Bede
BEDE 673-735 Our programme uses Bede's own words together with church chant and a specially commissioned work to celebrate a remarkable and likeable figure. Living so long ago, speaking two languages now largely unknown, his keen and detailed interest and curiosity yet come across compellingly in his writings. He had a great reputation in his own times for biblical scholarship; the list of his works includes commentaries on many books of the old and new testaments, saints’ lives, the lives of his own Abbots, a Martyrology, books of divine poems, hymns, epigrams, as well as teaching books and grammars, and works on the nature of time. It was Bede who defined the year of Christ’s birth as AD1, and in doing so gave rise to the calculation of time with reference to this date. His interest in calculation, numbers, and time was part of his profound religious faith and life; it explains why he gives the Synod of Whitby such a central part in his History, recording verbatim the arguments of the principal figures. For Bede, and for the church, the Resurrection was the defining moment in world history. To calculate its celebration accurately was of the greatest significance. Bede returns again and again to the problem of the true observance of Easter. He lived close geographically to the Celtic missionary centre of Lindisfarne, and the lives of great Celtic saints such as Cuthbert were within living memory. He had enormous respect for the Celtic saints and monks, and a great sorrow that they were so pig-headed as not to accept the Roman calculations.

However, his own monastery had been founded as a copy of a continental community by Benedict Biscop who had been to Rome at least four times, and had been a monk in a Roman monastery. Though living ‘in one remote corner of a remote island’, Bede was by no means provincial in his upbringing or outlook. One of the most illustrious visitors to his monastery when he was a young monk had been, astonishingly, none other than the chief cantor of St Peter’s in Rome, who taught the Roman chant to the community. Bede speaks often of the chant which was the lifeblood of the monastic prayer, though as it was entirely an aural tradition we know nothing of its sound. The first written examples of chant begin to appear more than a century after Bede’s death and after the destruction of the Northumbrian culture of which he was a part.

This programme uses texts sung liturgically in Bede’s day, quite probably to melodies similar to those still used. The two Ambrosian hymns are found in a psalter written in St Augustine’s Canterbury in the early eighth century, during Bede’s lifetime, which contains these two hymns and one other; Splendor paterne glorie for morning and Deus creator omnium for evening prayer. They stand symbolically therefore at the beginning and ending of the programme. Alleluia: Tu es sacerdos comes after Bede’s account of his ordination. Haec est domus domini follows the account of the monastery’s foundation and dedication, and the two mass chants for St Peter honour the narration of the visit of John, the Pope’s director of music at St Peter’s. The Introit for St Paul similarly refers to the dedication of Bede’s own monastic home at Jarrow, and a short extract of psalmody colours the description of the difficulty, and sadness, of chanting psalms without their structurally necessary antiphons. Judith Bingham’s The Necklace of Light is performed in the context of Bede’s best-known work today, the History of the English Church and People. The piece narrates the story of the Synod of Whitby amid settings of the dreams and visions of the principal figures.

It is followed by fragments from Bede’s Life of St Cuthbert, material for which he gathered verbatim from eye witnesses of the events of the saint’s life, especially from the brethren at Lindisfarne. The chant likewise sets stories from Cuthbert’s life: the incident of the angelic visitor in Patriarche nostri Abrahe happened when he was guestmaster at Lastingham Abbey; the events depicted in the three antiphons occurred when he was visiting Coldingham abbey on the Northumbrian coast. Verilocus vates Cuthbertus describes his reluctance, after having been a hermit on Farne, to accept the call to become Bishop and go into the world again. O beatum presulum Cuthbertum pays honour to his continued work as a healer after his death. These pieces from the Saxon tradition are transcribed from the Worcester Antiphoner, which happily preserves the music. Finally, within the narration describing Bede’s last days are two pieces specifically mentioned in the text, O Rex glorie, and Gloria patri.

The Necklace of Light - Programme note by Judith Bingham
I had never read any Bede before, so this commission from Opus Anglicanum to write a piece about St Hild filled me with a mixture of curiosity and apprehension. I had imagined a rather dry chronicle and so was delighted to discover a world in which powerful political figures mingled freely with the supernatural. In particular I was most struck by the description of the Synod of Whitby in 664 at which the date of Easter was set. It reminded me of nothing less than our present Northern Ireland peace talks, except that the major players are given to otherworldly dreams and visions, while all believing of course that they have God on their side. The piece begins with Caedmon’s dream. Caedmon was a monk at St Hild’s monastery who was given extraordinary gifts of poetry and singing by an angel in a dream. After this, the political drama unfolds, punctuated by the visions of first Breguswith, Hild’s mother, who, while she was carrying Hild, dreamt that she had a necklace of light under her robe which illuminated all Britain. Then comes St Wilfred’s vision of the Archangel Michael recalling him from death. The political discussion was not satisfactorily resolved for everyone, but the words of St John at the end remind us that the light of God illuminates all men. The dream-like parts of the piece are always in Latin, the spoken words in English. The notes B,E,D,E(flat) are a recurrent motif in the music, and I found that they unconsciously evoked plainsong, weaving continuous threads into a musical tapestry.

PROGRAMME

Splendor paterne glorie hymn
My Life - from the History of the English Church and People
Alleluia: Tu es sacerdos for the Ordination of a priest
Abbot Benedict Biscop founds the monastery of St Peter at Wearmouth
Haec est domus Domini respond for Dedication of a church
John, Archcantor of St Peter’s Rome visits Monkwearmouth
Constitues eos gradual for St Peter
Alleluia: Tu es Petrus
The plague disrupts the monastic service
Diffusa est gratia antiphon
He writes The Ecclesiastical History
The Necklace of Light Judith Bingham
The Synod of Whitby AD 663 fixes the date of Easter -
Caedmon’s Dream
Breguswith’s Dream
Hic est discipulum ille
Wilfred’s Dream
Tu es Petrus
Fuit homo
Bede writes his Life of Cuthbert
Patriarche nostri Abrahe
Edomans corpus
Mirum dictu
Adest frater curiosus
Verilocus vates Cuthbertus
O beatum presulum
Bede’s death is narrated by one of his pupils
O Rex gloriae
Gloria Patri
Deus creator omnium Hymn

Programme devised by John Rowlands-Pritchard