Yesterday was a day full of GUM! I'm stocked for a few weeks (at least of classical and operetta selections :). Here is a funny ballad from Gigi, that always makes me laugh. Several people were involved in making this music. Click here for more info....
[The first ~10 sec of the video has issues, but the audio is fine :) ]
[It made me laugh more when I realized that the one line from the song I thought I knew, I remembered wrong!]
As one of my Boston choir directors said, this unique, New England piece compares Jesus Christ to that most-American of trees, the apple tree. Below are two settings of the text, one by Elizabeth Poston (the most common, it appears, and the first version I heard), and another by Stanford Scriven.
Here also is a link to the only on-line recording I could find of Jeremiah Ingalls' setting, which is my favorite because it is so energetic! http://www.uchoir.harvard.edu/sounds/IngallsTheAppletree.mp3
(I first heard this setting, as is often the case, you've seen, at a Harvard Carols Service.)
I love this movement from the Messiah, and not just because I always smile at the title.* The music and text (below) work so well together, with a simple theme for "All we, like sheep," suggesting the simpleness of mankind relative to God; and fast notes for the words "astray" and "turned," suggesting the wanderings of a lost and scattered flock.
Text: "All we, like sheep, have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way, and the Lord hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all." (Isaiah 53 : 6)
* Sometimes when we are playing "Settlers of Catan," I start singing, "All we lack sheep."
It's Easter time! Time for good music about Jesus' priceless gifts to all mankind. I first heard this song on a CD that I purchased after a gorgeous concert by the Choir of Saint Thomas Church, New York City (at Christ Church in Cambridge, MA).
A translation of the text is: "This is the day which the Lord hath made: let us be glad and rejoice therein. Alleluia." [More words and translation here.]
This recording - by the Choir of King's College, one of my all-time favorites - includes two settings of the same text. Enjoy!