PASTOR DAVE’S MUSINGS FROM THE HEARTLAND

April 24, 2022

A WINDOW INTO THE SOUL

All of the works performed by the South Bend Symphony Orchestra Saturday, April 2, were written by Black American composers.  The evening opened with “A Joyous Trilogy” by 26 year old Quinn Mason who was in house.  Mason said about his work, “It’s basically music that’s designed to make the listener feel good.”

Florence Price composed the middle piece, Piano Concerto in One Movement, in 1934.  The program said of the piece “It incorporates a spiritual-like melody and the nineteenth century planation ‘juba dance’ created when drumming was outlawed and enslaved Africans used their bodies to make music.”  Price was born in 1887 in Little Rock, Arkansas, and died 1953 in Chicago.  She is the first African American woman to have a symphonic work performed by a major orchestra, the Chicago Symphony, in 1932.

William Dawson’s “Negro Folk Symphony” which the Philadelphia Orchestra premiered in 1934 in Carnegie Hall brought the night to a close.  “In the three movements, ‘The Bonds of Africa’,’ Hope in the Night’, and ’O Let Me Shine, Shine Like a Morning Star!,’ Dawson uses themes he had heard as a child in rural Alabama.” (Program)  Dawson went on to arrange spirituals and conduct the Tuskegee Institute Choir.

For me the highlight of the evening was Michelle Cann’s rendition of Price’s “Piano Concerto in One Movement.”  Her whole body, especially her face, brought the piece alive.  In the first section I felt the work’s connection with Liszt and Mendelssohn.   Michelle’s facial expression expressed the spiritual quality of the section.  It was her feet that made the juba background of the third section come alive.

The program by the South Bend Symphony Orchestra provided a window for those attending into the soul of the American Black experience.  “A Joyous Trilogy” was a window into the soul of Quinn Mason since he had worked with Alastair Willis, music director, as he prepared for the concert.  Price’s “Piano Concerto in One Movement” gave a window into the soul of Michelle Cann.

However, Black American music is not unique in its ability to provide a window into the soul of a community, a composer or a performer.  Music in general has this ability.  At almost every concert Alastair Willis will give some background information about what the orchestra will be performing.  This helps the audience to better understand what the composer had in mind when he or she wrote the piece and for what to look.

A number of the Psalms have instructions for the leader.  For several Psalms it is for those with stringed instruments, in others with flutes.  Evidently, the Psalms had musical settings, especially for corporate worship. Psalm 150 says that the people should praise the Lord with trumpet sound, lute, harp, tambourine, strings, pipe and clanging cymbals.  The Psalms allow one to reflect about how things are with one’s soul.  There is at least one Psalm that will resonate with any situation in which we might find ourselves.  They help us to find windows into our own soul.

Music provides a window into the soul.  This is especially when something in the music resonates with something in our own soul.  If we want to understand other cultures and other persons we can do no better than to listen to their music.  This is especially true if we understand some of the context out of which it came.

A scriptural index for past articles can be found at musingsfromtheheartland.com.