Advent Music Programs
 |
Sr. Anne Kathleen Duffy, Music Director, and Charlotte Mueller, Translator, discuss music for Adventsingen. Any Latin or German hymns that have not been translated into English have a translation listed in the printed program. |
The program opens with a recording of an alpenhorn. The sound floats over the audience as if it were coming down from a high Alpine peak.
One of the most important musical features of an Advent program is "The Search for Shelter." An excellent translation and arrangement (Who's Knocking There?) can be found in "The Trapp Family Book of Chrismas Songs." Copies may be ordered from the Trapp Family Lodge in Vermont. Another Advent hymn "Maria Walks amid the Thorn" is in the same songbook.
 In keeping with the religious theme of the program, we
include several selections from Franz Xaver Gruber's "German Mass in D Major." While his worldwide claim to fame is the melody for "Silent Night," Franz Gruber wrote dozens of beautiful masses and hundreds of hymns. The "German Mass in D Major" is available at the Silent Night Museum in Oberndorf, Austria. They can be contacted by e-mail for price and shipping information.
The English translation and
notes for a beautiful Austrian Advent hymn, "The Snow Falls Softly" are available on the internet. The same website also has the original Franz Gruber melody for "Silent Night."
A number of readings are included in the program including "The Legend of the Christmas Tree." This provides a different, non-Santa Claus view of the Christmas tree and ties it in with religious symbolism.
 In past years, Sister Monica, of the Irish Sisters of Mercy, worked with students to create the Angel Dance. It incorporates an Austrian legend about a shepherd boy who is wakened from a sound sleep to run to the stable in Bethlehem.
Audience participation is an integral part of our program. We ask them to join our opening selection, "O How Joyfully," and the final selection, "Silent Night." The latter would not be heard until Christmas Eve in Austria, however, this program gives us an opportunity to present the true story behind the composition of the world's best-loved Christmas carol along with a chance to
sing the actual Franz Gruber melody instead of the one that is popular today.
We want to make the program more of an ecumenical gathering and hope to present it in churches of various faiths during the next few years. Hopefully the idea will catch on and spread to other congregations just as it is doing in Austria.
|