Arts and Music at Redeemer

Janeanne Houston, Soprano, with Organist Sheila Bristow

Janeanne is a wonderful artist who performs in opera and oratorio throughout the Northwest. Her repertoire will include Bach’s Cantata 84, English songs by Finzi and Holst, and a fiery aria from Mozart’s Davidde Penetente. Come celebrate the close of the church year, and invite your friends to experience the arts at Redeemer! Free-will donation to support the music program.

About Janeanne Houston:

American soprano Janeanne Houston is a versatile performer, and one of the Northwest region’s busiest artists. Her extensive repertoire spans the Baroque era to the present. She has worked under the batons of many fine conductors including Gerard Schwarz, JamesDePreist, Sidney Harth, Dean Williamson, Richard Sparks, Christophe Chagnard, and Miguel Harth-Bedoya. Concert works that she has performed many times include Carmina Burana, Messiah, Requiems of Brahms, Verdi, and Mozart, and Mozart’s Mass in C Minor. Also at home on the opera stage, she has sung the roles of Konstanze in Die Entführung aus dem Serail, Susanna and the Countessa Almaviva in Le Nozze di Figaro, Violetta in La Traviata, Blanche in Dialogues of the Carmelites and Micaela in Carmen.

She has recorded many of North Carolina composer Dan Locklair’s songs and vocal works, and in the fall of 2006 she recorded a work titled Lairs of Soundings with the Slovak Radio Orchestra under Kirk Trevor for the Naxos label. A recording of world premieres by living composers titled The Shining Place was also released in 2006, and scheduled for 2009, a Zimbel Records release titled Songs of the Cotton Grass featuring music of Welsh composer Hilary Tann. Ms. Houston gave the East Coast premiere of that cycle on a New York State recital tour in October of 2006. Also that October, she soloed in the premiere of Judith Lang Zaimont’s Remembrance with Portland Symphonic Choir. Other recordings include So Great a Joy (2001), Living Mysteries (2002), The Chamber Music of Dan Locklair (Albany 2004), and So Much Beauty (2004).

The Seattle Times has called her singing “radiant-voiced” and Gramophone, “unfailingly responsive and dedicated.” The Journal of Singing raves “a flawless sense of style.” Performances this year have included the role of the Contessa Almaviva in Le Nozze di Figaro with Helena Symphony, Brahms’ A German Requiem with Bremerton Symphony, Bach’s Passion According to St. Matthew with Peninsula Singers and the Port Angeles Symphony, and a return engagement to the Messiah Festival of Music and Art in Kansas. In the spring of 2010, she will sing the role of Queen Elisabetta in Verdi’s Don Carlo.

She is the managing and founding member of Northwest Artists and the recording label Elmgrove Productions, and she has been a member of the voice faculty at Pacific Lutheran University since 1989

Searching for the Light: an exhibit of recent work by Redeemer’s artist in residence Angela Wales Rockett. Paintings will be on view in the nave August 16th– October 16th, 2009, with an artist’s reception planned for the evening of October 10th. More information about that later.

For the next two weeks flutists are providing special music for the 10:30 liturgy:

• 8/23: Sharon Grabner and Jan Bleakney; duets by Mozart and Telemann
• 8/30: Pearl Alexander; solo music by J. S. Bach

On Wednesday 8/26 organist Sheila Bristow and trumpeter Judson Scott will perform a short recital of contemporary music by American composers. This is part of the Wednesdays at Noon series at Trinity Parish (in downtown Seattle, at 8th and James). Free-will donation.

This Sunday’s hymns:

“Mary heard the angel’s message” is from an alternative hymnal by Church Publishing, Voices Found, which features women writers and composers. “Hail, Holy Queen”, the Fraction Anthem, and “Hail blessed virgin” are all copyrighted by GIA Publications, and are reprinted under OneLicense.net#A-713521.

Peace,

Sheila

Last night we had our first Art and Music Tuesday and it was great! There was wonderful fellowship and much laughter. Sheila taught us part of a lovely Psalm to sing (we’ll learn more of it each Tuesday in July). And the Christmas altarpiece is well underway. I’m really looking forward to next Tuesday!

This is my sketch for the altarpiece. (on the left is what I hoped to get done by the end of the night - and we did!)

Color Sketch for Christmas 2009 Altarpiece

Here I start the art portion of the evening by explaining some of the materials we’ll be using.

Art portion of evening begins

And here is one shift of my minions painters. You can really get a sense for the size of this thing when you see people working on it.

Ginny, Sheila, Polly, Eric and Kathy painting

Hope you can join in the fun next week!

-Angela

Every Tuesday evening in July, the Redeemer community is meeting for music, art and Eucharist.

Here’s the schedule:

• 6:00pm — Bring your own dinner
• 6:30pm — Learn music to sing during the Eucharist
• 7:00pm — Eucharist
• 7:30pm to approximately 9:00pm — Art, and more music

We’ll be posting photos to the blog as we go, so stay tuned!

The Sunday of the Passion  choir and organ

Choral Psalm 22  anglican chant/Hopkins

Choral Anthem  Adoramus te Christe/Jacques Berthier

Maundy Thursday   women’s schola, soloists, and organ

Organ prelude  Variations on Pange lingua glorioso/Nicolas de Grigny

Choral Psalm 78  plainsong, after Hildegard of Bingen

Choral Anthem  Panis Angelicus/Giuseppe Baini

Duet   Tantum Ergo/Nicolas Gigault
Erica Row & Christina Siemens

Solo   A Song of Lamentation/John Karl Hirten

Stacey Porter

Good Friday    choir and organ

Choral Anthem  Behold, Before Our Wondering Eyes/ Walker & Berberick

The Great Paschal Vigil   choir, soloists, trumpet, and organ

Choral Canticle  Come, let us sing to the Lord!/Dorothy J. Papadakos

Solo   Alleluia, from Cantata 51/J. S. Bach
Erica Row

Trumpet Offertory Aria/Flor Peeters
Judson Scott

Choral Anthem  Be Still and Know/Ana Hernandez

Organ Postlude  Allegro vivace assai, from Sonata No. 1/Felix Mendelssohn

The Sunday of the Resurrection  choir, soloists, trumpet, and organ

Trumpet Prelude Largo & Allegro/J. F. Fasch
Judson Scott

Solo   Victoria, mein Jesus ist erstanden/G. P. Telemann
Glenn Guhr

Duet   Maria Magdelena et alter Maria/Sulpitia Cesis
Christina Siemens & Glenn Guhr

Choral Anthem  Jesu, Joy of Our Desiring/J. S. Bach

Trumpet Postlude Moderato & Allegro/Guiseppe Torelli

Judson Scott

II Pascha    soloist and flute duet

Solo   I know that my Redeemer liveth, from Messiah/G. F. Handel
Christina Siemens

This Sunday’s anthem is from the 15th century, and like many English carols from that period has a text which alternates between English and Latin. The Latin refrain, “Nova! Nova! Ave fit ex Eva!”, can be translated as “News! News! ‘Ave’ has been made from ‘Eve’!”.

Ave refers to Mary (as in Ave Maria), and the name is especially symbolic in that it is Eve (Eva) spelled backward.

Join us for a contemplative evening of Advent readings and music on Saturday, December 6 at 7:30 PM. The service will include Taizé music and Advent hymns, and a beautiful new altarpiece designed by artist-in-residence Angela Wales Rockett and painted by members of the congregation.

Performers this evening include:

• The Redeemer Choir
• Erica Row, soprano
• Lorelette Knowles, recorder
• Sheila Bristow, organ

What is Advent?

The anthem for this Sunday (St. Michael and All Angels) is by William Billings (1746-1800), one of the United States’ first “homegrown” composers. He was an itinerant singing school teacher, and the music books published for those schools include many of his hymns and fuguing tunes. Let Mortal Tongues is actually a hymn, arranged for choir by local conductor Jason Anderson. The text is a hearty paraphrase of the reading for the day from Revelation:

Let mortal tongues attempt to sing
The Wars of Heav’n when Michael stood
Chief General of the Eternal King,
And fought the Battle of our God.

Against the Dragon and his Host
The Armies of the Lord prevail:
In vain they rage, in vain they boast,
Their Courage sinks, their Weapons fail.

Down to the Earth was Satan thrown,
Down to the Earth his Legions fell;
Then was the Trump of Triumph blown,
And shook the dreadful Deeps of Hell.

Now is the Hour of Darkness past,
Christ has assumed his reigning Power,
Behold the great Accuser cast
Down from the Skies, to rise no more.

‘Twas by thy Blood, Immortal Lamb,
Thine Armies trod the Tempter down;
‘Twas by thy Word and powerful Name
They gained the Battle and Renown.

Rejoice, ye Heavens, let every Star
Shine with new Glories round the Sky;
Saints, while ye sing the heavenly War,
Raise your Deliverer’s Name on high.

Episcopal Church of the Redeemer, Kenmore invites you to a Choral Evensong service on Saturday, September 13 at 7:30 PM to celebrate the Feast of Hildegard of Bingen. The music for this evening will consist of music by Hildegard and pieces composed using her texts, to be performed by the women of the Redeemer Choir and violinist Laurie Kempen under the direction of Sheila Bristow.

Map and driving directions

Listen to Hildegard’s music at Last.fm

About Hildegard of Bingen (from Wikipedia):

Hildegard of Bingen (1098 – 17 September 1179), also known as Blessed Hildegard and Saint Hildegard, was a German abbess, artist, author, counselor, linguist, naturalist, scientist, philosopher, physician, herbalist, poet, activist, visionary, and composer. Elected a magistra in 1136, she founded the monasteries of Rupertsberg in 1150 and Eibingen in 1165.

She is the first composer with an extant biography. One of her works, the Ordo Virtutum, has been called the first form, and possibly the origin, of opera.

She wrote theological, botanical, and medicinal texts, as well as letters, liturgical songs, poems, and the first surviving morality play, while supervising brilliant miniature illuminations.

Attention in recent decades to women of the medieval church has led to a great deal of popular interest in Hildegard, particularly of her music. Approximately eighty compositions have survived, which is one of the largest repertoires among medieval composers.

Hildegard communicated with popes such as Eugene III and Anastasius IV, statesmen such as Abbot Suger, German emperors such as Frederick I Barbarossa, and other notable figures such as Saint Bernard of Clairvaux.

Many abbots and abbesses asked her for prayers and opinions on various matters. She traveled widely during her four preaching tours, the only woman to have done so during the Middle Ages.