Argento's Evensong: Of Love and Angels a stirring oratorio
(April 2008)
After the passing of his wife of 51 years, Dominick Argento believed his career as a composer to be over. But Washington Cathedral Choral Society director J. Reilly Lewis gently persuaded him to write a choral piece in honor of the Baltimore-born soprano, Carolyn Bailey Argento. The resultant work, Evensong: Of Love and Angels, received its world premiere at Washington National Cathedral on March 2.The Baltimore Sun marveled: “The intensity of both love and loss inform virtually every measure of Evensong. With scriptural verses and texts by Argento, the piece delivers a message of faith in the power of love to heal those "afraid to face the darkness," as well as to comfort the survivors.” …
“At 80, the Pulitzer Prize-winning Peabody Conservatory alumnus has added to his sizable work list a[n]…affecting and expertly crafted score for soloists, chorus and orchestra.
“Vespers (Evensong) is a venerable and living tradition in the Episcopalian church, and that is the background of this new oratorio, which follows the basic outline of the service in the Book of Common Prayer. The scriptural reading that provides the basis of Evensong is taken from the fifth chapter of the Gospel of John. Argento focuses on the sick and infirm crowds huddled around the pool of Bethsaida (Bethesda), waiting for the miraculous cure associated with that place in Jerusalem. According to a legend, an angel would descend to the place and stir up the water, after which the first person to step into the water would be healed. The hope of a miraculous cure for a terminal illness is what appealed to Argento, according to his note in the program (Argento's wife spent her final days in a Bethesda Rehabilitation Center in Minnesota).”
The Washington Post noted Evensong’s “warmth and melodic accessibility” and deemed the liturgical piece “richly communicative:”
“What catches the ear most in "Evensong" is the way the octogenarian composer marries his accustomed American brand of lyricism with the British choral tradition, bringing Britten and Vaughan Williams occasionally to mind, and incorporating that fixture of Anglican church services, a boy soprano (Nelson James LePard Reed notably pure-voiced and eloquent here), significantly into the score. …
“It's hard to imagine a lovelier or more heartfelt memorial.”
> Further information on Work: Evensong: Of Love and Angels
Photo: Tom Berthiaume
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