A Concert for Peace on Earth

Agnus Dei by Samuel Barber (1910-1981)
Samuel Barber was truly a child prodigy, playing piano at six, composing at seven, and entering the Curtis Institute of Music at 14. So successful was his career that Barber had no need to do anything but write music, not in the austere non-tonal style of his contemporaries, but in the traditional, lyrical style which lie preferred. "It is said that I have no style at all," he said, "but that doesn't matter. I just go on doing, as they say, my thing. I believe this takes a certain courage." Perhaps Barber's inherent lyricism and expressiveness also stem from the fact that he was a competent mellow baritone.

The Agnus Dei is a choral arrangement of the composer's Adagio for Strings, itself an arrangement for string orchestra of the second movement to the String Quartet, Opus 11, written in 1936. Obviously aware that he had just composed a work that would gain him fame and fortune, Barber wrote to a friend, "I have just finished the slow movement of my quartet today - it is a knockout!" The orchestral version was performed often by Toscanini, and its sustained melodic lines and lush harmonies were used to great effect in the film "Platoon." Barber received several requests for arrangements of the Adagio and transcribed the work for chorus in 1967, using the Agnus Dei text. In this work, phrases usually begin with a single voice, followed by others which fill out the underlying harmony; then a step-wise melody gradually rises and unfolds toward an intense climax. To quote J. Peter Burkholder: "The sense of suspension, of slowed-down time, creates an impression of deep feeling that can scarcely be borne..."

For the Beauty of the Earth by John Rutter (b. 1945)
John Rutter, born in London and educated at Clare College of Cambridge University, is known as the founder of the Cambridge Singers, as a choral conductor, and as a masterful arranger of songs, anthems and carols. His own compositions, written in a traditional style, are almost exclusively choral, but also include large orchestral works, opera, pop and light music, and music for BBC television. "For the Beauty of the Earth," published in 1980, was written for Rosemary Heffley and the Texas Choral Directors' Association. The text is by F. S. Pierpoint (1835-1917).

Soundings by Janice Kimes
Janice Kimes has dedicated her career to creating music of depth and spirituality, nurturing young musicians and inspiring audiences. She is founder and director of The Bel Canto Voices, a concert choir for girls in Minneapolis-St. Paul, which has performed internationally and acquired a reputation as a virtuoso performing experience. Noted as a trainer of young voices, Ms. Kimes also serves as Children's Chorus Master for the Minnesota Opera. She conducted the Children's Festival Chorus for the Minnesota Orchestra for 10 years and has lectured and conducted at universities, clinics, and festivals in the Minnesota area. She has sung internationally and has also been an opera and concert accompanist, author, arts administrator, and consultant.

"Soundings" is a two-part choral composition which allows interpretive freedom and relies upon choral artistry to blend its musical ingredients. Whispering, the brushing of hands, and spoken words over harp-like chords expand the choral experience while dissonances eventually resolve into the purity of a single note. It was written for The Bel Canto Voices and published in 1993.

Island in Space by Kirke Mechem (b. 1925)
Vocal music is the heart of music by Kirke Mechem, who has over 200 published compositions to his credit, including an opera and several symphonic works. Raised in Kansas, the son of a state historian and a German-trained pianist, Mechem pursued creative writing at Stanford before turning to music, first at Stanford, then at Harvard. While in Vienna to study and compose, he met Joseph Krips, who, as conductor of the San Francisco Symphony, championed Mechem's music and premiered his first symphony. Mechem was guest of honor at the Tchaikovsky International Competition in Moscow in 1990 and in 1991 was honored with an entire concert of his works performed by the USSR Radio-Television Orchestra. Honors for this resident of San Francisco have come from the United Nations, the National Gallery, the National Endowment for the Arts, the American Choral Directors Association, and the Music Educators National Conference.

"Island in Space" begins and ends with the prayer Dona nohis pacem, added and sung as a counterpoint to texts by Apollo 9 astronaut Russell ("Rusty") Schweickart and poet Archibald MacLeish ( 1892-1982). "To see the Earth" is a poetic description of a photograph of earth taken from space. Schweickart's prose gives us a description of earth from space as seen by the first human to make an unattached space walk (in order to test the backpack that would later be used for exploration on the moon). Though Mechem ultimately lulls his listeners with restful tonal harmonies and unison singing (all voices on one tone), vocal movement toward and away from those harmonies introduces soft dissonances (those "disagreeable" sounds of Palestrina's day). These help to create the illusion of space. The joyous and hymn-like setting of MacLeish's poem is a subtle yet striking contrast to the somber tone which accompanies Schweickart's words. "Island in Space" was commissioned by the A Cappella Choir, California State University, Chico, Dr. Sharon J. Paul, Conductor, for its 1990 tour of the Soviet Union.

Dona Nobis Pacem by Ralph Vaughan Williams (1872-1958)
After receiving a doctorate in music at Cambridge, the most respected achievement an English composer could have, Vaughan Williams discovered folk music. "Two years of close association with some of the best (as well as some of the worst) tunes in the world was a better musical education than any amount of sonatas and fugues," he said. Educated in the classical tradition, he became the leader of the "folksong school" of composers, director of an annual folk music festival, the head of the English Folk-Song Society, and the unofficial composer laureate of his native country. It is a tribute to the United States that Vaughan Williams, an English nationalist, set the poems of Walt Whitman (1819-1892) in more than one of his vocal works. His democratic leanings found a sympathetic echo in Whitman and also in John Bright (1811-1889), a political agitator, orator, and representative of the emerging manufacturing class in the 1800s. The Bible, too, was a strong influence, and the composer's religious works reflect English Protestantism and the Anglican service.