THE CHORAL PRINCIPLE IN NATION-BUILDING
Great leaders of humanity have always stressed the role of choruses in nation-building. This may surprise some people, who do not understand the role of uplifting and educating the people, but we encounter it in the question that Plato keeps asking in his "Republic."
" Is it the quality of the Constitution that shapes the quality of the citizens, or is it the quality of the citizens that shapes the quality of the constitution?"
What would your answer be? In "The Republic", it is always the latter: the quality of the citizens shapes the quality of the constitution. Perhaps that is why Ben Franklin, when asked by a woman after the constitutional convention, "what type of government have you given us", answered, "A Republic, if you can keep it!"
But what about choruses?
St Augustine of Hippo wrote: "He who sings, prays twice."
A community chorus gives an individual with little training, whose voice, isolated, might leave something to be desired, a chance to be part of a beautiful whole. Though no individual voice should stand out, the more each individual voice is perfected, the better the overall result. Therein lies the paradox. There is no sacrifice of the individual for the whole, nor vice versa. They do hear their own voice, and all things work for The Good.
In the Renaissance (starting around 1400 A.D.), singing was taught, as part of general education, at the Cathedral schools. Choruses were formed there, and the great composers emerged from those choruses. The challenge of the Renaissance was the education of the people, in an environment hostile to their education. Music, and choruses, were a short cut. Great choral traditions were founded within the church, but also by working people. Let us leave you with one of each -- from wildly different times and places!
1. Sergei Rachmaninoff: Vespers # 14. The composer wrote this in 1915 for a war benefit. It solves the problem of setting a Russian Orthodox chant with the full chant intact. He had been working with the Moscow Synodal Choir for decades. It employs virtuoso choral technique (e.g.the tenor rises to a high Bb, sung pp in mm 5-6. The basses sink to a low C).
2. The amazing choral tradition in Welsh miners. The composer, Joseph Parry, was also a miner, working in Darby Pa. When, at the age of 15, work stopped, his fellow miners taught him reading, writing, solfege, and bel-canto singing. Here is the result.
https://youtu.be/vCnMx0wwC74?list=RDvCnMx0wwC74
3. Erasmus of Rotterdam's [28 October c. 1466 - 12 July 1536] understanding of the importance of music, can best be grasped by his beautiful Elegy, written for the death of the world's leading composer, Johannes Ockeghem in 1497. "Epitaph on the peerless musician, Johannes Ockeghem, by Erasmus of Rotterdam 1497". Here is Ockeghem's canon for 36 voices, "Thanks be to God" that is meant to shake the rafters.
https://youtu.be/rzBhYMvnMKQ?list=RDrzBhYMvnMKQ
More to come!