Category: Music

Holy Wednesday: Gallows

Victoria Emily Jones4 Comments

LOOK: Portrait of Judas by Julia Stankova

Stankova, Julia_Portrait of Judas
Julia Stankova (Bulgarian, 1954–), Portrait of Judas, 2004. Tempera, gouache, watercolor, and lacquer technique on wood, 45 × 60 cm.

In this painting by Julia Stankova, Judas presses in for his infamous kiss, identifying Jesus to his captors. Stankova portrays the moment as one of double woe, leading to the death of both Jesus and Judas. To heighten the emotional impact, she tightly crops the composition, eliminating all other figures besides the two. Jesus closes his eyes to receive with grace what has been a long time coming. Judas keeps his open. With one arm, he embraces his former friend; with the other, he holds a branch that’s ornamented, forebodingly, with his own dangling corpse. The Bulgarian inscription names the painting: Portrait of Judas.

Adapted from my commentary originally published in the two-part IMB article “Journey to the Cross: Artists Visualize Christ’s Passion.”

LISTEN: “Gallows of My Desire” by Kris MacQueen, on Good Morning. Happy Easter. 3 (2014)

Tonight we ate together
Bread and the wine cooked rare
You looked so disappointed
When I took off down the stairs
We took the road together
But I just exited right
I’ll see you in a little while
And again on the other side

Refrain:
I stood above you
Like a conqueror
And you stood beside me like a friend
I kissed you goodbye
At the gates of hell
But you’ve always called my bluff
Yeah, you know my every tell

Tonight I’m taking matters
Into my guilty hands
Just sold the Prince of Peace out
For a little stretch of land
There’s nothing like the yoke
Of the innocent when they die
It came upon me like a stone
When I saw the deed was mine [Refrain]

Now I’m swinging in the gallows
Of my own desire
My spirit is departing to God knows where
Is there a grace sufficient
To receive this broken soul?
You bled out for the whole wide world
How ’bout your very own? [Refrain]

But I always knew I’d bow to you in the end

Kris MacQueen is a singer-songwriter and former pastor from Kitchener, Ontario. Since 2019 he has been recording music with his wife, Liv, under the name The MacQueens. It is their voices on “Gallows.” This song was released in 2014 on a little six-song compilation album of Passion-Easter-Pentecost music put out by Morning and Night Music, which is no longer available. I asked MacQueen if he’d be willing to post his contribution online so that you all can enjoy it, and he obliged!

The song is in the voice of Judas, who is feeling the full weight of his betrayal—the innocent Christ’s death a yoke or a millstone around his neck. Many Christian interpreters think that Judas gave Jesus up to the authorities as a way to force his hand; impatient with Jesus’s not seizing power from Rome, Israel’s political oppressors, he thought that an arrest would be just the inciting event Jesus needed to finally unleash the forces of heaven against the empire, obtaining vindication and freedom for God’s people. Judas, according to this theory, was genuinely shocked and horrified when Jesus submitted to the capture and then the death sentence.

By asserting his own plans and desires counter to God’s, Judas effectively builds his own death trap, as the guilt over the consequences of his betrayal leads him to suicide. But before tying that noose, maybe, we can only hope, he sought redemption for his wrongdoing. His return of the blood money seems to indicate as much. He was clearly remorseful. MacQueen’s Judas prays from the gallows, pleading the blood of Jesus. If Jesus’s blood can save even the most odious of sinners, he reasons, then surely it avails for me. But he’s not so sure; he poses it as a question, a challenge, even.

The final line of the song suggests that in the end, perhaps Judas was finally able to see the rightness of Jesus’s way and was able to bow not to the king he imagined or wanted him to be, but to the king he was—the Prince of Peace, the servant-Christ, the sacrificial Lamb.

Roundup: Via Dolorosa with medical X-rays, hope in the night, and more

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PRINT SUITE: Via Dolorosa by William Frank: Commissioned by SSM Saint Louis University Hospital for their chapel, this set of Stations of the Cross prints by William Frank combines depictions of Christ’s passion with diagnostic X-ray imaging of patients from the hospital’s archives. “The human body, and the community, act as the landscape,” he told me. A bullet in the spine, a kidney stone, a wrist fracture, a tumor, tuberculosis of the bones—Jesus’s suffering unfolds against the backdrop of these specific, tangible forms of suffering. But the rainbow color scheme transforms the stark black-and-white medical images into something a little less scary, suggesting hope and promise—maybe healing, maybe not, but at the very least, divine accompaniment along the path of sorrow.

Frank, William_Via Dolorosa
William Frank (American, 1984–), Via Dolorosa (installation detail), 2020. Etching, archival inkjet, chin collé, with embossment, suite of fourteen prints, overall 4 × 16 ft. SSM Saint Louis University Hospital Chapel, St. Louis, Missouri. Photo: Lisa Johnston, courtesy of the artist.

This year, the Catholic Health Association of the United States created a set of video reflections around Frank’s Stations, one for each piece, which you can find at https://www.chausa.org/prayers/lent-reflections. They also shot a video conversation with the artist:

The suite won a Faith & Form International Award for Religious Architecture & Art.

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NEW SONG: “Spooling” by Rev. Matt Simpkins: Diagnosed with stage 4 skin cancer, the Rev. Matt Simpkins [previously] of Lexden in Colchester, an Anglican vicar and a rock musician, said the only way he could calm his nerves enough to get through his next MRI scan was by writing a song from inside the machine. He composed some words and harmonies in his head to the “groovy,” sonorous beeps of the scanner, recording the song afterward using sampling, thus turning a typically threatening, antiseptic medical sound into a party vibe. He was interviewed on the BBC about it last month:

And here’s the bizarre music video, with special effects!

“I’m in a difficult situation with stage 4 cancer, but again, you’ve got a choice, and this song is a good example of that—how you can take something up into song and live,” he says. He hopes the song will minister to those who are undergoing cancer treatment or facing a possible diagnosis—that it is a small oasis, a source of silly laughter, comfort, and strength, for those in dire health.

“Spooling” is the first single from Simpkins’s forthcoming album Pissabed Prophet, a collaboration with his friend Ben Brown. The album is available for preorder on Bandcamp.

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ART COMMENTARY: The Apostle Judas by Adrienne Dengerink Chaplin: As part of the Visual Commentary on Scripture project, Dr. Adrienne Dengerink Chaplin has selected three artworks that in some way interpret Matthew 26:20–25 (and parallel passages), when at the Last Supper Jesus announces that someone there will betray him. Rather than featuring the more common portrayals of Judas as malevolent, halo-less, and/or segregated from the group at the far end of the table, Dengerink Chaplin has chosen works that show him integrated and indistinct, one of twelve betrayers, whose treachery, she boldly proposes, we might construe as “a happy fault.”

  • Ofili, Chris_The Upper Room
    Chris Ofili (British, 1968–), The Upper Room, 1999–2002. Oil paint, acrylic paint, glitter, graphite, pen, elephant dung, polyester resin, and map pins on 13 canvases, each 183.2 × 122.8 cm, except head canvas, 244.2 × 183 cm. Installation at Victoria Miro Gallery, London. Collection of Tate, London.
  • Duccio_Last Supper
    Duccio di Buoninsegna (Italian, d. 1318), The Last Supper, from the Maestà Altarpiece, 1308–11. Tempera and gold on panel, 50 × 53 cm. Museo dell’Opera del Duomo, Siena, Italy.
  • Ofili, Chris_Iscariot Blues
    Chris Ofili (British, 1968–), Iscariot Blues, 2006. Oil and charcoal on linen, 281 × 194.9 cm. Photo courtesy of Victoria Miro and David Zwirner.

With the Duccio panel, she points out something I’ve often contemplated as well: that Jesus feeds Judas with the element he calls his body, keeps communion with him, and is there not a preemptive forgiveness implicit in that act?

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SONG: “In the Night” by Andrew Peterson: At a Laity Lodge retreat in 2015, Andrew Peterson of Nashville performed one of the songs from his album Counting Stars (2010) with fellow musicians Buddy Greene, Jeff Taylor, and Andy Gullahorn. “In the Night” rehearses “dark night” stories from scripture: Israel wrestles with God, is enslaved by Egypt, is pressed in by Syria; a prodigal son must resort to eating pig slop; the Son of Man is beaten and killed. But in each of these stories, deliverance comes. Hence the refrain: “In the night, my hope lives on.”

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VISUAL MEDITATION: On The Holy Women at the Tomb by George Minne, commentary by Marleen Hengelaar-Rookmaaker: Marleen Hengelaar-Rookmaaker, the creator of ArtWay, writes about a nineteenth-century bronze sculpture by the Belgian artist George Minne, which shows the three women who went to Jesus’s tomb on Easter morning in an attitude of grief—bent backs, bowed heads—drawing on the gothic pleurants, or weepers, of late medieval tombs. The women are “totally enwrapped in mourning their beloved,” Hengelaar-Rookmaaker writes. “This is in fact the very last moment of the passion, the last moment of suffering past the Pietà and the burial of Christ. It will only be a minute before their hoods will come off and the news of the resurrection will enter their numbed minds.”

Minne, George_The Holy Women at the Tomb
George Minne (Belgian, 1866–1941), Les saintes femmes au tombeau (The Holy Women at the Tomb), 1896. Bronze, 44.5 × 62 × 20.5 cm. Groeningemuseum, Bruges, Belgium.

This composition by Minne also exists in granite, wood, and plaster versions.

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NEW PLAYLIST: April 2023 (Art & Theology): Includes an excerpt from the psychedelic rock–style Mass in F Minor by the Electric Prunes, “The Outlaw” by Jesus Movement icon Larry Norman, a chuckle-inducing bluegrass song first recorded in 1926 by Gid Tanner and Faith Norris and covered here by the Local Honeys, a choral setting of Psalm 128 (“Happy is everyone who fears the Lord, who walks in his ways . . .”) by the Italian Jewish Renaissance composer Salomone Rossi, Whitney Houston’s rendition of “His Eye Is on the Sparrow,” and a short Kiowa Apache church song that translates to “Son of our Father will set up a cedar tree / Now he is calling to us / He’s going to heal our minds / That’s why he is calling to us.”

Holy Tuesday: The Bridegroom’s Coming

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And at midnight there was a cry made, Behold, the bridegroom cometh; go ye out to meet him.

—Matthew 25:6 KJV

In the Orthodox Church, observances of Holy Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday (which in that tradition take place next week) focus on the end times, “remind[ing] us of the eschatological meaning of Pascha,” says Alexander Schmemann.

The Gospel reading for the Liturgy of the Presanctified Gifts on Holy Tuesday is Matthew 24:36–26:2, which covers the need for watchfulness, the parable of the ten bridesmaids, the parable of the talents, and the Last Judgment. These passages constitute the latter half of Jesus’s Olivet Discourse, or Little Apocalypse, which, according to the chronology of Mark’s Gospel, Jesus preached the Tuesday before his death.

So, informed by the Matthew 25:1–13 reading, today I’ve selected a papercut by Chinese artist Fan Pu and a Black gospel song from the southern US that both engage with Jesus’s call to keep our metaphoric oil lamps burning in expectation of the return of the Bridegroom, who died and rose for love of us, and who has gone to build us a home.

LOOK: Ten Bridesmaids by Fan Pu

Fan Pu_Ten Bridesmaids
Fan Pu (Chinese, 1948–), Ten Bridesmaids, 2001. Papercut. Collection of the Asian Christian Art Association.

(Note: This artwork has changed since the original publication of this post. I learned that the previous artist did not want her work featured or her name mentioned on the website.)

LISTEN: “The Bridegroom’s Coming,” traditional gospel song | Recorded August 6, 1940, by Mitchell’s Christian Singers, on Mitchell’s Christian Singers, vol. 3 (1938–1940) (released 1996)

I couldn’t find lyrics for this song online, so I transcribed them myself the best I could. I’m not positive about the second line in the refrain, and I couldn’t make out the second half of the last line of verse 2.

Refrain:
And behold (and behold), lo, the Bridegroom’s coming
Lift up (lift up), I heard the voices cryin’ out loud
And be ready (and be ready) when the Bridegroom’s coming
To meet him in the air

Ever seen such a man as this?
Jesus was sent, he came down to die
Jesus was sent, he came down to die
Came to save my soul from the burning fire [Refrain ×2]

Ever seen such a man as this?
Jesus was sent, he came down to die
Jesus was sent, he came down to die
I want to meet . . . (?) [Refrain ×2]

Mitchell’s Christian Singers [previously] were an influential early gospel group from Kinston, North Carolina.

The Kentucky Jubilee Four recorded an earlier version of this song for OKeh in St. Louis, Missouri, in 1927.

Holy Monday: Anointing at Bethany

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LOOK: Intimacy of the Heart by Laura Makabresku

Makabresku, Laura_Intimacy of the Heart (7)
Laura Makabresku (Polish, 1987–), Intimacy of the Heart (7), 2020
Makabresku, Laura_Intimacy of the Heart (8)
Laura Makabresku (Polish, 1987–), Intimacy of the Heart (8), 2020

LISTEN: “Mary” by the Brothers of Abriem Harp, on Last Days (2015) [reviewed here]

Mary, my dear, come over here
Tell me, is it true what they say?
Mary, my dear, let go of your fear
And bring your gift to me, I pray
Let your heart rest with mine
I don’t have much time
So break your fragrance free, my dear

Let your tears fall on me
Brush your hair on my feet
Let your alabaster tears fall on me
Fall on me

Overflow, overflow
And go where you go
Let this fragrance fill the air with love divine
Love divine

Fill the air, fill the air
Let your heart beat with mine
Let this fragrance fill the air with love divine
Love divine

Mary, my dear, bring yourself near
Let your heart beat with mine, my dear

Makabresku, Laura_Intimacy of the Heart (10)
Laura Makabresku (Polish, 1987–), Intimacy of the Heart (10), 2020

Palm Sunday: Jerusalem, Jerusalem

Victoria Emily Jones1 Comment

LOOK: Palm Sunday by Justin O’Brien

O'Brien, Justin_Palm Sunday triptych
Justin O’Brien (Australian, 1917–1996), Palm Sunday, 1962. Oil on canvas, 45.5 × 62 cm.

This triptych (three-paneled artwork) by Australian artist Justin O’Brien portrays three scenes from the life of Christ. On the left wing is the Baptism of Christ, where he’s anointed by God’s Spirit for his messianic role, and on the right is the Miraculous Draught of Fishes, a story of miraculous abundance. The center panel shows Jesus about to enter the gates of a hilltop city representing Jerusalem. He rides a donkey and is dressed in red, the color of martyrdom. One man lays down his cloak before Jesus’s dusty path as a sign of reverence. Now the people welcome him in, but in just a few short days many will turn on him.

O’Brien grew up in a Catholic household in Sydney. In 1948–49 he visited Italy and fell in love with the work of the Proto- and Early Renaissance painters from Tuscany, like Duccio and Piero della Francesca. Most of O’Brien’s paintings are on religious subjects, despite his renunciation of Catholicism in 1954. Though he self-identified as agnostic for the second half of his life, he continued to be artistically inspired by the stories of the New Testament. He moved to Rome in 1967 and spent the remainder of his days there, returning to his home country of Australia every few years for exhibitions.  

LISTEN: “Jerusalem Interlude,” excerpted from “The Holy City” | Words by Frederick E. Weatherly, 1892 | Music by Stephen Adams (pseudonym of Michael Maybrick), 1892; arr. Noble Caine, 1946 | Performed by the Aeolians of Oakwood University on Aeolianology Acappella, vol. 2, 2015

Jerusalem, Jerusalem
Lift up your gates and sing
Hosanna in the highest
Hosanna to your king

This is the refrain of the Victorian choral ballad “The Holy City” by the English lawyer, author, lyricist, and broadcaster Frederick E. Weatherly (best known for writing “Danny Boy”) and his regular collaborator, the English composer Michael Maybrick, who published under the pen name Stephen Adams. The song became hugely popular in the UK and the US at the beginning of the twentieth century, and is even mentioned in James Joyce’s Ulysses (1920). It is sung by early Hollywood musical superstar Jeanette MacDonald in the 1936 film San Francisco.

Lyrics to the complete song are below, as is a video performance by the Aeolians from 2020:

Last night I lay a-sleeping
There came a dream so fair
I stood in old Jerusalem
Beside the temple there
I heard the children singing
And ever as they sang
Methought the voice of angels
From heav’n in answer rang

“Jerusalem, Jerusalem!
Lift up your gates and sing
Hosanna in the highest
Hosanna to your king!”

And then methought my dream was chang’d
The streets no longer rang
Hush’d were the glad Hosannas
The little children sang
The sun grew dark with mystery
The morn was cold and chill
As the shadow of a cross arose
Upon a lonely hill

“Jerusalem, Jerusalem!
Hark! how the angels sing
Hosanna in the highest
Hosanna to your king!”

And once again the scene was chang’d
New earth there seem’d to be
I saw the Holy City
Beside the tideless sea
The light of God was on its streets
The gates were open wide
And all who would might enter
And no one was denied
No need of moon or stars by night
Or sun to shine by day
It was the new Jerusalem
That would not pass away

“Jerusalem, Jerusalem!
Sing, for the night is o’er!
Hosanna in the highest!
Hosanna for evermore!”

The song’s speaker has a dream about Christ’s celebrated entry into Jerusalem, with crowds surrounding him and shouting his praises. But then the mood turns dark and hushed as a cross is erected on Golgotha and the newly hailed king is crucified. However, the mood revolves back to one of celebration in the final verse as the New Jerusalem comes down, permanently displacing all sorrow, its gates thrown open wide in universal welcome and the wounded but victorious Jesus seated on the throne.

The Aeolians’ isolation of the first refrain for their “Jerusalem Interlude,” which echoes Psalm 24:7–10 [previously], makes a perfect antiphon for Palm Sunday. Though the words are exultant, the music has an aching quality that foreshadows the suffering that is soon to come and that matches the tone of Jesus’s lament over Jerusalem on this day: “As he came near and saw the city, he wept over it, saying, ‘If you, even you, had only recognized on this day the things that make for peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes’” (Luke 19:41–42; cf. Matt. 23:37–39).

The American jazz composer Duke Ellington used the refrain’s melody as the basis of the opening of his “Black and Tan Fantasy” (1927), in which a cornet and trombone play dolefully in parallel harmony. Can you hear the clopping donkey?

Addendum, 4/23/25: Here’s another arrangement of the song I like, by African Vocals, an a cappella group from Namibia. The following video shows one of the performances from their 2019 Germany tour. Soloist Reinhard Kungairi Kahambuee (who doesn’t come into frame until fifty seconds in) is wonderful! Note that at 1:40, the tempo becomes bright, lively, and more rhythmic, with the addition of hand claps.

Roundup: Historiated crosses, English ballad carol of the Crucifixion, and more

Victoria Emily Jones4 Comments

Holy Week begins Sunday. I will be publishing short daily devotional posts during that time and through the first eight days of Easter. Also: don’t forget about the Art & Theology Holy Week Playlist and Eastertide Playlist! I’ve made some new song additions since last year, mixed in to preserve the narrative flow.

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ART VIDEO: “The Crucifixion, c. 1200 (from Christus triumphans to Christus patiens)”: When I was a student in Florence for a semester, my first paper for my Italian history, art, and culture class traced the evolution of the painted wood-panel crucifix in late medieval Italy, from the Christus Triumphans (Triumphant Christ) type to Christus Patiens (Suffering Christ). I lived less than a five-minute walk from the Uffizi, which has in its collection a beautiful example of each—explored by Drs. Steven Zucker and Beth Harris in this short Smarthistory video. Longtime readers of the blog may recognize the latter, which I posted back in 2018.

Painted cross, Pisa (detail)
Painted cross (detail), Pisa, ca. 1180–1200. Tempera and gold leaf on wood, 277 × 231 cm. Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence, Inv. 432. [object record]

Zucker provides wonderful photos of both in high resolution on his Flickr page (start here and scroll right)—the full crosses and details of each apron scene—available for free noncommercial use under a Creative Commons license. And there are many other art historical images there as well!

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ONLINE EXPERIENCE: “Anamnesis: Journey through the Stations of the Cross”: This year visual artist Daniel Callis and the music and liturgy collective The Many collaborated on a self-guided set of online Stations of the Cross. There are fifteen total, which are being released one at a time every morning and evening from March 30 through April 5. Each station consists of an artwork, a prayer, a song, and a written meditation that help us enter into lament.

Callis, Dan_Grief Station 1
Daniel Callis (American, 1955–), Grief Station #1, Prognosis, 2022. Ink, oil, palm ash, fiber, clay, ash, fabric, 60 × 24 × 24 in. (total work). Photo courtesy of the artist.

The artworks are by Callis, and they’re from his Stations: Resurgam series, a body of work that was just exhibited this month at Green Art Gallery at Biola University in La Mirada, California. He began the series in January 2021 in response to the death of his son, Jeremy David Callis (1980–2020). It consists of fifteen mixed-media works on paper (his process involves printing, “wounding,” stitching, etc.) and fifteen raku-fired offering bowls that incorporate, from the cooling process, copies of letters, hospital documents, and drawings from Jeremy. “They are about pain and the absurd insistent pursuit of hope,” Callis says of the series. Resurgam is Latin for “I shall rise again.”

The songs are by The Many.

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BOOK EXCERPT from The Unvarnished Jesus: A Lenten Journey by Brian Zahnd: In this post from his blog, Pastor Brian Zahnd excerpts a passage from his book The Unvarnished Jesus (2019). “To interpret the meaning of the cross is more than a life’s work—in fact, it has and will remain the work of the church for millennia,” he writes. “The cross is the ever-unfolding revelation of who God is, and it cannot be summed up in a simple formula. This is the bane of tidy atonement theories that seek to reduce the cross to a single meaning. The cross is many things: It’s the pinnacle of God’s self-disclosure. It’s divine solidarity with all human suffering. It’s the shaming of the principalities and powers. It’s the point from which the satan is driven out of the world. It’s the death by which Christ conquers Death. It’s the abolition of war and violence. It’s the supreme demonstration of the love of God. It’s the re-founding of the world around an axis of love. It’s the enduring model of co-suffering love we are to follow. It’s the eternal moment in which the sin of the world is forgiven . . .” Read more.

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SONGS:

>> “The Leaves of Life”: “The Leaves of Life,” alternatively titled “The Seven Virgins,” is a traditional English ballad carol of Christ’s passion, first set down in the nineteenth century. It is narrated by (the apostle?) Thomas, who on a fateful Friday runs into the Virgin Mary and six of her companions, who are looking for Jesus. He directs them to the hill where Jesus is being crucified (“And sit in the gallery” may be a corruption of “The city of Calvary”). The women tearfully fly to the site, and Jesus tries to console his mother from the cross before breathing his last. The song ends with Thomas imbibing a strong scent of rose and fennel as he meditates on Christ’s love. [HT: Global Christian Worship]

Here the song is performed in the chapter house of Wells Cathedral in Somerset by William Parsons, founder of the British Pilgrimage Trust and author of Singing for Our Supper: Walking an English Songline from Kent to Cornwall, a book about the seven months he spent as a wandering minstrel. Parsons refers to it as a gypsy carol because Ralph Vaughan Williams collected one version of it from the Roma singer Esther Smith during his 1908–13 collecting trips that resulted in the publication, with Ella May Leather, of Twelve Traditional Carols from Herefordshire (1920).

>> “Were You There”: This African American spiritual is performed here by Pegasis, a vocal trio of sisters—Marvelis, Rissel, and Yaina Peguero Almonte—originally from the Dominican Republic but now living in Green Bay, Wisconsin. It’s as if they’re the three Marys singing their testimony! The song is on their 2016 album Peace Through Praise, which they released under the name The Peguero Sisters. Their harmonies are gorgeous.

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PODCAST EPISODE: “Malcolm Guite: Poems on the Passion”: In this special passion- and resurrection-themed Nomad devotional episode from 2018, Malcolm Guite reads and reflects on three of his poems, and David Benjamin Blower performs an original three-part song that he wrote in response and that has not been released elsewhere (see 4:30, 16:04, and 27:18).

Guite’s “Jesus dies on the cross,” part of his Stations of the Cross sonnet cycle, was inspired by a line from George Herbert’s poem “Prayer”: “God’s breath in man returning to his birth.” And his “Easter Dawn” [previously] is based in part on a sermon by the seventeenth-century Anglican bishop Lancelot Andrewes. Paraphrasing Andrewes, Guite says, “Jesus is the gardener of Mary [Magdalene]’s heart—her heart is all rent and brown and wintery, and with one word, he makes all green again.” Beautiful! For more on the theme of Jesus as gardener, see my 2016 blog post “She mistook him for the gardener.”

Roundup: Musical Passions beyond Bach; Angola inmates enact the Passion; and more

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VIDEO: “Waiting with Christ: An Artful Meditation for Holy Week”: A collaboration between Duke Initiatives in Theology and the Arts in Durham, North Carolina, and City Church in Cleveland, Ohio, this half-hour video from 2021 presents a small collection of scripture readings, poems, visual art, and music for Holy Week, interspersed with reflections by theologian Jeremy Begbie. The artistic selections are a spoken word performance by Paul Turner, Malcolm Guite’s sonnet “Jesus Meets His Mother,” the Adagio movement of Schubert’s String Quintet in C Major, the painting Riven Tree by Bruce Herman, and Bifrost Arts’ “Our Song in the Night,” performed by Salina Turner, Allison Negus, and Joel Negus [previously].

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ARTICLE: “6 Musical ‘Passions’ Beyond Bach” by Josh Rodriguez: Composer, professor, and Deus Ex Musica cofounder Josh Rodriguez is an excellent classical music curator and guide. In this article he introduces us to six modern large-scale musical works about Jesus’s final week: The Passion of Yeshua by Richard Danielpour, La Pasión Según San Marcos by Osvaldo Golijov, The Passion of the Christ Symphony by John Debney, Johannes-Passion by Sofia Gubaidulina, Simeron by Ivan Moody, and the St. John Passion by James MacMillan. He interweaves composer biography, musical analysis, and meaning in concise ways, with nods to music history. Stylistic influences for these diverse selections range from Byzantine chant to salsa! Audio/video excerpts are provided, such as the cued-up “¿Por qué?” from Golijov’s Pasión (see below), a movement centering on the woman who anointed Jesus’s feet with perfume (Mark 14:3–9).

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PRINT SERIES: The Passion and Its Objects (after Dürer) by Marcus Rees Roberts: “The Passion and Its Objects (after Dürer) is a series of etchings and monotypes by Marcus Rees Roberts. The images derive from fragments from Albrecht Dürer’s series of woodcuts The Small Passion (1511). Images of the Passion – and of the crucifixion in particular – are so embedded in Western consciousness that we forget that it is a depiction of betrayal, prejudice, and torture. In this version of the Passion by Dürer, one of several he made, small, everyday objects lie scattered within the images – a jug, pliers, a hammer, a coil of rope. Even five hundred years later, we recognise these objects as our own; we can identify with them. But in so doing, we enter the depicted space, and we become complicit in the cruelty. This is one reason why Dürer’s Small Passion is both so powerful and so uncomfortable.”

Roberts, Marcus Rees_Passion I
Marcus Rees Roberts (British, 1951–), The Passion and Its Objects (after Dürer) I, 2019. Diptych etching and aquatint with chine collé printed on Somerset Satin soft white 300gsm, each plate 29.5 × 21 cm (overall 29.5 × 42 cm). Edition of 15.

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PHOTOGRAPHY SERIES: Passion Play by Deborah Luster: “There are more than 5,300 inmates at the Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola. Nearly 4,000 of them are serving life without parole. In 2012 and 2013 the Angola Prison Drama Club staged a play unlike any other in the prison’s experience. The Life of Jesus Christ featured 70 inmates, men and women acting together for the first time—in costume, with a real camel, performing for the general public. For the untrained actors, this production held special meaning as they saw pieces of their own lives revealed in the characters they played.”

Luster, Deborah_Layla "Roach" Roberts (Inquisitor)
Layla “Roach” Roberts (Inquisitor), sentenced to LIFE, Angola Prison, Louisiana. Photograph by Deborah Luster, from the Passion Play series, 2013.
Luster, Deborah_Bobby Wallace (Jesus)
Bobby Wallace (Jesus), Angola Prison, Louisiana. Photograph by Deborah Luster, from the Passion Play series, 2013.

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SONGS:

>> “May I Go with You” by January Lim: This Maundy Thursday song was written in 2020 in the voice of Jesus in Gethsemane, speaking to God the Father. In the first stanza, it seems to me that Jesus is asking to be taken up to heaven, like Elijah—just whisked away back to glory, and spared tomorrow’s cruelties and pain. But in the second stanza that same request seems to shift in meaning as Jesus expresses a desire to go with God’s plan and asks for the strength to follow through. The song was released on the EP Gathered Sighs (2021), put out by Evergreen Baptist Church of Los Angeles, where Lim serves as worship arts pastor. [HT: Global Christian Worship]

>> “Calvary” (Traditional): In this excerpt from Washington National Cathedral’s 2020 Good Friday noon service, Imani-Grace Cooper performs Richard Smallwood’s arrangement of the African American spiritual “Calvary,” accompanied on piano by Victor Simonson. Wow. Chilling!

See also Cooper’s performance of “Lamb of God” by Twila Paris and “Were You There” from the same service, which I cued up at those time-stamped links.

The Reproaches: A divine lament for Good Friday

Victoria Emily Jones13 Comments

O my people, what have I done to you?
In what have I wearied you? Answer me!

—Micah 6:3

The Reproaches (Latin: Improperia), also known by the first phrase of their refrain, “Popule meus” (O My People), are a series of antiphons and responses used in Good Friday liturgies across all three branches of Christianity. The text contrasts Old Testament stories of God’s goodness with humanity’s enactment of evil against God’s Son. Whereas God graciously delivered his people from death time and again throughout history, they delivered his Son to death—death on a cross. Thus God reproaches us, his beloved ones, for our fatal rejection of Christ, his greatest gift, lamenting that we have spurned his love.

The lyrics are reproduced below (the side-by-side formatting with English translation on the right is best viewed on a computer screen), followed by four musical settings, chosen from among dozens. In the present Roman Rite, the roman-style text is sung by a cantor and the italicized text by a choir, and the lines of the Trisagion (“Thrice Holy”), the ancient hymn that follows the first improperium, are sung by two halves of a choir in alternation—the first singing in Greek, the second in Latin. Composers working outside that context, however, may assign the sections differently.

(Related post: “Blood and Tears”)

Fra Angelico_Man of Sorrows
Fra Angelico (Italian, ca. 1395–1455), Man of Sorrows, ca. 1440. Fresco, Cell 39, Convent of San Marco, Florence. Photo: Fr. Lawrence Lew, OP.
Popule meus, quid feci tibi?
Aut in quo contristavi te?
Responde mihi.

Quia eduxi te de terra Aegypti:
parasti Crucem Salvatori tuo.

   Hagios o Theos.
      Sanctus Deus.
   Hagios Ischyros.
      Sanctus fortis.
   Hagios Athanatos, eleison himas.
      Sanctus immortalis, miserere nobis.

Quia eduxi te per desertum quadraginta annis:
et manna cibavi te, et introduxi te in terram satis bonam:
parasti Crucem Salvatori tuo.
Hagios . . .

Quid ultra debui facere tibi, et non feci?
Ego quidem plantavi te vineam meam speciosissimam:
et tu facta es mihi nimis amara:
aceto namque sitim meam potasti:
et lancea perforasti latus Salvatori tuo.
Hagios . . .

Ego propter te flagellavi Aegyptum cum primogenitis suis:
et tu me flagellatum tradidisti.
Popule meus . . .

Ego te eduxi de Aegypto, demerso Pharone in mare Rubrum:
et tu me tradidisti principibus sacerdotum.
Popule meus . . .

Ego ante te aperui mare:
et tu aperuisti lancea latus meum.
Popule meus . . .

Ego ante te praeivi in columna nubis:
et tu me duxisti ad praetorium Pilati.
Popule meus . . .

Ego te pavi manna in desertum:
et tu me cedisti alapis et flagellis.
Popule meus . . .

Ego te potavi aqua salutis de petra:
et tu me potasti felle et aceto.
Popule meus . . .

Ego propter te Chananeorum reges percussi:
et tu percussisti arundine caput meum.
Popule meus . . .

Ego dedi tibi sceptrum regale:
et tu dedisti capiti meo spineam coronam.
Popule meus . . .

Ego te exaltavi magna virtute:
et tu me suspendisti in patibulo crucis.
Popule meus . . .

O my people, what have I done to thee?
Or how have I offended thee?
Answer me.

Because I led thee out of the land of Egypt:
thou hast prepared a cross for thy Savior.

   O holy God!
      O holy God!
   O holy strong One!
      O holy strong One!
   O holy and immortal, have mercy upon us.
      O holy and immortal, have mercy upon us.

Because I led thee through the desert for forty years:
and fed thee with manna, and brought thee into a land exceeding good:
thou hast prepared a cross for thy Savior.
O holy God! . . .

What more ought I to have done for thee, that I have not done?
I planted thee, indeed, my most beautiful vineyard:
and thou hast become exceeding bitter to me:
for in my thirst thou gavest me vinegar to drink:
and with a spear thou hast pierced the side of thy Savior.
O holy God! . . .

For thy sake I scourged the firstborn of Egypt:
Thou hast given me up to be scourged.
O my people . . .

I led thee out of Egypt, having drowned Pharaoh in the Red Sea:
and thou hast delivered me to the chief priests.
O my people . . .

I opened the sea before thee:
and thou hast opened my side with a spear.
O my people . . .

I went before thee in a pillar of cloud:
and thou hast led me to the judgment hall of Pilate.
O my people . . .

I fed thee with manna in the desert:
and thou hast assaulted me with blows and scourges.
O my people . . .

I gave thee the water of salvation from the rock:
and thou hast given me gall and vinegar to drink.
O my people . . .

For thy sake I struck the kings of the Canaanites:
and thou hast struck my head with a reed.
O my people . . .

I gave thee a royal scepter:
and thou hast given a crown of thorns for my head.
O my people . . .

I exalted thee with great strength:
and thou hast hanged me on the gibbet of the cross.
O my people . . .

1. “Popule meus” by Tomás Luis de Victoria (1585)

First up, a traditional setting of the Latin by the Spanish Renaissance composer Tomás Luis de Victoria (ca. 1548–1611) [previously], performed by Ensemble Invocatio under the direction of Daniel Knaggs in 2022 at Seminary Church in Warsaw, Poland. The soloist is Łukasz Dziuba. This four-part motet is the most widely performed setting of the Reproaches.

2. “The Reproaches” by John Sanders (1984)

This setting in English by the British composer John Sanders (1933–2003) has become standard repertoire for many English cathedral and church choirs. Sanders first wrote it in 1984 for a Good Friday service at Gloucester Cathedral, where he served as organist, but it wasn’t published until 1993. It’s performed here by the Ely Cathedral Choir, conducted by Sarah MacDonald, from 2018. Whereas Victoria scored his setting for four voices (SATB), Sanders scored his for eight (SSAATTBB), creating more complex harmonies, including dissonance.

3. “Popule meus” by Filipe Faria and Sérgio Peixoto (2015)

In 1999 Portuguese composers Filipe Faria (b. 1976) and Sérgio Peixoto (b. 1974) founded Sete Lágrimas ECMC (Early and Contemporary Music Consort) to create dialogues between medieval, Renaissance, and early Baroque music on the one hand and contemporary music on the other. Their “Popule meus,” which includes just the opening refrain, is from their Missa Mínima, a minimalistic setting for two voices and recorder of the five parts of the Catholic Mass, along with other important liturgical texts. They began composing it in 1999, put it on the back burner for a while, and returned to it later, completing it in 2015. In this 2016 recording, the singers are Faria and Peixoto. The melodic embellishment on the syllable -sta in contristavi (literally “saddened” but more often translated in this song as “offended” or “distressed”) creates a tense quivering effect, a climax before the languid return to the title phrase and a petering off with “Responde mihi.”

4. “The Reproaches” by Paul Zach (2021)

American singer-songwriter Paul Zach wrote this condensed version of the Reproaches with frequent collaborator Kate Bluett [previously], which puts the words in the voice of the people, who assume and repent of their responsibility for Jesus’s death—for no matter our temporal or geographical proximity to the event, it was our sin that led him to and held him on the cross. Transferring the speaker from God to the Christian for the whole duration helps make the song more suitable for congregational singing, as it can then function as a corporate confession.

You delivered us from Pharaoh;
We delivered you to death.
You gave manna in the desert;
We gave a crown of thorns for your head.

You brought us out of slavery
Into the promised land;
We brought you up to Calvary
And pierced your feet and hands.

Holy God, Holy Mighty One,
Holy Immortal One,
Have mercy, mercy,
Have mercy on us.

You opened up the Red Sea;
We opened up your side.
“Come down, come down,” we mocked you;
“My God, my God,” you cried.

Holy God, Holy Mighty One,
Holy Immortal One,
Have mercy, mercy,
Have mercy on us.

Zach told me he’s not fully satisfied with the song and is working on a rewrite that he may release in 2024. Nonetheless, I really like what he and Bluett have created here! And I appreciate how it brings the Reproaches into an indie-folk idiom, making that long-standing sung portion of the global church’s Good Friday liturgy accessible to those who find it difficult to connect with choral music or chant.

Addendum, 3/21/23: Rev. Bill Combs from Greensboro, Georgia, has just reminded me of a contemporary adaptation of the text of the Reproaches by Janet Morley, a liturgist from the UK. It’s from her wonderful collection All Desires Known, a resource for public worship and private devotion, and can be read here. Combs’s church, Episcopal Church of the Redeemer, chants this text as part of their annual Good Friday service using Tone II.1.

Roundup: New Lent album, Porter’s Gate Kickstarter, “Bare and Bones,” and more

Victoria Emily Jones1 Comment

NEW ALBUM: Lent Hymns by Paul Zach: Released this month, Lent Hymns by Paul Zach comprises twelve songs, a mix of originals and classics, with contributions by IAMSON, Jessica Fox, Sara Groves, Jon Guerra, and Kate Bluett. The LP is available wherever music is streamed or sold. Here’s an Instagram video that excerpts “Draw Me In”:

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KICKSTARTER: New Porter’s Gate album: This summer The Porter’s Gate, an interdenominational Christian music collective, is gathering songwriters to write and record musical settings of passages from The Message, a translation of the Bible by the late Eugene Peterson [previously] that uses contemporary idioms and phrases. The project is in partnership with the Eugene Peterson Center for Christian Imagination at Western Theological Seminary in Holland, Michigan. I’m so looking forward to this!

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SONGS:

>> “Вечірня молитва” (Vechirnya molytva) (Evening Prayer): A choral setting of a text from the Divine Service of the Eastern Orthodox Church, by contemporary Ukrainian composer Iryna Aleksiychuk. Performed in 2012 by the Female Choir of Kiev Glier Institute of Music, conducted by G. Gorbatenko. [HT: Global Christian Worship]

English translation:

Heavenly King, Comforter, Spirit of Truth,
Who art everywhere present and fillest all things,
Treasury of good things, and Giver of life:
Come and abide in us, and cleanse us from every sin,
And save our souls, O Good One!
Holy God, holy Mighty, holy Immortal,
Have mercy on us.

>> “Bare and Bones” by Candace Coker: Trinidad-born, Vancouver-based singer-songwriter Candace Coker sings the title track from her new album, Bare and Bones, with her boyfriend, Josiah Charleau. The video is shot at Bamboo Cathedral, a thousand-foot stretch of roadway in Tucker Valley in Chaguaramas, Trinidad and Tobago, where bamboo stalks bend toward each other across the road, creating a canopy.

>> “HigherHoly” by IAMSON: IAMSON is the artist name of singer-songwriter and music producer Orlando Palmer, based in Richmond, Virginia. He released this song as a single in 2020. The rap is performed by guest artist Marv (Marvin Hudgins II) of Chattanooga, Tennessee, and the animation in the video is by Kenya Foster.

>> “I Could Sing of Your Love Forever” (cover) by Mary Yang and Ger Vang: Mary Yang and Ger Vang are Hmong Christian musicians living in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. (The Hmong are an Indigenous people group from East and Southeast Asia.) Here they perform their bossa nova arrangement of this modern worship classic by Martin Smith of the English band Delirious?. Yang and Vang are part of the Fishermen’s Project, a band that releases mainly classic hymns translated into the Hmong language. [HT: Global Christian Worship]

Roundup: Les Mis, blood collages, Esau McCaulley on Lent, and more

Victoria Emily Jones3 Comments

I’ve received a few requests from followers to resume my monthly thirty-song playlists. I had previously thought I’d stick to publishing these during Ordinary Time, since I have longer, thematic playlists for the seasons of Advent, Christmas, Lent (our current place in the calendar), and Easter—which you can find on my Spotify profile. But I’m happy to oblige! Here’s a new playlist for March:

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ESSAY: “Victor Hugo’s Masterpiece of Impossibility” by Caitrin Keiper, Plough: A wonderful essay on how competing vows in the novel and musical Les Misérables reveal the paradox of grace. I’ve been captivated by this story of mercy, forgiveness, and transformation set in revolutionary France ever since I saw the 1998 film adaptation starring Liam Neeson in middle school. The faith-inspired actions of Bishop Myriel at the beginning set the life of the protagonist Jean Valjean, an escaped convict, on a trajectory that is beautiful to watch unfold, and the downfall of the law-obsessed Inspector Javert, who cannot bring himself to accept the grace offered him, is most tragic.

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PODCAST EPISODES:

>> Season 2, episode 2, of Gather Round, on the DPP’s Lent 2023 Living Prayer Periodical: On the in-house podcast of Grace Mosaic in Washington, DC, three of my four Daily Prayer Project colleagues and I walk listeners through the latest edition of our prayer periodical, which covers the six weeks of Lent. The conversation starts at 3:46. Rev. Joel Littlepage, curator of the liturgies and songs, highlights a litany to the Servant-Christ from Andhra Theological College in Hyderabad, India, and a song by Pastor Antonio Rivera González of Mexico (see below). Ashley Williams, who commissions or secures reproduction rights for the practice-based essays and curates the photographs throughout, shares some teasers for “Calling Out to God in Lament” by Nina Barnes and “Intractable Sin, Preemptory Prayer” by Alicia Akins.

Daily Prayer Project, Lent 2023
The Daily Prayer Project’s Lent 2023 booklet, featuring scripture, prayers, practical essays, art, and music from diverse contributors, is available in print and digital formats.

As curator of the art on the cover and in the Gallery section, I discuss the marble sculpture Condemned to Death by Chang Dong Ho (장동호) (see more by the artist), the mixed-media piece Gathering Fragments 1 by C. F. John, the photograph Untitled #10, Flushing, NY from the Stranger Fruit series by Jon Henry, and the painted woodcarving Qwi:qwelstom (Halkomelem, a Coast Salish language, for “Balance and Harmony”) by Don Froese.

At 32:44–35:06, our theological editor, Rev. Russ Whitfield, discusses a theological method that has informed our work at the DPP called triperspectivalism (or multiperspectivalism), which says that we can enrich our perspective, limited on its own, by looking at things from different angles, especially those revealed to us by other people and cultures. For a snippet of the Herman Bavinck quote, see here. What Russ says is SO GOOD! I believe our prayerbooks stand out from other similar projects in that they are deliberately cross-cultural—not because it’s trendy, but because there is so much beauty and wisdom we are missing by not availing ourselves of the many resources of the global church. Our content is also cross-historical.

There are subscription options for individuals (you receive a print edition and a digital download link) and groups (digital access, with bulk-printing options). You can also buy a single copy, but it’s cheaper to purchase a monthly subscription and then cancel after you receive your edition if you don’t wish to continue. We publish six editions a year, each following the same format but filled with new content for the given season.

>> “Lent: Season of Repentance, Renewal . . . and Rebellion” with Esau McCaulley, For the Life of the World: Here Rev. Dr. Esau McCaulley—associate professor of New Testament at Wheaton College, contributing opinion writer for the New York Times, and award-winning author of Reading While Black—talks about the Christian practice of Lent as a collective wisdom passed down through generations of Jesus followers, as well as a spiritual rebellion against mainstream American culture, which has its own established rhythms that shape how we spend our money, when we feast, and what we celebrate.

McCaulley spent the first twenty-one years of his life in the Black Baptist church and the past twenty in a high-liturgical tradition, both of which have been formative for him. One thing he appreciates about liturgy (both the yearly calendar and the elements within a worship service), he says, is how it helps him more fully inhabit the story of Christ. He construes Lent as a season of repentance and grace; he points out the justice practices of Lent; he walks through a Christian understanding of death, and the beautiful practice of stripping the altars on Maundy Thursday; and he’s emphatic about how Lent is a guided season of pursuing the grace to find, or perhaps return to, yourself as God has called you to be. These ideas are expanded upon in his new book, Lent: The Season of Repentance and Renewal, from IVP’s Fullness of Time series.

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SONGS:

>> “Divino compañero del camino” (O Lord, Divine Companion): Written in 1964 by Antonio Rivera of Mexico, this popular Spanish-language song is performed here by Karina Moreno and Joseph Espinoza. It’s based on Luke 24:28–32, from the postresurrection story of the walk to and supper at Emmaus, but its pilgrimage aspect—the idea of Jesus as a companion on our life journey—makes it appropriate for Lent. [HT: The Daily Prayer Project]

>> “Yeshu Ji Mere Paap Kshama Kar Do” (Lord Jesus, Forgive My Sins): A Hindi song of confession with words by the late Shri Jalal Masih and music by his granddaughter, Mercy Sharon Masih. Mercy sings it here with her father, Hanook Masih. For an English translation, click the “CC” button. [HT: Global Christian Worship]

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ARTICLE: “The Blood Collages of John Bingley Garland (ca. 1850–60),” Public Domain Review: Peruse the so-called Victorian Blood Book, an eccentricity made by the British politician and fishmonger John Bingley Garland as a wedding gift for his daughter Amy in 1854. It consists of forty-one collages whose sources are engravings by William Blake and various other religious artists, botanical and zoological illustrations, photographs of medieval tombs, and other images from nineteenth-century books, but with one distinguishing decorative addition by Garland’s hand: drops of blood in red India ink, presumably signifying the blood of Christ. The pages also bear extensive handwritten religious commentary.

Garland, John Bingley_Blood Book
Detail from a page of John Bingley Garland’s “Blood Book” (ca. 1850–60), featuring a cut-out from a reproduction of William Blake’s engraving The Soul exploring the recesses of the Grave.

The Blood Book transferred from the collection of novelist Evelyn Waugh to the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas at Austin upon Waugh’s death, and they identify it as “the single most curious object in the entire library.” Though modern eyes may see the collages as surreal or even grotesque, Garland’s descendants regarded them as nothing other than “a precious reminder of the love of family and Our Lord,” as they have written. The Harry Ransom Center has digitized the full book.