In anticipation of his recital this weekend, second-year DMA candidate, Andrew Major shares some thoughts on his chosen repertoire and finding meaning in music.
The choirs here at Northwestern do a lot of new music, much of which is political. But unlike the vitriolic pundits of the fake news world in which we are living, many of today’s composers work to remove themselves, their ideologies, from their art. The result is a body of works that attempt to balance relevance with objectivity, documents of a time and place that ask questions rather than give definitive answers.
Sarah Kirkland Snider’s Mass for the Endangered is both in this strain and against it. On the surface, it documents our species’ arrogant destruction of the planet and those we share it with, and it considers the line between identifying the problem and being the problem. In its adaptation of the ancient liturgy of the Mass, it invites us into Communion with nature and with each other through the most powerfully human of means: ritual. And like those rituals of marriage, graduation, inauguration, and passing, it suggests that we find ourselves at a critical threshold – on the brink of transformation.
But it’s also deeply personal and intensely emotional music. It’s not entirely objective; it doesn’t attempt to remain alien to the impulse that created it. And it charges us – the faithful observers of nature’s plight – to seize the chance we have “to look within ourselves and change how we have lived.” Indeed, it’s a piece that lies, if unwittingly, at the heart of what William Saroyan wrote about some 80 years ago: “Art is answerable to politics, and politics is answerable to religion, and all are answerable to man, so that when there is disgrace in life, as there is now, we are all guilty.”
Mercy on this refuge,
this braided boundless stone
Mercy for their old
Mercy for their young
And mercy now
for what we’ve done
My relationship with nature runs deep. I was born surrounded by mountains and grew up in the wild places of Montana. Along with conducting, being in nature is where I feel completely myself, completely seen. And when we are seen for exactly who we are, there is a freedom that we can attain – a glory. That’s where hope lies.
There’s a moment at the end of the Sarah’s Sanctus in which the bright cascade of musical gestures relaxes, hovers, and recedes into non-existence. This theme of non-existence, beyond its obvious connection to endangered species and conservation, is a powerful and seductive way of asking questions. Who has a Voice and how do they use it? Who has no Voice? And what are we actually doing when we sing? These are all considered by Sarah, and left unanswered. In place of answers: conviction and commitment. Hope.
We believe in all who are offset.
We believe in all who are outcast.
We believe in all who are voiceless…
We believe in listen.
Join us for Andrew’s recital this Saturday, February 19, 2022 at 2:30pm CST in Galvin Recital Hall!
Learn more about Andrew here.
