For a very long time I’ve talked of “glimpses into beauty.” I even tried poetry once* to talk about these marvelous moments. Naturally, for me it most often happens as I’m listening or even conducting a choral work. I have the sensation I’ve seen (heard) something of the divine. The physical sensation is (yep) those “goose-bumps” or, because I’m wired this way, I may be brought to tears. 

 

Those of you who know the “late in life” Howard, know that I am, at best, a “doubter” in most of what religions of all stripes have to offer including Christianity, the very one in which I have been immersed since childhood. If you have the slightest inclination to know about this circuitous journey of discovery I claim as mine, see articles I’ve written about this HERE. Believe me, I’m not trying to make converts to my way of thinking. I’m just offering observations.  

 

But still...
I’ve touched on this subject before, but would like to expand on the idea of the “thin place.” You have a right to ask, “what in the world is he talking about?” From a historical and, for many, a present day perspective, there are many of the Christian faith who often look to All Saints Day or even Halloween as that period of time when we might be caught up in that “thin place” between current reality and something of the “other world.” The Episcopal church I served as choir director for ten years continues each “All Saints Day” to have a service of remembrance for departed family and friends, complete with beautiful candle lighting and marvelous music.    

 

One person’s definition of the “thin place” is as follows: “You might say it’s the place where the everyday illusion of separation brushes up against the divine truth of eternity and universal interconnection. The place where form meets spirit, seen meets unseen, known meets unknown.” 

 

I simply don’t know if my “glimpses into beauty” parallel or intersect in any way with concepts of the “thin place.” Somehow, I doubt that I need religion of any sort to sense things of beauty and to have my life enriched by those moments.  

 

On the other hand, it takes no forced logic to realize that ALL our past experiences...and for us our music experiences...have a huge bearing on our inner being.

 

You all “know” our friend and the man who has arranged so many of Chor Anno’s “ending” pieces at concerts, Shawn Kirchner. Shawn grew up in a tightly knit religious group. (He can tell his own story.) I’ve “talked” briefly with him (via email) about our somewhat parallel growth through all of this “religious” stuff. My guess is that he has struggled to understand how there is almost a dichotomy between his older (now) Shawn views and his attraction to, say, gospel style music of his earlier years. Here is what he said: (and note he ends the whole paragraph with a question mark! And an “or something!”) 

 

One of my reflections on why I also get a charge out of this religious music (and there's a whole Sacred Harp community that could attest to this --- probably chock-full with agnostics and people without church backgrounds who ADORE singing Sacred Harp music about Jesus and heaven and all of that)  is that some of this music expresses the idea of spiritual freedom in  a very real way.  And maybe it expresses it better than any lyric or concept source.  So, we're not going to tire of these kinds of songs, because somehow our souls need to sing about themselves!  And our souls are less particular than our minds about the "alignment" of our concepts -- they just want to have some great images to spring off of?  Or something! (Shawn Kirchner)  

 

We could (or, at least, some people could) wrestle about “souls and minds” and whether they are separate entities...all of that sort of thing...for a very long time. Even as I sit and write this, I’ve come to the conclusion it matters not. “Thin place,” “glimpses of beauty,” definitions and explanations maybe matter less than when I started to write this yesterday!

 

Whether it’s “spiritual freedom” or a spirit of freedom, I’m delighted to continue the search for beauty. So, Chor Anno rehearses and we do our best to rid ourselves (to the best of our abilities) of the dross and become vehicles through which things of beauty shine.

 

Chor Anno member, you surprise me. For ten years you’ve surprised me. You continue to come back for more, without pay...in fact at considerable personal expense. The reasons are no doubt complicated. Aside from the friendships, the joyful and oh so capable leadership of one Nicole Lamartine, the genuine sense of support for each other, there is more. Perhaps one reason for this is that (just as I dreamed it might) we find we’re rather quickly able to make something beautiful happen. Whatever we might call this...a glimpse of the divine, a look through the thin place, or spiritual freedom, the experience, yes, even the hard work to get there, nourishes the spirit. Our composers speak to us and through us. You and I are better because of it.

 

Many of you have spoken via social media of your pride and of the uplift felt by you and your singers as you sang concerts during the lead-up to the Christmas break of 2019. I read the following as of this morning (Saturday morning, December 21). Billy Buhl wrote about his choir singing in The Grotto in Portland. He spoke in glowing terms about this performance, saying “every single singer was “locked in” with me and each other.” But here is the “kicker.” He went on to say “They were merely vessels in which a meaningful and shared musical experience passed through.” Talk about “glimpses of beauty!”

 

Brian Mitchell, who preceded Billy as the director of choirs at Longview’s Mark Morris High School, and who sat in on a rehearsal of this group recently, replied to Billy, saying:

 

James Jordan’s “The Musician’s Soul” talks about the need to be vulnerable as a conductor in order to get to that space. I saw, felt, and heard all that line up yesterday morning. The technical fades away from the conscious and the expression and communication takes over. True art. Erik Barnum talked about it like tuning into the divine presence and music that is always with and around us. Robert Shaw talked about cleaning out the bird cage to prepare for the moment when the dove descends.

 

Yes, it’s easy to “get carried away” at such moments. I started to say that that sometimes happens. But it occurs to me that “carried away” is just fine! We don’t need that admonition! Nor do we need sheer perfection. It ain’t gonna happen. But a room full of people who are “locked in” with a conductor and with each other, as Billy described earlier, can sweep us all into (call it what you will!)...it’s worth the price we pay!
Merry Christmas to you! 

 

*Things of beauty,
Moments of beauty, how quickly they pass.

Photograph it,

paint it,

preserve it in some way.

Record it, re-state it,

Will it be the same in replay?

The notes of a symphony or some particular scene
     are but particles in time.
Fleeting, but real, and can't possibly mean

     any less for their transience or difficulty to define.