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Songs (Too Often) Without Words New York
Crypt of St. John the Divine
10/08/2025 - October 9, 2025*
Doug Balliett: Relics and Martyrs (World Premiere)
Dietrich Buxtehude: Selections from Membra Jesu nostra
Caroline Shaw: to the hands
The New Consort: Aine Hakamatsuka, Olivia Greene (Sopranos), Elisa Sutherland (Mezzo-soprano), Jacob Perry (Tenor), Brian Mummert (Baritone, annotator) – Theotokos: Ela Kodzas, Rafa Prendergast (Violins), Andrew Gonzales (Viola), Charles Reed (Cello), Doug Balliett (Double‑bass, Concept-arranger), Dusan Balarin (Theorbo), Caitlyn Koester (Organ)
Ensembles in the Crypt (© Steven Pisano)
“Where Bach polishes the surfaces, Buxtehude leaves in some grit, an enormous feeling of rhythm and tension. I like that.”
Anonymous
“I guess I’d like people to be able to forget a lot of things and just enjoy the beauty of harmony and melody for a moment.”
Carolyn Shaw
The concept of Andew Ousley’s newest “Death of Classical” production is like a verbal polyphony for the absurdly complex musical polyphony of Johannes Ockeghem.
What did we have here? The faux‑taper-lit dungeon...er crypt, of the majestic St. John the Divine. Theotokos’ delicate Renaissance chamber orchestra divided in two parts across the stage. The wonderful voices of The New Consort dynamically creating endless diverse physical patterns for their music. Add to this a beautiful written adoration in the program of those who died for their faiths.
That, though, was the beginning. The music alternated between Dietrich Buxtehude’s highly visual 17th Century celebration of Christ’s body (in Latin) and Carolyn Shaw’s 21st Century reflections on the same–including her melodies that resembled or quoted from the 17th Century Danish composer himself. Almost hidden in this sextet of movements was original music by Doug Balliett. But so subtle that one had to be informed later of his interpolations.
And now the double-kicker. Buxtehude was no holier-than-thou J.S. Bach. He was more adventurous, more human in many ways. His seven‑part Limbs of our Jesus was not a simple prayer. His music danced, sang, adored, cut and healed.
Caroline Shaw, as always, showed she is one of the most radiant lyrical, original and spellbinding composers of our day. Yet her words here meant something. And when the entire ensemble stood behind the audience enumerating our refugees (an echo from her quote of Emma Lazarus), or the poetry of our deep humanity... well, we must – should have been moved. Ms. Shaw is not a “political” musician. Yet every note, semibreve, harmony, measure affirms Diderot’s words that “all creatures are involved in the life of all others.”
This described the complex structure and we should have embraced the consequential musical structure which followed. That, though, was a problem.
D. Buxtehude/C. Shaw
(From The Musicians by Johannes Voorheut/© Chris Connor)
Had these interlocking sections of Shaw and Buxtehude been a Mass, we would have no trouble listening. In this case, though, the music had the same literal pictures as Messiaen’s images of Jesus.
The result was a bipolar appreciation. Those few who had studied the Latin and English words, could have determined the meaning of “the wounds” in the hands or the “healing of embrace.” The excerpts here were raging, emotional, tender. We had short orchestral concerti, solos, duets and quintets, all written for the specific meaning of the words.
That knowledge itself, for the two composers, could have hinted at Renaissance pictures or 21st Century poetry. Both vocal and instrumental ensembles should have been supremely visual.
Still, before the concert, I saw none in the audience give more than a passing glance at the program. (Quite understandable, since the usual Death of Classical wines were excellent.) Thus, instead of a series of images, the audience was treated to a patina of beautiful sounds. Sounds without foundation.
Just as one can immerse oneself in, say, a Romantic concerto, here were a whole series of clouds which floated, billowed, swam, and pulsed. Rather than specific rage, the notes became lightning bolts, rather than the joys of “healing and embrace”, we had rays of sunshine, resplendent yet emblems of nothingness.
And with the wondrous plucking theorbo, the glorious strings, the perfect harmonies of The New Consort, that sheer beauty was quite enough.
Obviously Mr. Balliett had a Sophie’s choice. Whether to softly announce each section, thereby giving the notes extra‑musical dimension; or to let the beauty of the notes be their own reward in the dark liturgical depths of the crypt. He chose the latter, and the result was at times transcendent.
Composers as splendid as Shaw and Buxtehude need more than mere transcendence, since their music last night had meaning beyond mere sounds. Such was the substantial significance given to a rare coterie of listeners.
Harry Rolnick
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