But surely not “Western European….” That I have never seen. Where does that leave Brahms? Vienna is not Western Europe. Chopin? Warsaw is not Western Europe. Dvorak? Prague is not Western Europe. Vivaldi? Venice is not Western Europe, and the whole of Italy is not either.
“European art music” is simple, descriptive, accurate, basically coterminous with the practice of written music — musical notation being a European invention dating from ca 1035. Read More »
IN CASE you missed it: the architect who oversaw restoration of Notre Dame Cathedral in 2013 and was chief architect of France’s historic monuments says the ancient oak timbers of the cathedral could not have ignited and burned so quickly without “a lot of kindling:”
“Oak that is 800-years-old is very hard – try to burn it,” Mouton said. “Old oak, it is not easy at all. You would need a lot of kindling to succeed… It stupefies me.”
Asked to present an explanation for how the blaze spread so quickly and with such strength, Mouton asserted that there were no additional precautions that could have been taken to ensure such a “quick” incineration could be prevented.
“In the Nineties, we updated all the electrical wiring of Notre Dame,” Mouton said. “So there is no possibility of a short circuit. We updated to conform with the contemporary norms, even going very far – all the detection and protection systems against fire in the cathedral.”
Mouton also revealed that there are two watchmen on duty around the clock who monitor for any chance of fire, adding that the technical and security measures taken to protect monuments like Notre Dame are unprecedented. [Source]
The New York Timesblamed the fire on Mouton. This video supposedly shows the effect of a blow torch on old oak. Hmm, the fire may have been a case of “some people doing something.”
In related news, a Harvard University professor toldRolling Stone the fire represents “liberation:”
[N]otre Dame has also served as a deep-seated symbol of resentment, a monument to a deeply flawed institution and an idealized Christian European France that arguably never existed in the first place. “The building was so overburdened with meaning that its burning feels like an act of liberation,” says Patricio del Real, an architecture historian at Harvard University. If nothing else, the cathedral has been viewed by some as a stodgy reminder of “the old city — the embodiment of the Paris of stone and faith — just as the Eiffel Tower exemplifies the Paris of modernity, joie de vivre and change,” Michael Kimmelmann wrote for the New York Times.
Don’t miss new comments by the reader John added to this previous entry on Notre Dame. John writes:
In some ways the majority of people become co-conspirators in some sense by putting their heads in the sand and effectively helping them to cover these things up.
Lord Acton wrote of the French Revolution:
“The appalling thing in it is not the tumult but the design. Through all the fire and smoke, we perceive evidence of calculating organization. The managers remain studiously concealed, but there is no doubt about their presence from the first.”
I WAS walking through the lobby of an “assisted living” facility about two years ago when I saw a touching and beautiful sight.
Someone had brought in a glass tank filled with straw and placed it on a table in the lobby, where the residents gathered to watch television and stare off into the distance. Racing about in little circles inside the tank were several small, fuzzy, energetic, and bewildered baby chicks.
An old woman — partly balding, no longer in possession of her full mind, clearly out of touch with the important and complicated world beyond this place — sat in front of the tank, which was lit with a warming incubator light. She was riveted. Every particle of her being, it seemed, was concentrated on the sight before her. Sitting as close to the tank as possible and hunching over to see as much as she could, she stared at the chicks without moving or speaking.
It was genius and great kindness on the part of whoever brought the chicks there. They were filled with an energy and newness the old woman no longer possessed. And, like her, their existence was caught up in the tiniest of things. The sight of them gave her new life.
We all possess within us the capacity for rebirth. Whether we are old or young, rich or poor, happy or sad, smart or senile, we have the capacity for resurrection. In that way, our inner drama reflects the greatest event in human history, the mystery which we celebrate today.
“Brethren, purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new paste, as you are unleavened: for Christ our Pasch is sacrificed. Therefore let us feast, not with the old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.” (Epistle: 1 Cor. v. 7-8)
God promised he would come. And He did. He promised He would rise from the dead. And He did.
May your Easter be filled with joy and may you ever be born anew in Christ’s eternal promises.
“JESUS on the cross! O stupendous sight for heaven and earth of mercy and of love! To see the Son of God dying through pain upon a cross of infamy, condemned as a malefactor to so bitter and shameful a death, in order to save sinful men from the penalty that was due to them! This sight has ever been, and will always be, the subject of the contemplation of the saints, and has led them willingly to renounce all the goods of the earth, and to embrace with great courage sufferings and death, that they might make themselves more pleasing to a God who died for love of them. The sight of Jesus despised between two thieves has made them love contempt far more than worldings have loved the honors of the world. Beholding Jesus covered with wounds upon the cross, they hold in abhorrence the pleasures of sense, and have endeavored to afflict their flesh in order to unite their sufferings to the sufferings of the Crucified. Beholding the patience of our Savior in his death, they have joyfully accepted the most painful sicknesses, and even the most cruel torments that tyrants can inflict. Lastly, from beholding the love of Jesus Christ in being willing to sacrifice his life for us in a sea of sorrows, they have sought to sacrifice to him all that they had, possessions, children, and even life itself.”
“WE KNOW how great is the gift which Our Lord bestows upon us in the Blessed Sacrament when we consider that in this Adorable Sacrament He gives us something of Himself, aye, of His own Person; Himself really and substantial, whole and entire, in His humanity and in His divinity. In the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar Jesus has given us something of Himself, of His own Person. He announced this to us in establishing this sublime and adorable Sacrament at the Last Supper. For then Jesus, Our Saviour and Redeemer, did not say, “This is bread, and that signifies My body,” nor did He say, “This is and remains bread, and shall symbolize to you My body;” nor did the apostles hear from His divine lips, “As this was bread, so it remains bread, and shall be a memorial of My body.” No, those truthful, holy lips said clearly and plainly to the apostles,”This which I have in My hand, which you see, which appears like bread is My body.” And nowadays, people do violence to the words of Jesus, twisting them at their pleasure, and say we have nothing more in this wonderful Sacrament than in the other sacraments; they say that as in the other sacraments we have water, oil and chrism, so in this Adorable Sacrament we have but bread. Certainly it is true that we are purified by water in baptism; strengthened by chrism in confirmation; anointed in sickness by consecrated oils; but, ye who have true faith, your Lord does not nourish your soul in holy communion by blessed bread. No, far holier, far more divine, is this food. That which you receive here is not really bread, but something of the Lord Himself.
ONE of the typical signs of a false flag is a dramatic rescue, an exciting leitmotif that gets ’em coming back for more.
At Christchurch, we had the man hailed as a hero for chasing the shooter from mosque. At the Pulse nightclub shootings in Florida, we had the hero cop. At the Nice truck attack, we had the hero motorcyclist.
The presence of a hero, whose story is instantly broadcast around the world, is certainly not conclusive proof that state-sponsored terrorism is at work. After all, real heroism exists. But when a hero who has been at other false flag events, whose story reads as if scripted by a Hollywood producer, is involved then we have at the very least an important suggestion that the official story of a public disaster is not true.
Such is the case with the story of Fr. Jean-Marc Fournier who reportedly rescued the Crown of Thorns and a Nail from the Holy Cross from the burning Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris this week. This New York Times account is one of many that reads like a movie trailer. The audience will believe anything.
Fr. Fournier, we are told, was also allegedly involved in the Bataclan shooting in Paris, rushing inside and imparting a general absolution on those who had been shot.
When he saw the flames getting closer to the cathedral’s two towers, Father Fournier’s thoughts turned to another fire chaplain: the Rev. Mychal F. Judge, who died at the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001.
Father Fournier’s job has made him a witness to some of his own city’s most traumatic events in recent years.
A chaplain with the Paris Fire Brigade since 2011, Father Fournier, 53, saw the bodies of the journalists and cartoonists killed at the Charlie Hebdo newsroom in January 2015. He was also at the scene shortly after an attacker stormed a kosher supermarket two days later. And he was among the hundreds of firefighters who evacuated survivors at the Bataclan concert hall during the Paris attacks in November 2015, where 90 people died in a terrorist attack.
Not just one, not two, but three probable staged events, for which this ever-present priest just happened to be on hand. And now a fourth.
Fr. Fournier is reportedly a former member of the Fraternity of St Peter (FSSP), a traditionalist order in communion with Rome. Why did he leave? What is his full background? We do not know.
Could the story of his dramatic rescue be true? Yes.
But a rescue of the Crown of Thorns during Holy Week from a building more iconic of Christian civilization than almost any other, a building intensely despised by the Church’s enemies? It all reads as if it came from a committee of mass manipulators thrilled with their own talents.
Let’s reserve judgment about this suspicious fire, which some are predictably blaming on Muslims. Let’s reserve judgment until we know more. The suspension of belief is an assertion of independence and sanity. Read More »
“WHY did Christ come upon earth? To make Reparation; for no other reason. He came to repair His Divine work which sin had ruined, to restore to man his supernatural life; to compensate, by His merits, for the insult offered to the Father in the garden of Eden and for those insults which man’s malice daily renews and multiplies. He came to expiate by His sufferings in the stable, during His Hidden Life and on the Cross, the human selfishness which began with man’s creation and never ceases.
“Our dear Lord could have performed this work of Reparation alone, but He did not so will it. He has chosen as associates each one of us, every Christian. We must grasp this truth well, for it is the foundation of the doctrine of Reparation. Read More »
The Scottish born Roman Catholic James MacMillan (b. 1959) produced a real gem of 20th-Century music with the intensely expressive and sonically varied Seven Last Words from the Cross for choir and string orchestra. The work was commissioned in 1993 by the BBC. The writing for choir is very difficult (highly dissonant tonalities), and exploits almost every aspect of the human voice, including glissandi, speaking and whispering. The amount of varied material the composer gets out of the limited instrumentation of choir and strings is impressive.
The string orchestra does much more than just accompany the singing. The strings are their own voice, and in the last movement, you can even hear some hints of Scottish folk music. There are times when only the choir is featured, others when only the strings are called upon. But mainly, choir and orchestra work with each other to produce an integrated work of modern art.
What is wonderful about music after the hyper-modern movement of the early to mid-20th century is the freedom allowed artists remains but the extreme experimentation has passed. There was nowhere else for music to go after Anton Webern, Elliot Carter, Pierre Boulez and Meredith Monk. Every aspect of music, tonality, rhythm, melody, instrumentation was blown up! John Cage dropped a grand piano onto a football field from a helicopter, for Pete’s sake!
As eye-rolling as some of modern music seems, the modern composer can rightly do anything he wants now. He may use a mixture of modern techniques of dissonance and odd instrumentation, but also what Lenard Bernstein called “Music of the Earth,” or tunes, triadic harmonies, and repetition.
MacMillan’s Seven Last Words is a perfect example of this freedom afforded to modern artists at the service of expression. This work is highly dissonant, and uses masses of sound at some points (held tone clusters, think Ligeti in 2001: A Space Odyssey), but spans of silence are also employed. Silence is something you won’t hear a lot of in 18th- and 19th-century music. For example, in the Seventh of The Words (the last movement), the strings incorporate sustained silence to express the feeling of “Into Thy Hands I Commend My Spirit” and in order to balance a 45-minute piece of music.
The ending of this piece is very complicated. The tonality is not resolved, indeed the piece ends on a minor second (a black key next to a white key on the piano). And the length of the ending is like a troubled sigh. Is there something after? Is this an ending? Is it sad, is it hopeful? Are we still in the Crucifixion, or are we looking forward to the Resurrection that we know is coming? The ending is brilliant.
The attached Youtube performance is of the Swedish Norrbotten Chamber orchestra and Erik Westbergs Vokalensemble. The rest of the work is here. The musicians are performers, using quasi theatrics, including blocking, levels, and some acting, that I think are appropriate and effective, as unconventional as they are.
To those only exposed to 18th- and 19th-century classical music, this will be a challenge but it is an absolute masterpiece in its ability to express what it means to express.
Given that there were restoration works going on exactly on the roof and spire that burned, I wonder if the fire was not indeed done on purpose by the government, exactly in order to “restore it” or rather rebuild it afterwards in a post-modern way.
LEEKS are a great vegetable in the kitchen, very popular in French cooking and in Wales, where the leek is a national emblem and where they supposedly say,
Eat leeks in March and wild garlic in May And all year after physicians may play.
They are not so common on American tables but they have definitely grown in popularity.
Botanically, leeks are related to onions, shallots, garlics and scallions. As an edible, they have a subtlety that is superior to all of these. Though leeks usually reach full maturity in the fall, they can be found in supermarkets all year. Look for ones that are not dried out at the ends and not super-thick. (Thinner seems better.) The long leaves are white at the base, light green in the middle and dark green at the end. The ends are tough and not usually used, though they make a good addition to stock. When they are straight from the garden, leeks are loaded with sandy dirt between the leaves and it’s best to slice them crosswise and then put them in a bowl full of water for a few minutes to thoroughly remove the dirt. Several rinses may be needed.
Leeks are great with Easter dinner because their subtlety goes well with strong tasting meats such as ham and lamb. Their gentle green is suggestive of spring.
Here is a recipe from Williams Sonoma that I have made several times. If you make this for a crowd, you will have to wash and chop lots of leeks but other than that this is very easy to make. Once again, GROO-yair cheese is a star ingredient. This dish is rich, I admit. It’s not something you want to eat every day and you should not pair it with other gratin-type side dishes. But it is a delicious dish worthy of a celebration.
Palmesel, 15th century German, Limewood with paint (Metropolitan Museum of Art)
“Today, again, our Saviour sets out in the morning for Jerusalem. His intention is to repair to the temple, and continue His yesterday’s teachings. It is evident that His mission on earth is fast drawing to its close. He says to His Disciples: You know that after two days shall be the Pasch, and the Son of Man shall be delivered up to be crucified (St. Matth., xxvi. 2).
On the road from Bethania to Jerusalem, the Disciples are surprised at seeing the fig tree, which their Divine Master had yesterday cursed, now dead. Addressing himself to Jesus, Peter says: Rabbi, behold, the fig tree, which thou didst curse, is withered away (St. Mark, xi. 21). In order to teach us that the whole of material nature is subservient to the spiritual element, when this last is united to God by faith,–Jesus replies: Have the faith of God. Amen I say to you, that whosoever shall say to this mountain: Be thou removed and cast into the sea! and shall not stagger in his heart, but believe, that whatsoever he saith shall be done, it shall be done unto him (Idem, ibid., 22, 23).
Having entered the City, Jesus directs his steps towards the Temple. No sooner has he entered, than the Chief Priests, the Scribes, and the Ancients of the people, accost him with these words: By what authority dost thou these things? and who has given thee this authority, that thou shouldst do these things (St. Mark, xi. 28)? We shall find our Lord’s answer given in the Gospel. Our object is to mention the leading events of the last days of our Redeemer on earth; the holy Volume will supply the details.
As on the two preceding days, Jesus leaves the City towards evening: He passes over Mount Olivet, and returns to Bethania, where He finds His Blessed Mother and his devoted friends.
I was on a train back into Paris this afternoon when I started receiving a number of messages on my phone asking if I had heard about Notre Dame. The roof was on fire, I was told, and it might be difficult to put out. But the first thought that came to mind was that all things happen by God’s will or His permission. Nothing is random. Everything has a purpose. This was Monday of Holy Week. Could I help but think of Our Lord’s words, “Weep not for me, but for your children“?
Just yesterday in the liturgy Our Lord was triumphantly welcomed into Jerusalem, a city He so loved. A city whose denizens He wished to gather as “the hen doth gather her chickens under her wings.” A city that would not know, would not accept the “things that are to thy peace.”
France, in the person of King Louis XIV, that most disastrous of Capetian monarchs, refused the request of Our Lord to be consecrated to the Sacred Heart. One hundred years later his descendant was cruelly murdered. Paris, where Our Lady appeared to St. Catherine Laboure the day after King Charles X was chased out of office by the mob, missed Our Lady’s message and continued spreading her errors, born of the so-called “Enlightenment” and come to life in the Terror. Notre Dame de Paris, one of the most celebrated cathedrals in the land, has not hosted the true sacrifice of the Mass for half a century, the anniversary of Paul VI’s promulgation of the New Mass having passed only two weeks ago. Can we be surprised that God abandons a building that has abandoned Him, a building in a city that is in the capital of the country that refused his gentle yoke, then and now?
Notre Dame is owned by the state and will probably be rebuilt as the museum of Catholicism it was before the fire. Fortunately, the historic structure is not owned by the New Church, which has built ugly edifices around the world, such as Notre-Dame du Haut, below, in Ronchamps, France.
I WAS thinking on Sunday, “Something big is going to happen this week.” Holy Week is a time when the sinister forces of the world want some big event because it keeps people from focusing on what is most important: their own immortal souls and the mysteries of the Cross.
The huge fire at Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris yesterday is something big. The question is: Was it an accident or deliberately set? Could a fire of such intensity be accidental?
I hope to post more on the details in the future. But please don’t let this distract you. As magnificent and historic as this building was — the symbol of French Catholicism — it is not more important than a single soul. The Cross is eternal. Buildings will go up in flames. Holy Week is a time to grow closer to God.
The culmination of our Lenten musical journey focuses on the Austrian Catholic, Franz Joseph Haydn, a composer of the Classical Period. When we say “Classical” music, most people associate this with what I think is best called “Western European Art Music.” But really the Classical period was a specific artistic phase in its own right. It spanned approximately 1780 to 1825, and was characterized by balanced forms, slow harmonic rhythms (the chords don’t change very much) and clean, simple melodic lines without a lot of ornamentation. The major composers of the era were Haydn, Mozart, early Beethoven, and Boccherini.
The Seven Last Words, a musical meditation on the Seven Last Words of Christ on the Cross, was commissioned for a Good Friday service in Spain. The work had quite a journey of different musical forms. First, as orchestral “Sonatas” (literally, sounds), then as a string quartet, and finally as an Oratorio (Orchestra, choir, soloists; a kind of religious opera which is not acted out). I’ll let the master speak for himself regarding the origin of the composition. His description of the Good Friday tradition in Spain is fascinating:
Some fifteen years ago I was requested by a canon of Cádiz to compose instrumental music on the Seven Last Words of Our Savior On the Cross. It was customary at the Cathedral of Cádiz to produce an oratorio every year during Lent, the effect of the performance being not a little enhanced by the following circumstances. The walls, windows, and pillars of the church were hung with black cloth, and only one large lamp hanging from the center of the roof broke the solemn darkness. At midday, the doors were closed and the ceremony began. After a short service the bishop ascended the pulpit, pronounced the first of the seven words (or sentences) and delivered a discourse thereon. This ended, he left the pulpit and fell to his knees before the altar. The interval was filled by music. The bishop then in like manner pronounced the second word, then the third, and so on, the orchestra following on the conclusion of each discourse. My composition was subject to these conditions, and it was no easy task to compose seven adagios lasting ten minutes each, and to succeed one another without fatiguing the listeners; indeed, I found it quite impossible to confine myself to the appointed limits.
Composers work best under constraints. When they are given outside constraints like the ones described above, their creativity can soar. Stravinsky talked about how much easier he found composing under non-musical constraints (such as text or dancers, etc).
The Seven Last Words by Haydn, is radical in its use of tonalities. The tonal journey is thus: Bb Major, c minor, C Major, E Major, f minor, A Major, g minor, G Major, Eb Major, c minor.
The juxtaposition of these keys is innovative. The closest relationships are from Major to minor in the same key, and the last two keys of Eb Major and c minor. But besides that, most of the relationships are very distant and jarring. For instance going from E Major to f minor is unheard of during the Classical period! Perhaps this has to do with the subject matter, the Crucifixion. So we get a little “modern music” with Franz Joseph after all!
The performance below is the Oratorio version in German.
THE Anglo-Saxon homilist Ælfric, in a tenth-century sermon on Palm Sunday, stated:
‘It is the custom in God’s church, established by its teachers, that everywhere in God’s congregation the priest should bless palm-branches on this day, and distribute them, thus blessed, to the people; and God’s servants should then sing the hymn which the Jewish people sang before Christ when he was coming to his Passion. We imitate the faithful ones of that people with this deed, for they carried palm-branches with hymns before the Saviour. Now we shall hold our palms until the singer begins the offering-song, and then we shall offer the palm to God because of what it signifies: a palm betokens victory. Christ was victorious when he overcame the mighty devil and rescued us, and we also shall be victorious through God’s power, so that we conquer our evil habits, and all sins, and the devil, and adorn ourselves with good works; and at the end of our life we shall deliver the palm to God, that is, our victory, and thank him fervently, that we through his help have conquered the devil, so that he could not deceive us.’
THINGS HAVE been very busy at home this week as my husband and I work on repairs and renovations. A contractor is doing root canal on our house today and everything is a mess. I haven’t been able to blog much, but I expect to return to normal in time for Holy Week, which begins on Sunday.
Here, in the meantime, is an interesting letter I received this morning:
Grace A. writes:
I immensely enjoyed reading The Bostonians, thanks to the recommendation on your site. However, I would be interested to know what you make of the final sentence in the book:
“It is to be feared that with the union, so far from brilliant, into which [Verena] was about to enter, these were not the last [tears] she was destined to shed.”
Initially, I was dismayed, thinking that he had undone his entire story with that one sentence, but it’s hard for me to believe he would do such a thing, and the sentence is vague enough to mean something else.
This was only my first work of Henry James, and I plan to read others to attain a better grasp of his views in general, but if you wouldn’t mind sharing your opinion, I think it would help me to make sense of it. Read More »
