bond to the music. each year i participate in this, and live, and see the world, and long for His Kingdom, the lyrics...simply scripture...become more powerful, more reassuring, more comforting, more encouraging, and more strengthening. several times this year i couldn't sing simply because the thought of the truth being sung, whether by the DIY chorus, or the soloist, was simply too much to take it. these are the stories, thoughts, truths, that i've heard for many years, and believe with as much of my heart happens not to be commandeered by me at any given moment. the music, especially well composed to match the words being sung, connects me to that truth even more. Handel's Messiah literally draws me to worship, probably more than any other musical piece, chorus, or hymn. God's word is a story...one story...from front to back. it's the story of His love for us, our creating a unbridgeable gap, and His pursuit and intervention and sacrifice to close the gulf between Him and man. Messiah is like a 2 1/2 hour cliff notes version of this story that started before time.


the rest of this post is over on my other blog as it pertains less to the artistic part of this and more how my life relates to it.

as for the "resolve" part of this...i resolve to actually learn my part. not sure which. maybe both tenor and bass. but i simply don't sing by sightreading enough anymore to step in and do that. in high school? no problem. i was in every choir they'd let me be a part of. now? this is the only day of the year i have to do it. and this score is like painting the sistine chapel by paint by number. not where you want to start, even with it mapped out. i'm gonna know this thing next year. and the year after that. probably three years out from now i'll start forgetting...but for the next two years? look out!