A Modern Mass With Notes of Messiaen
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.
The Summer Festival of Sacred Music at St. Bartholomew’s Church features an all-encompassing variety of mass settings, from High Renaissance polyphony to modern jazz. Hearing the same subject in the same words treated by composers of many countries, periods, and stylistic bents allows the regular attendee to develop a much clearer picture of the evolution of church music over time, and its subtle shades of difference and harmonic color.
But what of contemporary American classical music? In an age of apostasy, are there still significant masses being written? On Sunday, music director William Trafka led the St. Bart’s choristers and organist in the Missa Brevis of New Yorker McNeil Robinson, written in 1996.
Mr. Robinson has been here for quite some time. He has been organist and choirmaster at both the Church of St. Mary the Virgin and the Park Avenue Christian Church. He is currently the chairman of the organ department at Manhattan School of Music, and director of music at Holy Trinity Roman Catholic Church. The program booklet mentions his debt to the sacerdotal work of Poulenc and Duruflé, and this was apparent in the singing of his highly skillful construction. But the composer I kept hearing was Olivier Messiaen.
In fact, Mr. Robinson’s mass would have fit in nicely at the Church of Saint Trinity in Paris, where Messiaen was organist for so many years. The Kyrie began at a very high pitch with a noticeable propensity for dissonance. Some of the notes were a bit beyond the reach of the choristers, adding another overlay of discordance that only increased the otherworldly feel of the movement.
The Gloria was especially ear-catching. The fast opening section was divided between bouncy choral writing and odd meanderings at the organ, unfolding tendrils of surrealistic poetry disappearing into the ether. The Domine Deus section is an extended female solo — sadly, the church does not announce the individual names of the singers — that was beautifully intoned this day. The Filius Patris is a quiet interlude punctuated by organ rumblings so deep that they became essentially unpitched. Truly a description of the unknowable that was both inevitable and frightening. All is resolved gloriously in the final Quoniam.
The music most reminiscent of Messiaen is in the Sanctus, at the line “Dominus Deus Sabaoth.” Here, a repeating organ figure takes on a relentless life of its own, contemplative and yet energetic simultaneously. As is the standard function of the Sanctus, this section as a whole is angelic, aspiring, paradisiacal.
After a pause, the Benedictus brings us to a quiet place of infinite repose, leading to a beatific Agnus Dei. In an interview, Mr. Robinson stated that when he first came to New York “40 years ago, the singing was loud, and the organs were played even louder.” His pastoral sense has softened the blow considerably, and this particular mass is an impressive and understated spiritual journey that promises rich rewards on further hearings.
A contemporary piece certainly seemed appropriate at St. Bart’s, where Leopold Stokowski was music director. Stokowski was a tireless champion of the new and daring, directing the first recording of Arnold Schoenberg’s massive “Gurrelieder,” leading the world premiere of “Ameriques” by Edgard Varese, and conducting the American debut of Alban Berg’s “Wozzeck.” Stoky would have been proud.