echoes of war the resonating patterns of influence: an

Echoes of War—The Resonating Patterns of Influence:

An Examination of Recurrent Musical Trends in

Large-Scale, Sacred, British, Anti-War Choral Works of the Twentieth Century

by

Jonathan M. Kraemer, B.M., M.M.

A Dissertation

In

MUSICOLOGY

Submitted to the Graduate Faculty

of Texas Tech University in

Partial Fulfillment of

the Requirements for

the Degree of

DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY

Approved

Dr. Stacey Jocoy, Chair

Dr. Christopher J. Smith

Dr. John Hollins

Dr. Bill Gelber

Dr. Janis Elliott

Fred Hartmeister

Dean of the Graduate School

May, 2009

Texas Tech University, Jonathan M. Kraemer, May 2009

ii

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I would like to thank the following people without whose support I would not

have been able to complete this research project: Michelle Kraemer (my wife), my

Family, The Staff and Membership of Calvary Baptist Church, Captain Ed and Ann

Carr, Karl Jenkins, Boosey and Hawkes, Guy Wilson and The Royal Armouries, Hefin

Owen, Luned Phillips, Chris Lawrence and Opus TF, Grayshott Concert Series, Joe

and Carol Schoenig, Larry and Peggy Hay, Betty Cogliser, Dr. Stacey Jocoy, Dr.

Christopher J. Smith, Dr. John Hollins, Dr. Bill Gelber, Dr. Janis Elliott, Dr. John

Dickson, Dr. Ellen Peffley and others whom I may have left out but have not done so

intentionally. I cannot even begin to express to you all the appreciation that I have for

the support and encouragement you have given me over these past few years during

my time invested in this project. Thank you.


iii

TABLE OF CONTENTS

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS...………………………………………………………….ii

ABSTRACT…………………………………………………………………………...v

LIST OF TABLES…………………………………………………………………..vii

LIST OF FIGURES………………………………………………………………...viii

INTRODUCTION……………………………………………………………………1

I. THE ARMED MAN: A MASS FOR PEACE…………………………………….20

THE ROYAL ARMOURIES……………………………………………………...20

COMMISSION OF THE ARMED MAN: A MASS FOR PEACE…………………23

COMPOSER: KARL JENKINS (BIOGRAPHY)………………………………...27

THE ARMED MAN: A MASS FOR PEACE……………………………………….29

L‘homme Arme (LHA) Tradition………………………………………………..29

Layout…………………………………………………………………………..32

CONCLUDING THOUGHTS…………………………………………………….58

II. STRUCTURAL COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF THE PIECES………….59

WAR……………………………………………………………………………….62

AFTERMATH……………………………………………………………………..67

RESOLUTION AND HOPE………………………………………………………72

CONCLUDING THOUGHTS…………………………………………………….77

III. ICONOGRAPHICAL COMPARISON OF THE PIECES………………….78

THE ARMED MAN………………………………………………………………..80

WAR REQUIEM…………………………………………………………………...86

DONA NOBIS PACEM……………………………………………………………96

CONCLUDING THOUGHTS…………………………………………………..101


iv

IV. COMPARISON OF THE CRITICAL RECEPTION OF THE PIECES….109

THE ARMED MAN……………………………………………………………….110

WAR REQUIEM………………………………………………………………….115

DONA NOBIS PACEM…………………………………………………………...119

CONCLUDING THOUGHTS…………………………………………………...123

CONCLUSION……………………………………………………………………..126

BIBLIOGRAPHY…………………………....…….…………………………...….135

APPENDIX (PROGRAM NOTES)……………………………………………….141


v

ABSTRACT

Composers associated with the British Musical Renaissance (c. 1860-1950),

and especially those working in and around the period of the First and Second World

Wars, created a significant body of works of large-scale, sacred, choral pieces

reflecting a strong anti-war bent. Two composers and their respective works that are

closely associated with this movement, and for whom much scholarly discourse is

extant, are Ralph Vaughan Williams and his Dona Nobis Pacem (1936), and Benjamin

Britten and his War Requiem, Op. 66 (1962). A third, later twentieth-century

composer, Karl Jenkins, and his lesser-known work, The Armed Man: A Mass For

Peace (1999/2000): a multi-movement work based on the Renaissance tune/text of

L‘homme Armé, appears also to fall within the margins of this movement. Further

examination of the tradition initiated by Vaughan Williams reveals a weight of

evidence employing recurrent patterns in areas of musical and textual structure,

iconography, and critical and scholarly reception between the three choral pieces. The

presence of such patterns suggests that both Britten‘s and Jenkins‘ latter works follow

the model first established by Vaughan Williams in Dona Nobis Pacem.

This dissertation provides a comparative style analysis of recurrent patterns

found in the musical and textual structure, iconography, and critical and scholarly

reception of Dona Nobis Pacem by Ralph Vaughan Williams, War Requiem, Op. 66

by Benjamin Britten, and The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace by Karl Jenkins, arguing

for a classification of these works into a newly-established sub-genre within the choral

music of the twentieth-century British Musical Renaissance that is comprised of large-


vi

scale, choral, anti-war pieces within a sacred framework. In addition, this paper

provides a movement-by-movement narrative and structural analysis of The Armed

Man: A Mass For Peace, the first of its kind.


vii

LIST OF TABLES

2.1 Organization of Thematic Structures…………………………………...61

2.2 ‗War‘ Texts & Music…………………………………………………...63

2.3 ‗Aftermath‘ Texts & Music…………………………………………......68

2.4 ‗Resolution and Hope‘ Texts & Music………………………………....72

3.1 TAM/WR Film – Chapter Comparison #1……………………………....87




3.5 The Armed Man Film – Chapter Locations……………………………103

3.6 The Armed Man Film – Thematic Image Summary…………………..105

3.7 War Requiem Film – Thematic Image Summary………….…………..107


viii

LIST OF FIGURES

I.1 Coventry Cathedral bell tower remnant ………………………………….8

I.2 Coventry Cathedral interior and perimeter walls remnant……………….8

1.1 The main entrance to the Royal Armouries – Leeds Campus……….….21

1.2 TAM ‗1. The Armed Man‘: Measures 55-57 (Rehearsal Letter E)….….34

1.3 TAM ‗1. The Armed Man‘: Measures 27-30 (Rehearsal Letter B)……..35

1.4 TAM ‗1. The Armed Man‘: Measures 93-End………………………….35

1.5 TAM ‗3. Kyrie‘: Measures 76-81 (Rehearsal Letter F)...........………….38

1.6 TAM ‗4. Save Me From Bloody Men‘: Measures 1-7………………….40

1.7 TAM ‗5. Sanctus‘: Measures 87-End…………………………………...41

1.8 TAM ‗6. Hymn Before Action‘: Measures 1-8…………...…………….42

1.9 TAM ‗7. Charge!‘: Measures 147-149………………………………….45

1.10 TAM ‗8. Angry Flames‘: Measures 21-25……………………………...47

1.11a TAM ‗9. Torches‘: Measures 1-2…..…………………………………...49

1.11b TAM ‗9. Torches‘: Measures 1-11……………………………………...50

1.12 TAM ‗10. Agnus Dei‘: Measures 1-12………………………………….51

1.13 TAM ‗11. Now The Guns Have Stopped‘: Measures 1-13……………..53

1.14 TAM ‗12. Benedictus‘: Measures 1-18……………………..…………..55

1.15 TAM ‗13. Better Is Peace‘: Measures 24-29…………………………....56

1.16 TAM ‗13. Better Is Peace‘: Measures 143-145………………………....57

3.1 The White Dove from The Armed Man Film…………………………....82

3.2 Cross of Nails, High Altar – New Coventry Cathedral ………………...90

3.3 Saint Michael and the Devil – New Coventry Cathedral……………….92

3.4 Commemorative Plaque, Reconciliation – Old Coventry Cathedral…...94


ix

3.5 Reconciliation – Old Coventry Cathedral……………………………....95

3.6 Plaque from the Bell Tower – Old Coventry Cathedral………………...96

3.7 Plaque from interior wall – Old Coventry Cathedral…………………...98

3.8 The Royal Armouries – Leeds, Map of the Galleries……………..……99

3.9 When the Guns Stop Firing: 1918…………………………………….101


1

INTRODUCTION

L‘homme armé doit on douter? The armed man should be feared?

On a fait partout crier, Everywhere it has been proclaimed,

Que chacun se viegne armer That each man should arm himself

D‘un haubregon defer. With a coat of iron mail.1

While this paper is a musicological discourse, the primary subject matter is, on

the surface, seemingly quite different. To begin with, consider the opening dedication

of Benjamin Britten‘s (1913-1976) War Requiem, Op. 66 (1962) which begins with

the now infamous words penned by the British poet of the First World War, Wilfred

Owen (1893-1918), ―My subject is War and the pity of War.‖2

Warfare, which has changed little since the time of the text above concerning

the armed man and coats of iron mail (c. 1400s), pervades this study. The subject of

this paper is in fact, War. War is not only that which is known as armed conflict in the

sense of drawing up battle lines to fight for the sake of a predetermined cause, but is

also that which is a comparison of three major choral works, each composed by

twentieth-century British composers, all of whose messages center around the subject

of war: its effects upon those involved, contrasted with a hope or prayer for a more

peaceful tomorrow.

This paper, then, is a comparative study of Karl Jenkins‘ The Armed Man: A

Mass for Peace, Benjamin Britten‘s War Requiem, Op. 66, and Ralph Vaughan

William‘s Dona Nobis Pacem upon which I wish to make the following argument.

1 French text of L‘homme Armé excerpted from Karl Jenkins, The Armed Man: Full Version, Full Score

(London: Boosey and Hawkes Music Publishers, Ltd., 2000), English translation found in Mark Evan

Bonds, A History of Music in Western Culture (Upper Saddle River: Pearson Education, Inc., 2006),

131. 2 Benjamin Britten, War Requiem, Op. 66 (London: Boosey and Hawkes, Ltd., 1962), 1.


2

Three works, as a whole, form the foundation for what I am arguing is a larger, yet

previously unexplored sub-genre of large-scale, sacred, choral works with anti-war

themes by twentieth-century British Musical Renaissance composers. This

comparative study considers patterns of similarity between the three choral works as

evidenced through three major areas of qualifying criteria: structure, iconography, and

criticism.

At this point, I would like to clarify what I mean by a sub-genre. This sub-

genre, as I define it, is a smaller classification set taken from the larger genre, that of

the Mass. Within the larger Mass genre, this sub-set maintains a consistent and yet

unique set of characteristic traits that help to differentiate it from the larger

classification: the inclusion of juxtaposed sacred and secular texts, new and varied

musical treatment of those texts, the presence of associated iconography, and lastly the

comparable responses to these works from both critical and scholarly quarters.

In the formation of this argument, this paper assumes several key factors of

comparison between the three works and their representative composers: Nationality,

Time Period, Scope, and Subject Matter.

To begin, Ralph Vaughan Williams, Benjamin Britten, and Karl Jenkins are all

three, twentieth-century British Composers. Secondly, each of these composers‘

evolution of musical style comes out of the established tradition of the British Musical

Renaissance as set forth by Britain‘s national music schools throughout the first half of


3

the twentieth century.3 Thirdly, all three works are both choral and large scale in

scope, considering the fact that all three works average over forty minutes in

performance length and all three are scored for the distinguishing combination of

chorus, soloist, and orchestral performance forces. Fourthly, each of these works

deals exclusively with the subject matter of war. Therefore, it is from this quad-

faceted presupposition that I form the basis for my argument throughout this paper.

Since this research topic primarily involves British composers writing on war,

one must be mindful of Britain‘s colonialist and imperialistic wars during the greater

part of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Imperialism and the social and cultural

after-affects of it are deeply embedded within the British consciousness. The

ramifications of this are both manifold and complex.4 However, what can be noted in

British culture is: a) a lingering relationship with the non-Christian ‗Other‘—

represented by the Middle-and Far East and b) a distrust in the mechanisms of

imperialism. While in a sense national pride is still communicated in British society,

the militaristic fervor that originally bolstered that pride has popularly declined over

the course of the twentieth century, prompting many to rally for a cessation of arms

and ultimately for peace. This is especially evidenced in music. A basic background

understanding of these issues is paramount to the foundational formation of the

argument throughout this paper.

3 Both Vaughan Williams and Britten were students of the Royal College of Music, whereas Jenkins

enjoyed a similar educational upbringing as a pupil at a sister institution, the Royal Academy of Music. 4 For more information on the relationship between Britain and its imperialistic, military heritage,

please see: T.O. Lloyd, The British Empire 1558-1995, 2nd ed. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996)

and Paul Ward, Britishness Since 1870 (London: Routledge, 2004).


4

Against the political backdrop of religiously-influenced culture groups, all

three works‘ respective composers set anti-war messages. Vaughan Williams wrote

the Dona Nobis Pacem (DNP) against the backdrop of the First and Second World

Wars, Britten wrote War Requiem, Op. 66 (WR) after World War II, as part of a

rededication ceremony for a cathedral destroyed in that war, and Jenkins wrote The

Armed Man: A Mass for Peace (TAM) against the backdrop of the Kosovo conflict

raging in the late 1990s.

All three works share a similar genesis. Thus to better understand these works

and the following comparative analysis, one must know about them and their geneses.

BACKGROUND MATERIAL:

The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace

Karl Jenkins‘ The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace (TAM) was commissioned by

Britain‘s Royal Armouries to mark the passing of the millennium, ―the most war-torn

and destructive century in human history.‖5 Written with a pedagogical purpose in

mind, as the stated intent of both the composer as well as the commissioning body,

TAM challenges the listener to reconsider the far-reaching effects of war upon all ages,

those now, those past, and those yet to come. It was their hope that the texts, scores,

and accompanying images of TAM would lead concert-going audiences to consider the

full ramifications of loss, horror, and pain resulting from the seemingly eternal

struggle between those declaring war and those desiring peace. TAM received its

premiere performance on 25 April 2000 at Royal Albert Hall in London.

5 Guy Wilson-Master of the Royal Armouries, 2000.


5

Jenkins dedicated TAM to the victims of the Kosovo conflict that raged at the

turn of the last century:

19 March 1999, a peace agreement, aimed at resolving armed conflict between

the ruling Serbs and the ethnic Albanian majority population in the Province of

Kosovo, was negotiated at a conference in Rambouillet, France, but was not

signed by the Former Republic of Yugoslavia and its then President, Slobodan

Milosevic.6

Following the failure of the Rambouillet talks, NATO had initiated an air

campaign (‗Operation Allied Force‘) on 24 March 1999 against Serbian targets. The

military campaign, which lasted for seventy-nine days, displaced hundreds of

thousands of people from their homes, created war-related casualties numbering in the

thousands, and nearly destroyed the economic infrastructure of the province. This

campaign was suspended on 10 June 1999 when President Milosevic agreed to a

cease-fire, removing Serbian military presence from the region and calling off attacks

on the Albanian locals.7

It was against this backdrop of armed conflict in Kosovo and its surrounding

regions that The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace was commissioned, conceived, and

thereby dedicated. Parallel investigations of two other choral works, DNP and WR,

confirm my conviction that both of these pieces may also be interpretively ‗read‘ as

commenting upon a war-time context.

6 For more information regarding the events leading up to the conflict in Kosovo and the immediate

consequences of the crisis, see Stephen Badsey and Paul Latawski‘s Britain, NATO and the Lessons of

the Balkan Conflicts 1991-1999, Mary Buckley and Sally N. Cummings‘ Kosovo: Perceptions of War

and Its Aftermath, and the United Nations Environment Programme and the United Nations Centre for Human Settlements‘ The Kosovo Conflict: Consequences for the Environment and Human Settlements. 7 Following the removal of Serbian military presence in Kosovo, the United Nations set up a temporary

government, or mission, to help restore order to the former Yugoslav province. A full description of this

new mission (UNMIK) and an outline of its provision and purposes can be found in the 1999 United

Nations Security Council document Resolution 1244.


6

Dona Nobis Pacem

The Dona Nobis Pacem (DNP) (1936) of Ralph Vaughan Williams (RVW)

(1872-1958) received its premiere performance on 2 October 1936 from the

Huddersfield Choral Society (HCS) with the Hallé Orchestra under the direction of

Albert Coates. The work had been commissioned at the behest of the HCS as a part of

their centennial celebration.

DNP is a large-scale cantata, (averaging over forty minutes in length in

performance), written for soprano and baritone soli with chorus and orchestra.

Contrary to the textual layout of most ―sacred‖ cantatas, DNP combines both sacred

and secular texts under the umbrella of the Latin liturgical prayer, ―Dona Nobis

Pacem‖, from the Roman Catholic Requiem Mass. These juxtaposed texts come from

a variety of sources – including three poems by Walt Whitman, a parliamentarian

speech by John Bright, and selected passages from The Holy Bible – but all have

poignant anti-war subject matter as their common thread.

Throughout the decades following the premiere of the work, DNP, like both

the Jenkins and Britten pieces under consideration, has been associated with memorial

services marking events wherein armed conflict resulted in great loss of human life.8

The work‘s primary message, as derived from the texts woven together under the

auspice of ―a prayer for peace‖, is one that is both timeless, and yet continuously

relevant. Vaughan Williams biographer James Days says:

8 Similarly to DNP, 11 September 2006 was selected as the date for the US premiere of TAM coinciding

with and commemorating the five year anniversary of the national tragedy that occurred on American

soil on that date in 2001.


7

Vaughan Williams was issuing an unmistakable warning here, based on

personal experience in the trenches, as well as expressing the hope that conflict

could be averted and the blessings of peace enjoyed.9

DNP was sometimes even deployed as an attempt at international peace-

keeping: on the eve of the German Luftwaffe‘s ―Blitz‖ of England during World War

II, (beginning on September of 1940), the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC)

tried to schedule a broadcast of selected movements from RVW‘s DNP in Germany in

hopes that its message might deter Hitler and his forces from going through with their

plan.10

Unbeknownst to the BBC at the time, however, all music by British composers

had already been banned from performance within the Third Reich, (Germany, c.

1933-1945) since the previous spring; while the Nazis had banned all things British

earlier that year, they may also have believed in the potential power of music to

subvert their aggressive intent.

War Requiem

In October of 1958, in response to a commission from the Coventry Choral

Society, Benjamin Britten (1913-1976) began composing his War Requiem, Op. 66

(1962). This work was conceived as a centerpiece in the Coventry Cathedral Festival,

held on 30 May 1962, to both rededicate and consecrate the newly-constructed St.

Michael‘s Cathedral.

On 14 November 1940, during the Battle of Britain in World War II, the

German Luftwaffe had nearly destroyed the city of Coventry and its medieval

9 James Day, The Master Musicians: Vaughan Williams (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998), 70-

71. 10

Robert Stradling and Marion Hughes, The English Musical Renaissance 1860-1940: Construction

and Deconstruction (London: Routledge, 1993), 152.


8

cathedral, St. Michael‘s. Dating back to the fourteenth century, with its tall spire and

impressive size, the church building had been an easy target for the German bombing

raids and consequently, the wooden beams and rafters of the church were quickly

consumed in the resulting fire. By daybreak, only the outside perimeter walls and its

bell tower remained. See images of the Coventry Cathedral bell tower and perimeter

walls below:

Fig. I.1: Coventry Cathedral bell tower remnant (left)

11 and Fig. I.2: Coventry Cathedral interior

and perimeter walls remnant (right)12

.

In the desire for the newly-constructed cathedral to offer a message of hope for a more

peaceful tomorrow to the greater religious and civic community of Coventry and

beyond, while retaining its earlier war-time narrative significance, the Coventry

Choral Society extended its commission to Britten.

Britten based the work upon a compilation of texts from the Latin Requiem

Mass (Missa pro Defunctis) and selected poems by the First World War poet, Wilfred

Owen. As with both the Vaughan Williams and Jenkins works, War Requiem borrows

11 Photo of the Coventry Cathedral – bell tower taken by author (29 October 2007). 12 Photo of Coventry Cathedral – interior and perimeter walls taken by author (29 October 2007).


9

the skeleton of a traditionally sacred, Latin Catholic service, while interpolating new

secular, vernacular texts to heighten the intensity of the message. Although several

studies have discussed the textual aspect of the work, Britten scholar Mervyn Cooke

most clearly articulated the significance of its organization, commenting:

WR is without a doubt a highly original reworking of the genre, breaking new

artistic ground in its daring juxtaposition of vernacular poems and Latin

liturgical texts, and the bleak portrayal of man‘s inhumanity offered by the

Owen poems seriously undermines the stylized religious phrases of condolence

and consolation voiced by the words of the Missa pro defunctis.13

However, while the WR is original, its strategy of combining secular texts into

a sacred framework is not. The current study is the first to examine Britten‘s work,

along with its predecessor DNP and the later TAM, to form a fuller historical context

for this previously-unremarked aspect of twentieth-century British choral

compositions.

THESIS:

In this paper, using the The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace, by Karl Jenkins,

War Requiem, Op. 66, by Benjamin Britten, and Dona Nobis Pacem by Ralph

Vaughan Williams, I will argue for a classification of these works into a new sub-

genre within the choral music of the twentieth-century, British Musical Renaissance:

that of large-scale, choral, anti-war pieces based upon a sacred framework.

REVIEW OF RELATED RESEARCH:

Although many reviews can be found for performances of Karl Jenkins‘ music,

scholarly attention to his work has been lacking; this thesis begins to fill that lacuna.

13 Mervyn Cooke, Britten: War Requiem (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), 52-53.


10

On the other hand, a great deal of analysis and scholarly discourse already

exists for the Britten and Vaughan Williams works. Much of the background

information necessary for understanding the scope of this project lies within the pages

of several key studies which inform mine. The resources that I have found to be the

most helpful fall largely into four main sub-categories: those addressing nationalism

and British music, those engaged in formal structural analysis, those focused upon

scholarly and audience‘s critical reception, and iconography. In addition to helping

form the foundation for the opening argument set forth in the introduction of this

paper, the sub-categories cover the main subject areas that comprise the latter portion

of my work (Chapters Two, Three, and Four).

Nationalism and British Music

Two resources have served me particularly well. The first is an historical,

sociological study on the concept of ―Britishness‖: what it means to be British, which

with the collapse of the British Empire, has changed dramatically over the last

hundred years. The following passage epitomizes the insights offered by Paul Ward‘s

single-volume study, Britishness since 1879:

Loyalty to the nation and state was loyalty also to both monarch and Empire:

‗We drew Union Jacks, hung classrooms with flags of the dominions and

gazed with pride as they pointed out those massed areas of red on the world

map. ‗This, and this, and this‘ they said, ‗belong to us!‘ Domesticity and

Empire are explored even more deeply in John MacKenzie‘s pivotal work,

Propaganda and Empire...The British people received the imperial message

from school textbooks and teachers, juvenile literature, youth movements, the

churches, music hall, theatre, propagandist societies, exhibitions, cinema, radio

and political parties. The imperial and the domestic were linked, often through

the monarchy in architecture, coins, stamps and letterboxes as well as in ‗an

amalgam of names, places, building, images, statues, rituals and observances‘.


11

Imperialism held sway over British culture and values, surviving the First and

Second World Wars, well into the 1960‘s.14

What it means to be ‗British‘ in the sense of Ward‘s discussion is important to

the careers of Karl Jenkins, Benjamin Britten, and Ralph Vaughan Williams, as they

were all products of England‘s nationalistic educational process – all having attended

the Royal College of Music or the Royal Academy of Music.

Since these two schools were integral in the shaping and development of

English musical culture, especially during the period of the two World Wars, it has

been essential to consult a source that deals primarily with music‘s role in this

historical and cultural context. Robert Stradling and Marion Hughes‘ The English

Musical Renaissance 1860-1940: Construction and Deconstruction chronicles the

history and development of Britain‘s national music as fostered through her national

music schools under the conditions of war and armed conflict:

In many ways, the Renaissance had never ceased waging cultural war against

enemies within as well as foes without. As a movement, the Musical

Renaissance had deep within itself an assertive and competitive – even

conflictual – streak. Yet its main function was to express and confirm what

was at once the most profound and most dangerous of all political realities –

the nationalism which determined the history of its time, as also of our own.

To that extent, the English Musical Renaissance is still with us. Whatever their

background – the composers…were bonded together by ‗national‘ attitudes

crystallised by the war. 15

14 Ward, 2-8, 14-16. Ward writes further: ―Some historians, sociologists and political scientists have

seen Britishness as some form of economic or cultural imperialism imposed...by English ruling

elites...functions of capitalism, imperialism and Protestantism, and therefore British national identity

enforced upon the lower classes, colonies and non-Protestants, who resisted at each point. With the

economy facing a decline in the regions, the Empire coming to an end, and Protestantism being attacked

by secularization and the growth of new non-Christian religions, English insensitivities led to the inevitable crisis of Britishness at the end of the twentieth century. In addition in this period, two World

Wars contributed powerfully to the sense that the British had common purpose. Out of the second of

these wars emerged a new form of Britishness that entered into people‘s everyday lives through a

national welfare state. 15 Stradling and Hughes, 110-111, 183.


12

The values of the English Musical Renaissance were thus handed down to its

pupils either through direct instruction in classrooms, and through the spirit of the

times that impacted the day-to-day existence of students, faculty, and administration

living and working under its umbrella. As students of this time period and culture,

Jenkins, Britten, Vaughan Williams and their respective works were shaped by this

nationalist, war-time ‗crystallisation‘. In his own words, Vaughan Williams, the

champion of Nationalist and folk music in Britain, writes:

We can get our music from Germany, our painting from France, our jokes from

America, and our dancing from Russia. Has this brought us peace? Does not

this colourless cosmopolitanism bring in its train wars, such as our isolated

forefathers never dreamed of? I believe that all that is of value in our spiritual

and cultural life springs from our own soil; but this life cannot develop and

fructify except in an atmosphere of friendship and sympathy with other

nations.16

Vaughan Williams thus articulates a call for a renewed sense of cultural

Britishness, one which can be evidenced in the works of the three composers

examined in this paper.

Structural Analysis

Detailed structural analyses of WR and DNP already exist and are beyond the

scope of this study; however, it must be noted that there are several common structural

components evident in each work that require further exploration.

For a convincingly comprehensive structural and musical theoretical analysis

of the War Requiem, Mervyn Cooke‘s 1996 edition of the Cambridge Music

Handbook Britten: War Requiem still remains the leading authority. Additionally, for

16 Ralph Vaughan Williams, National Music (London: Oxford University Press, 1963), 155.


13

a fairly thorough comparative analysis of the texts and music of War Requiem and

Dona Nobis Pacem, Norma Louise Baker‘s 1969 thesis Concerning the ‗Dona Nobis

Pacem‘ of Ralph Vaughan Williams and ‗War Requiem‘ of Benjamin Britten is an

excellent resource. Baker‘s thesis is as follows:

To discuss the musical techniques that were used by Vaughan Williams and

Britten to express texts of similar philosophical attitude toward the issue of war

and peace. This similarity in attitude will be demonstrated by a study of the

texts, and their relationship to the musical element of each of the two

compositions.17

Taking both Cooke and Baker as a point of departure, my work provides a

comparative structural analysis between all three works, seeking a better

understanding of their musical-rhetorical strategies.

Iconography

With respect to available iconography, both the Britten and Jenkins works are

associated with specific film sources, which thus become a necessary part of my

examination. Let a word be said at this point that although both Britten‘s and Jenkins‘

works have accompanying films, their music stands alone without the visuals. The

film pieces were added after the fact. In the case of TAM¸ the film was produced four

years after the original musical score was premiered, while in the case of WR¸ the film

was created several decades later. Therefore, the earliest performances of the musical

works were without imagery and as a result, not all subsequent renditions of the

musical scores make use of the accompanying films. It is important to state explicitly

that this body of iconography presents a corollary to critical reception through its

17 Norma Louise Baker, ―Concerning the Dona Nobis Pacem of Ralph Vaughan Williams and War

Requiem of Benjamin Britten‖ (MA Thesis: University of Southern California, 1969), 3.


14

patterning of allusion, which has evoked a consistent critical response and is further

confirmed by my own analysis.

In 1989, filmmaker Derek Jarman released an experimental, eighty-nine

minute film consisting of a series of silent flashbacks and moving images set to

Britten‘s original 1963 recording of War Requiem. (Note: The images in this film are

similar in content and layout to those found in the later TAM film discussed below.)

Cambridge professor Rowland Wymer‘s text, Derek Jarman, provided a collection of

critical analyses chronicling the major events, images, and even the controversies

involved in each of Jarman‘s major films, an important text for its analysis of the WR

film and its symbolism.18

Welsh documentary producer Hefin Owen, who had previously worked with

Jenkins on other projects, commented that upon hearing TAM for the first time, ―he

was struck by how visual the work was,‖19

and set his mind to create an accompanying

film for the piece. Hefin stated further, ―What we set out to do was to create the visual

narrative of the progression of war; its beginnings, the actual conflict and the resulting

destruction, and the hope for final peaceful resolution.‖20

Personal experience with

the film and subsequent conversations with its production crew assisted my own

formation and understanding of the concepts and images associated with the work.

Combining Jarman, Wymer, and my own research directly pertaining to the TAM

18

Roland Wymer, Derek Jarman (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2005), 122. 19 In-Person Interview with Hefin Owen (12 November 2007 – 11:00 am). 20 Ibid.


15

iconography, I compare discrete visual references as they relate to their respective

pieces.

Although DNP does not have a motion picture associated with it, static images

found in and near key war-related structures in Britain use quotes in common with the

work, creating a visual-cultural relationship with DNP and its symbolism. I examine

these associated images for their related context to both WR and TAM.

Critical Reception

This study examines the critical reception of all three pieces in order to

establish connections between the respective contexts and responses to these works.

Studies of published or recorded receptions of these pieces include the seminal works

of Mervyn Cooke on WR and Norma Louise Baker‘s masters thesis on both DNP and

WR.21

Cooke‘s study is particularly important for his comparative analysis of the

critical reviews of WR, but also for his perceptive discussion of the musical

antecedents to Britten‘s output. Baker‘s thesis helps to create a connection between

the older pieces in my study, noting the composers‘ respective responses to the

reception of their large-scale, anti-war pieces. Additionally, I explore published

newspaper reviews of initial performances for patterns primarily related to the

performance contexts of these works.

With regards to the major sections (chapters) in this study—nationalism and

British music, structural analysis, iconography, and critical reception—the above-

21 Cooke, and Baker.


16

referenced resources have aided in the development and formation of a three-part

analysis of the three works and their classification.

METHODOLOGY:

The thrust of this study includes comparative formal textual and structural,

critical, and iconographical analyses of recurrent musical patterns found throughout

selected sections of Jenkins‘ The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace, Britten‘s War

Requiem, Op. 66, and Vaughan Williams‘ Dona Nobis Pacem. However, this study is

not meant to be primarily analytical, as both earlier works have been subjected to such

analysis in several previous studies.22

Instead, I will interpret and compare these

works in light of their individual and corporately-shared social, religious, cultural, and

historical contexts.

My interpretive analysis will employ several strategies: 1) a look at the

patterns found in the musical and structural settings of literary texts as well as the

selection of the texts themselves by each composer in their respective work; 2) a look

at the patterns found in iconography associated with and/or represented by each work

and how such iconography might illuminate the works‘ message or organization; 3) a

consideration and documentation of patterns of reception to the premieres, and where

applicable, how that response rejected or supported the perceived messages of the

work.

By providing these three major angles of analysis, I hope to show that Jenkins‘

TAM need not stand alone at the end of the twentieth century, but will rather take its

22 See paragraph above on structural analysis under Review of Related Research.


17

place at the end of a longer British musical tradition, that includes DNP and WR,

which express the horror and anxiety of the post-World Wars period.

CONTENTS OF THE DISSERTATION:

Chapter One

In Chapter One, I provide an overview of the history, mission, and purpose of

The Royal Armouries, the major commissioning body behind The Armed Man: A

Mass for Peace. Also, I include a short biography of the composer Karl Jenkins, as

well as a discussion of the events leading up to his acceptance of the commission of

TAM. In addition to these background contexts, I provide a brief overview of the

tradition of the L‘homme Armé, as this work extends the tradition of composers

creating large-scale choral works on the basis of that tune/text into the twentieth

century. Finally, I provide a summation of the layout and content of TAM.

Chapter Two

In Chapter Two, I analyze the recurrent patterns found throughout the formal

structure of each of the works, with special consideration given to the content and the

formal implications of the texts and the music. While it is clear that each work draws

on a variety of sources, both literary as well as musical, comparing the works‘ major

structural characteristics, provides evidence from which to argue for the placement of

the three works into the larger sub-genre discussed at length above. (Note: This

chapter, as in Chapters Three and Four that follow, examines each of the major choral

works with respect to Jenkins‘ work, thus providing a comparison and a basis for The


18

Armed Man: A Mass for Peace‘s classification within the larger political, social,

religious, British, sacred, choral, anti-war contextual framework.)

Chapter Three

In Chapter Three, I examine and discuss recurrent patterns found throughout

available examples of iconography associated with each of the three major works as

they relate to one another. To complete this task, I examine primary source evidence

including, but certainly not limited to the following sources: playbills, journal

entries/articles, letters of correspondence, pictures taken during a live performance of

a work, accompanying DVD images, and real-life landscapes/photographs taken by

the researcher on-site. Again, the examination and discussion of these iconographic

influences, helps to solidify the classification of all three works into the larger anti-war

sub-genre.

Chapter Four

In Chapter Four, I examine the phenomenon of recurrent patterns found

throughout audiences‘ critical reception to each of the works‘ premieres. In order to

accomplish this task, I have consulted a variety of different sources including, but

certainly not limited to, the following mediums: newspaper articles, critical journals,

and primary-source interviews. By examining reception, one can ascertain two things:

1) how the composer did or did not fulfill the original commissioning body‘s desires

surrounding the composition of each work; and 2) how the premiere audience

responded to the works‘ central message as communicated through the performance of

the music itself. From this angle, one can establish that the three works share similar


19

goals, compositional techniques, and receptions, which, in turn, suggests the existence

of a previously-unexamined sub-genre.

Conclusion

In the Conclusion, I review the content of the paper suggesting that: 1)

consistent patterns of intention exist; 2) this analysis provides new insights toward the

establishment of a new subgenre; 3) this work provides a unique methodology to

facilitate future research. Ultimately, it is my hope that this project highlights the

effectiveness of an interdisciplinary approach in musicological analysis—especially

for scholars working in the areas of the British Musical Renaissance, music with

largely socio-political-religious undertones, and for those working with Jenkins‘

overall musical output. This research will provide new insights for choral/orchestral

directors performing analyses of major structural and literary components contained

within large-scale, sacred choral works, and for scholars wishing to work across or in

conjunction with other disciplines within the larger fine arts core, in turn opening up

new avenues to facilitate such cross-discipline research.

CONCLUDING THOUGHTS:

Finally, this project will most definitely provide the interested reader with

selected formal analyses of The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace, War Requiem, and

Dona Nobis Pacem. More significantly, it is my hope that my work will also make

available for future scholars a new classification for better understanding the various

universal, textual, musical, and iconographical elements at play within British, large-

scale, politically motivated, sacred choral works of the twentieth century.


20

CHAPTER ONE

THE ARMED MAN: A MASS FOR PEACE

Jenkins‘ work, The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace (TAM) has not yet received

a thorough scholarly analysis, although it has garnered many popular reviews and

praise. It is the purpose of this chapter to introduce TAM from its inception, through its

composition, and structure. Such an introduction will then lay the foundation for

comparative analyses of TAM and other similar pieces in the following chapters. As an

important part of the process toward understanding Jenkins‘ work, it is essential to

first introduce and discuss the aims and goals of the sponsoring body, The Royal

Armouries.

THE ROYAL ARMOURIES:

The Royal Armouries (RA), or National Museum of Arms and Armour, is the

United Kingdom‘s oldest museum, with parts of its collection open to the public as far

back as the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries. The raison d‘être of the Royal

Armouries has changed drastically over the years. Even recently, during the year of

TAM‘s commission, their mission statement was:

To promote in the UK and world-wide the knowledge and appreciation of arms

and armour and of the Tower of London through the collections of the

Museum and the expertise and its staff.23

However, in 2007 the Armouries and its governing board modified their former

statement of purpose to embrace a new vision, ―to make Britain a safer place‖, by

issuing the following statement:

23 Karl Jenkins, Written Correspondence with the Composer (February 28, 2007).


21

(The Royal Armouries exists): To harness the reputation and relationships of

our organisation, the talents of our team and the power of our brand to promote

greater safety in all walks of life.24

Holding true to its initial mission and purpose as well as its newly-adopted

focus, the RA continues to chronicle the history of the development and use of arms

and armor in the United Kingdom while maintaining a strong pedagogical purpose.

―Military action is important to the nation – it is the ground of death and life, the path

of survival and destruction, so it is important to examine it.‖25

In keeping with its mission to raise national and international awareness

concerning military history, the Armoury opened a substantial new facility in Leeds in

1998-1999 (Fig. 1.1).26

Fig. 1.1: The main entrance to the Royal Armouries-Leeds Campus

The Museum‘s galleries showcase various aspects of military life from across the

globe. The War Room chronicles the weapons and military tactics used in war from

ancient and medieval times to the present. The Oriental Gallery tells the military

history of the people of Asia. The Hunting Gallery tells the story of man as hunter,

24 The Royal Armouries, ―About Us: Our Mission‖, http://www.royalarmouries.org/extsite/view.jsp?

sectionId=63 <Accessed: 12/07/07>. 25

Sunzi, The Art of War, (c. 4th cen. B.C.) (Source: The Royal Armouries -

http://www.royalarmouries.org/extsite/view.jsp?sectionId=121) <Accessed: 03/01/08>. 26 Photo of the Royal Armouries – Leeds Campus taken by the author (10 November 2007).


22

out of necessity to survive, and man as sportsman for individual conquest and hobby.

The Tournament Gallery features the story of the joust, foot combat, and the tourney

dating back to the Medieval and Renaissance periods. The Self Defence Gallery

traces the story of man arming himself against outside threats and the attempt of the

government to both provide alternatives as well as control his ability to own and

manufacture arms and armor. Finally, the Leeds Museum contains a set of outdoor

facilities that allow for the recreation of actual events through demonstration. Among

these venues are the Craft Court, the Tiltyard, and the Menagerie Court:

The Royal Armouries Museum is more than just a collection in a building.

Our objects were largely made for use out of doors, and therefore external

demonstration areas have been provided to enable the collection to be properly

put in context, explained and shown in action.27

In conjunction with the expansion of the RA to include the latest Leeds

campus, the Museum‘s board of directors initiated several new programs designed to

raise the general public‘s awareness of their mission and purpose. These new

programs include gun-control, personal safety and security, and conflict resolution. It

is the hope of the RA that these new initiatives will equip the general public with the

resources necessary to effect change in these areas:

It is true that Britain‘s oldest museum has earned a formidable reputation for

its collection and its knowledge of the history of weaponry but less well-

known is the organisation‘s work to help make Britain a safer place: raising

awareness of the effects of gun crime, working in partnership with the police to

remove guns and knives from our streets and, through education, helping

young people deal with conflict. Since the 1990s, the Royal Armouries has

been working with various organisations to help people develop a real

understanding of their safety and security. Through educational and

27 The Royal Armouries, ―Craft Court, Tiltyard, and Menagerie‖

http://www.royalarmouries.org/extsite/view.jsp?sectionId=484 <Accessed: 03/01/08>.


23

community work, exhibitions, gallery enhancements and partnerships we have

begun to address some of the most challenging and controversial issues facing

contemporary society.28

Far from the older image of an armory as just a place to find weapons – usually

for immediate practical application – the Royal Armouries are clearly reinterpreting

themselves for a modern audience. As part of the effort to reinterpret, Guy Wilson,

(then Master of the Royal Armouries), and the RA set themselves to commission a

musical work of lasting significance as well as profound educational impact. The

expanded size and presence of the Royal Armouries, along with its international and

educational focus, is reflected in the choice to sponsor a cultural work of art that

highlights historical, militaristic, and international characteristics. It was under this

framework that the inspiration for The Armed Man came into being.

COMMISSION OF THE ARMED MAN: A MASS FOR PEACE:

The concept of The Armed Man developed over a period of several years and

was born out of a collaborative initiative. Wilson states, ―most good ideas come from

no one individual, but rather grow out of the thoughts and ideas of a team.‖29

Therefore, in approaching this task, the RA assembled a team that could evaluate and

consider the variety of options available to them for realizing this project:

We were looking for an appropriate way for the Royal Armouries to

commemorate the Millennium. We had decided that as we moved into a new

century we should be doing something new; we had decided that we wanted to

do something of lasting value that we could continue to use; and we had

decided that what we did should somehow reflect this country‘s Christian

28 The Royal Armouries, ―About Us: Our Mission‖ http://www.royalarmouries.org/extsite/view.jsp?

sectionId=63 <Accessed: 12/07/07>. 29 Guy Wilson, ―The Royal Armouries Millennium Commission: The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace‖.

2000, 1.


24

tradition as we were commemorating an important anniversary in a Christian

system of marking time.30

In addition to the decision to commemorate Britain‘s Christian tradition, the

RA team found that they also needed to consider their history and future role in a

multicultural, global community. In the end, it was determined that the Millennium

Commission would be a musical work, whose pedagogical foundation would

encompass a Christian worldview, while expanding its accommodation of sources

from world literature. This approach was intended to make the work accessible to all,

bridging the gap between different people groups world-wide, and ultimately

satisfying the RA team‘s desire for a more educationally-grounded holistic worldview:

And so the idea developed to combine within the basic mass form a variety of

poetry and prose and a wide range of musical styles reflecting the multi-

cultural global society in which we live in an attempt to create a work that

dealt in an inclusive way with a theme of universal interest and relevance. The

challenge then was to create a coherent work that tells a story, makes people

think, and tugs at the heart-strings. We began to consider the possibility of a

musical commission, something we could use in our continuing educational

work, something through which, by involvement and performance, we could

deal with some of the historical and moral issues raised by our subject. What

better for this than a work of music that could appeal to the heart as well as the

intellect?31

To create this idea of ‗music that could appeal to the heart as well as the

intellect‘, Guy Wilson, working as librettist, began to draft an outline for a text that

would fulfill the desires of the commissioning body. Toward this end, he drew upon a

varied body of literature that spanned the world‘s major religions, Kipling, Malory,

Tennyson, and even an eye-witness account of the bombing of Hiroshima in World

30 Ibid. 31 Ibid.


25

War II. Once the initial draft was complete, the team contacted ―Classic FM‖, a local

radio station and one of the UK‘s leading advocates of classical music and music

education, to help them promote the new work:

The next step was to see if I could produce an outline that appealed to someone

who really knew about these things. I put pen to paper and, in 1998 took the

result to Michael Bukht of Classic FM. He liked it and this began the

association with Classic FM and their Masterclass Music Charitable Trust that

moved the idea forward.32

The result was a serendipitous relationship that would ultimately lead to the world-

wide success and promotion of the commissioned work. Classic FM helped

financially back the commission and later lent its support through broadcasting the

performance of the work over the airwaves, increasing TAM‘s popularity with the

general public.

Once the basic outline and terms for the commission were agreed upon, the

search began for a composer who could fulfill the wishes of the team while staying

true to the spirit behind the work. They narrowed their choices to a few possible

composers; among them were composer-conductor John Rutter of ‗Cambridge

Singers‘ renown and the Welsh-born composer Karl Jenkins of ‗Adiemus‘ fame.

Ultimately, it was Jenkins who received the commission and was more than happy to

take on the project. TAM received its premiere performance on 25 April 2000 at

Royal Albert Hall in London. Wilson writes of Jenkins and the satisfying end product:

We managed to persuade Karl Jenkins to take up the challenge. And how

fortunate we were to work with him. It proved to be an exciting and

constructive partnership. He responded to the commission by composing the

most marvelous, varied, accessible, appropriate music that embraces the whole

32 Ibid.


26

world and the full range of emotions that the subjects of war and peace evoke.

He managed to combine the tradition of liturgical music with that of military

music in a very exciting way. In addition he took an active part in developing

the form and content of the work and greatly improved my first, crude, and

overlong selections of text. He has, I believe, created something of rare

power.33

―Composing the most marvelous, varied, accessible music‖, Wilson‘s description of

TAM can be extended to describe Jenkins‘ musical opus as a whole.

Jenkins‘ style is hard to classify, for he neither writes in a purely classical, pop,

jazz, or world music idiom, but rather blends many of these. To that end, Jenkins

defends himself and his work against his critics:

I haven‘t got a lot of time for music criticism in this country. I don‘t mean this

in an arrogant way, but the critics can‘t cross the boundaries I‘ve crossed.

Unless they can sit down and discuss Miles Davis, alongside Gustav Mahler,

their musical education isn‘t well-rounded enough. If they can‘t cross that

bridge, their opinion isn‘t worth anything to me. My music should be judged

as something new, and not within the parameters of something else, something

expected, which is often what happens.34

His music incorporates the percussive rhythms and instruments found in

African and African-influenced cultures, (which can be evidenced in the ‗Kyrie‘

movement of TAM), the chord progressions and improvisatory nature of jazz, the

formal structures of pop, (evidenced in the formal structure of the ‗Sanctus‘ movement

of TAM), and the instrumentation and voice leading of classical music (evidenced in

the final a cappella chorale in the ‗Better Is Peace‘ movement of TAM). To better

understand the musical style of TAM, it is important to place the work within the

context of Jenkins‘ larger opus.

33 Ibid. 34 ―Classical Music: Fanfare for the Common Man‖ The Independent (London), 05/17/04.


27

COMPOSER: KARL JENKINS (BIOGRAPHY):

(The following biographical information has been printed with permission granted by

the composer):35

Dr. Karl Jenkins OBE B.Mus., F.R.A.M., A.R.A.M., L.R.A.M., F.W.C.M.D., F.T.C.C

Karl William Pamp Jenkins was born in Wales (1944) and educated at

Gowerton Grammar School before reading music at the University of Wales, Cardiff.

He then commenced postgraduate studies at the Royal Academy of Music, London. It

was in jazz that Jenkins initially made his mark. After co-forming ‗Nucleus‘, he later

joined up with ‗Soft Machine‘, one of the seminal bands of the 1970s.

Jenkins also made significant contributions to the field of advertising winning

the prestigious D&AD award for best music [twice], the ‗Creative Circle Gold‘ and

several ‗Clios‘ [New York] and ‗Golden Lions‘ [Cannes]. His advertising credits

include Levi‘s, British Airways, Renault, Volvos, C&G, Tag Heuer, Pepsi as well as

US/global campaigns for De Beers and Delta Airlines.

After a period as a media composer, Jenkins returned to the music mainstream

through his Adiemus project. Adiemus combines a classical base with ethnic vocal

sounds, ethnic percussion and an invented language, and topped the classical and

‗pop‘ charts around the world, gaining 15 gold or platinum album awards.

After achieving a great deal of success with his Adiemus project, Jenkins wrote

The Armed Man: A Mass For Peace (25 April 2000). Following TAM, Jenkins

composed Requiem, a large-scale choral work based on the Catholic Requiem Mass

which went to No1 in the UK classical charts. He is currently composing and

35 Karl Jenkins, ―Autobiography in email from composer‖ (Printed with permission by the composer:

Granted: November 15, 2007).


28

recording his Stabat Mater which will be performed at Liverpool Cathedral on March

15th 2008 as part of the city‘s European City of Culture status for 2008.

In 2004 Jenkins entered Classic FM‘s ‗Hall of Fame‖ at No. 8, the highest

position for a living composer and has been in the top ten both in 2005 & 2006 as well

as, in 2006, at No. 4 amongst British composers.

Jenkins holds a Doctor of Music degree from the University of Wales, has

been made both a Fellow and an Associate of the Royal Academy of Music, where a

room has been named in his honor, and holds fellowships at Cardiff University, the

Royal Welsh College of Music & Drama, Trinity College Carmarthen, Swansea

Institute and was presented by Classic FM with the ‗Red f ‗award for ‗outstanding

service to classical music‘. He was recently awarded an honorary doctorate [music]

from the University of Leicester, the Chancellors Medal from the University of

Glamorgan and two honorary visiting Professorships, one at Thames Valley

University/London College of Music and the other at the ATriUM, Cardiff. He was

awarded an OBE, by Her Majesty the Queen, in the 2005 New Years Honours List

―for services to music‖.

While Jenkins may not have been the sponsoring body‘s first choice for this

commission, his creative spirit, and mainstream popularity, especially through his

Adiemus projects, finally led the committee to offer him the contract. The very

eclecticism of Jenkins became an effective choice in the Royal Armouries offering

him the commission for TAM.


29

Before embarking on analysis and subsequent narrative of Jenkins‘ stylistic

interpretation as evidenced throughout the movements of TAM, I must first provide a

brief background of the history and tradition of L‘homme Armé.

THE ARMED MAN: A MASS FOR PEACE:

L'homme Armé (LHA) Tradition

The title L‘homme Armé (LHA) or The Armed Man, from which both the first

movement and the entire work takes its name, comes from a tune/text written c. 1450-

1463. The origin of the text/tune is still under investigation, but musicologists and

historians have been able to trace the earliest appearances of L‘homme Armé back to

the Court of Charles the Bold of Burgundy (1433-1477) around the middle of the

fifteenth century. Whether the work was commissioned by Charles to promote a

church-initiated crusade for the purpose of reclaiming fallen Constantinople from the

Ottoman Turks, or was simply the name of a popular nearby tavern, it is not known for

sure. 36

One thing is for certain though: the text, ―the armed man must be feared...

each man must arm themselves with an iron coat of mail‖, in the context of the late

twentieth century, speaks poignantly of the inherent ravages of war.

L‘homme Armé became a popular inspiration for composers writing masses

throughout the Renaissance period and beyond. This melody was a compositional rite

of passage. Composers such as Ockeghem, Josquin, Busnois, Tinctoris, Obrecht, and

Palestrina each wrote masses using the L‘homme Armé tune in what Howard Mayer

36 Paula Higgins writes of Michael Long‘s argument in her introduction to Antoine Busnoys: Method,

Meaning, and Context in Late Medieval Music (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), 12. that, ―the

earliest L‘homme armé masses grew out of a direct response to the propaganda campaign launched by

Pius II in support of the idea of a new crusade against the infidel Turks following the Fall of

Constantinople in 1453.‖


30

Brown calls a tradition of Renaissance imitatio, the goal of which was to both honor

the predecessor and to surpass one‘s models:

Because we cannot document the intentions of composers during the

Renaissance, we shall never know whether such emulation or imitation was

practiced to compete with other composers-to demonstrate superior expertise

using the same musical material-or to pay them homage. In truth, the two

impulses are doubtless closely related. But the point is that emulation as

competition or as homage was a fairly common technique among late fifteenth-

century song writers.37

By the end of the sixteenth century, nearly forty complete Mass cycles had

been composed on or around this tune/text.38

Through the employment of LHA in

TAM, Jenkins continues the tradition of imitatio honoring his predecessors while

providing his own personal interpretation to the larger subgenre.

Ralph Vaughan Williams wrote of composers‘ enticement and the resulting

ubiquity of the tune LHA:

Through all the ecclesiastical music of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries

runs the mysterious figure of l‘homme armé a secular tune which it became the

fashion to introduce as a canto fermo into masses and motets. Now why did

these early choral composers introduce this and other secular airs into their

Masses? I think that these old composers felt that they must keep in touch with

real life, that they believed, unconsciously, that music which is vital must

preserve the popular element. I think that we can trace the influence in the

‗tuney‘ bits which Palestrina occasionally introduces into his motets and

masses, when the metre of the word allows it, as at the ‗Osanna‘. In the

37 Howard Mayer Brown, ―Emulation, Competition, and Homage: Imitation and Theories of Imitation

in the Renaissance,‖ Journal of the American Musicological Society 35:1 (Spring, 1982): 11. 38 In the New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians article, L‘homme Armé, author David Fallows

makes reference to over forty mass cycles composed around the tune/text, written by nearly thirty

different composers, 29 of which he names, not including the unknown composer(s) of the six Naples Manuscripts. For further investigation into the time frame of the L‘homme Armé‘s compositional

phenomenon, Appendix B of Craig Wright‘s, The Maze and the Warrior: Symbols in Architecture,

Theology, and Music. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2001, sorts twenty-seven named

composers who wrote Armed Man Masses by the date of their work‘s composition: 1450‘s – 1480s,

1480s – 1520s, 1520s – 1550s, 1550s – 1600s, and the Seventeenth Century.


31

fifteenth century...almost every composer, including Palestrina, wrote a mass

founded on the folk-tune ‗l‘homme armé‘.39

TAM utilizes a common technique of compositional borrowing, but is also an

important cultural artifact of early modern international relations. Wilson speaks

plainly about the RA team‘s reasons for selecting the L'homme Armé as the focus for

their Millennium Commission:

Bob Smith, our Head of Collection Care and a great enthusiast for Early

Music, came to see me. He had already organised several series of concerts for

us in our new museum in Leeds and he had an idea: to celebrate the

millennium by putting on a series of concerts featuring some of the L‘homme

Armé masses of the late 15th and 16

th centuries. This we decided to do, but it

also gave me another idea. The theme that "the armed man must be feared",

which is the message of the song, seemed to me painfully relevant to the 20th

century, and so the idea was born to commission a modern ―Armed Man

Mass‖. What better way, within the framework of a Christian musical and

liturgical form, both to look back and reflect as we leave behind the most war-

torn and destructive century in human history, and to look ahead with hope and

commit ourselves to a new and more peaceful millennium.40

Why then, after many centuries have passed, should one now find a new

contribution to this Renaissance tradition? In this instance, once again, L‘homme

Armé, has been appropriated by modern people towards an analogous end. Hence, it

was against L‘homme Armé‘s historical association with war, the Crusades, and the

need for defensive preparedness, and coinciding with the desire of the Royal

Armouries‘ Millennium Commission team to relate and educate its charge that, The

Armed Man: A Mass for Peace was conceived.

39

Ralph Vaughan Williams, National Music and Other Essays (London: Oxford University Press,

1963), 44, 45, 227. 40 Wilson, 1.


32

The Armed Man: A Mass For Peace: Layout

The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace, is essentially to be understood as depicting

the musical and visual progression of war from its initial threat, to the ensuing

consequences, and lastly, in the hindsight gained through painful experience, the hope

and desire to pursue a more peaceful tomorrow.

With a basic understanding of the major narrative-based decisions driving the

organization of the work in place, one can better focus on the layout of TAM,

beginning the dissection of its major parts from the whole.

The Armed Man is composed of thirteen movements with the following formal

structure:

1. The Armed Man

2. Call to Prayers (Adhaan)

3. Kyrie

4. Save Me From Bloody Men

5. Sanctus

6. Hymn Before Action

7. Charge!

8. Angry Flames

9. Torches

10. Agnus Dei

11. Now the Guns Have Stopped

12. Benedictus

13. Better is Peace

The subsequent discussion breaks down the complete work into its major

constituent parts, offering the reader a movement-by-movement narrative-style

analysis, with the intention of creating a better understanding of the major musical and

textual elements present within each part.


33

I. The Armed Man

The opening movement, which is based largely on the L‘homme Armé tune,

provides a martial treatment complete with bugle calls (trumpet), fifes (piccolo), and

field drums signifying the approaching threat of war. Wilson states: ―The Mass begins

with the beat of military drums, the orchestra gradually building to the choir‘s

entrance, singing our 15th century theme tune – The Armed Man, the whole movement

dominated by military drums and trumpet calls.‖41

Here Jenkins preserves the unmistakable and ubiquitous quality of the original

tune in its native language, French. The original French text with its English

translation is included below:

L‘homme, l‘homme, l‘homme armé, l‘homme armé,

L‘homme armé doit on douter, doit on doubter?

On a fait par tout crier, que chacun se viegne armer

d‘un haubregon de fer.

L‘homme, l‘homme, l‘homme armé, l‘homme armé,

L‘homme armé doit on douter, doit on douter?

The man, the man, the armed man, the armed man,

The armed man should be feared, should be feared?

Everywhere it has been proclaimed that each man should arm

themselves with an iron coat of mail.

The man, the man, the armed man, the armed man,

The armed man should be feared, should be feared?42

In an even exchange between orchestral interlude and vocal lines, Jenkins presents the

tune of l‘homme Armé, a total of six times, five of which are complete statements of

the tune and text in various treatments in the vocal lines: some of which are true to

41

Ibid, 2. 42 Text and translation of LHA found in J. Peter Burkholder and Donald Jay Grout and Claude V.

Palisca A History of Western Music, 7th ed (New York: W. W. Norton and Co., 2006), 185.


34

form, preserving the poem‘s original verse and meter, and some of which are extended

wherein Jenkins has added an additional statement of the opening phrase as seen in

Fig. 1.2: Measures 55-57 (Rehearsal Letter E)43

:

Fig. 1.2: TAM „1. The Armed Man‟: Measures 55-57 (Rehearsal Letter E)

During the orchestral interlude between statements of the French tune, the composer

introduces an original secondary melody, a fanfare-like call in the trumpets. This can

be seen in Fig. 1.3: Measures 27-30 (Rehearsal Letter B)44

below:

43 Karl Jenkins, The Armed Man: Full Version, Full Score (London: Boosey and Hawkes Music

Publishers, Ltd., 2000), 5. 44 Karl Jenkins, The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace, Complete Vocal Score (Boosey and Hawkes Music

Publishers, Ltd., 2003), 4.


35

Fig. 1.3: TAM „1. The Armed Man‟: Measures 27-30 (Rehearsal Letter B)

This movement comes to a close with a four bar crescendo concluding on a ‗g

minor chord‘ leaving the listener unsettled and ready for all that is to follow in the

next movement (Fig. 1.4).45

Fig. 1.4: TAM „1. The Armed Man‟: Measures 93-End

II. Call to Prayers (Adhaan)

The origin of the Adhaan or Call to Prayers is from the Islamic Qur‘an

(Fussilat 041:033), wherein ―The Muadhin‖, the one who performs the call, is both

charged and blessed to call God‘s people to prayer. The Adhaan is performed five

45 Ibid, 14.


36

times a day, in each instance facing the Qiblah; or the direction of Ka‘bah at Mecca.

In giving the Call to Prayers, ―The Muadhin‖ raises his hands to his ears and calls out

in a loud voice. The Adhaan significance is so central to the Islamic faith that even

the Iraqi and Iranian flags carry this text in their centers. The Arabic with the

corresponding English translation is included below:

Allahu Akbar

Allahu Akbar

Allah: God is (the) Great(est)!

Allahu Akbar

Allahu Akbar


Ashadu An La Illa-L-Lah

Ahsadu An La Illa-L-Lah

I (testify) bear witness that there is no god but the One God!

Ashadu Anna Muhammadan Rasulu-l-lah

Ashadu Anna Muhammadan Rasulu-l-lah

I (testify) bear witness that Muhammad is the Messenger of God!

Hayya Ala-s-salah

Hayya Ala-s-salah

Come fast to prayer (face right)

Hayya Ala-l-Falah

Hayya Ala-l-Falah

Come fast to success (face left)

Allahu Akbar

Allahu Akbar


La Illaha il la-lah

There is no god but the One and true God!46

46 All scriptures taken from The Holy Qur‘an 2nd ed., (New York: Tahrike Tarsile Qur‘an, Inc., 1995).

For a more detailed description of the origin and practice as well as a translation of the Call to Prayer

(Adhan) from the Islamic faith see www.islambasics.com/view.php?bkID=87&chapter =7 <Accessed

10/07/06>.


37

Perhaps the most intriguing aspect about the Adhaan is that no two melodic

realizations of the ‗Call to Prayer‘ are ever the same. This is due to the fact that in

Islam, no written musical notation exists for ‗The Call‘. In TAM, Jenkins includes the

Adhann as a textual and programmatic reference only. Therefore, since only the text

of the Adhaan exists in written form, it is left up to the individual performer as to how

they will interpret the musical particulars of their performance.

III. Kyrie

The Kyrie is the first installment of the Mass Ordinary wherein the worshipper

humbles himself before the LORD requesting mercy from pending judgment, conflict,

and pain. In this particular rendition, the composer provides the stylistic indication,

―pietoso‖, symbolizing a need for penitent supplication. This plea is offered by one

who wishes to be rescued from the pain and turmoil at work in the depths of their soul

towards a better end result than what apparently continually haunts them.

The Kyrie movement of a Mass is traditionally performed in three parts. The

first part, or Kyrie, is almost always in triple meter and often contains great lyrical

passages and long phrases. This rendition of the Kyrie does not disappoint.

The second section, or Christe, is almost always contrasting in style and in a

duple meter with a push towards greater movement and energy as the penitent‘s prayer

takes flight to Christ, who is seen as a benevolent intercessor. For this section, the

composer indicates, ―after Palestrina‖, which implies that this section is in imitation of


38

the work of Palestrina, who, as mentioned in the earlier discussion of the history of

L‘homme Armé, wrote a Mass on the tune of the same name (Fig. 1.5).47

Fig. 1.5: TAM „3. Kyrie‟: Measures 76-81 (Rehearsal Letter F)

The final section, Kyrie, is a restatement of the opening section‘s themes and

brings this longing movement to a close. The text with the corresponding English

translation is included below:

Kyrie eleison. LORD, have mercy.

Christe eleison. Christ, have mercy.

Kyrie eleison. LORD, have mercy.48

IV. Save Me from Bloody Men

This movement is unaccompanied and written in the style of a cappella

Gregorian chant. This movement‘s text, from the King James Version of The Holy

Bible, is found in the Book of the Psalms (56:1-2; 59:1b-2) and recounts two Old

47 Jenkins, The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace, Complete Vocal Score, 20. 48 Text and translation of Kyrie found in Burkholder/Grout/Palisca, 52.


39

Testament stories. The first account, a Mikhtam (an Atonement Psalm, or

Epigrammatic Poem) of David, calls for protection and divine intervention from the

LORD when David was seized by the Philistines in Gath (1 Samuel 21:10-15).49

The

second, also a Mikhtam of David, calls for God‘s divine justice to fall on David‘s

enemies when the future King David was being sought out by current King Saul to be

brought forth and killed. Utilizing multi-meter and nine separate musical phrasings

following the poetic meter of the text, Jenkins incorporates both of these texts/stories

into this movement giving it the feel of a free-flowing supplicatory prayer to one‘s

God (Fig. 1.6).50

The text of the prayer is as follows:

Be merciful unto me, O God:

For man would swallow me up;

He fighting daily oppresseth me.

Mine enemies would daily swallow me up:

For they be many that fight against me,

O thou most high.

Defend me from them that rise up against me.

Deliver me from the workers of iniquity,

And save me from bloody men.

49 The term Mikhtam is somewhat disagreed upon by scholars and may be a musical instrument, or perhaps is indicative of a particular style of musical expression. In this case, the usage is provided only

as a heading as it appears at the beginning of the psalm text. An Epigrammatic Poem is one that

typically deals with a single issue or thought and often employs the use of satire in the expression of

that thought. In this instance, King David is asking for judgment to be poured out upon his enemies. 50 Jenkins, The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace, Complete Vocal Score, 28.


40

Fig. 1.6: TAM „4. Save Me From Bloody Men‟: Measures 1-7

V. Sanctus

The Sanctus, is traditionally the fourth part of the Mass Ordinary, but in the

case of TAM, and by personal preference, the composer omits both the second (Gloria)

and third (Credo) parts of the Ordinary. The Sanctus is performed as a hymn of

purification and serves as the worshipper‘s plea for blessing at the point in the Mass

directly preceding the observance of the LORD‘s Supper, recognized by Christians as

symbolic of Christ‘s sacrifice.

The text of the Sanctus comes from the Old Testament prophet Isaiah‘s vision

as recorded in Chapter 6, verse 3 of the Book of Isaiah. In this experience, Isaiah is

completely transformed by his awareness that God is present in everything, even in

struggles and in insurmountable tasks. Therefore Isaiah elects to give God praise for


41

both the good and ill times before accepting his call to go forth and serve wherever he

is needed.

The Sanctus text is underscored with a driving military drum beat similar to

that which began both the opening and Kyrie movements, echoing the inevitable

conflict yet to come. The text is included below:

Sanctus, sanctus, sanctus Holy, holy, holy

Dominus Deus Sabaoth. LORD God of hosts.

Pleni sunt caeli et Heaven and earth are

terra gloria tua: full of Thy glory:

Hosanna in excelsis. Hosanna in the highest.

Benedictus qui venit Blessed is He that cometh

in nomine Domini: in the name of the LORD:

Hosanna in excelsis. Hosanna in the highest.51

This movement ends almost as softly as it began with the beating of the drums

dying away one measure at a time (Fig. 1.7).52

Fig. 1.7: TAM „5. Sanctus‟: Measures 87-End

VI. Hymn Before Action

Rudyard Kipling wrote the text of ―Hymn Before Action‖ in 1896. In this

movement, Jenkins sets the first two of Kipling‘s five stanzas to music. The text calls

on God to defend and to bless the warrior in his time of need. When the battle lines

51

Text and translation of Sanctus found in Mark Evan Bonds, A History of Music in Western Culture,

2nd ed. (New York: W. W. Norton and Co., 2006), 673. 52 Jenkins, The Armed Man: Full Version, Full Score, 50.


42

are drawn and nation goes up against nation to fight, the poet cries out to God that He

might have mercy on the souls of those who are willing to die for their beliefs. This

message, when set to music, becomes a battle hymn, taking on the flavor of an epic

British sea battle. The composer‘s initial stylistic marking reads, ―Eroico‖ (Fig. 1.8).53

Fig. 1.8: TAM „6. Hymn Before Action‟: Measures 1-8

This is a song for the hero, sung with gusto, in preparation for the honor and glory that

will be gained, either through life or death, upon the pending battle-field. War is

coming. Yea, it is already here. Kipling‘s original text is included below:

The earth is full of anger,

The seas are dark with wrath,

The Nations in their harness

Go up against our path:

53 Jenkins, The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace, Complete Vocal Score, 44.


43

Ere yet we loose the legions –

Ere yet we draw the blade,

Jehovah of the Thunders,

Lord God of Battles, aid!

High lust and froward bearing,

Proud heart, rebellious brow –

Deaf ear and soul uncaring,

We seek Thy mercy now!

The sinner that forswore Thee,

The fool that passed Thee by,

Our times are known before Thee –

Lord, grant us strength to die!

In addition to the war-time context, this movement recalls British imperialism

at its apotheosis. By drawing on Kipling, the composer and librettist link themselves

and their message to all things Imperial:

Numerous instances of ties between literature and the nation can be found in

the rise of the modern nation-states of Europe, and postcolonial states are no

exception…one example being the colonial novels by Kipling, which

buttressed Britain‘s national identity as an imperial power.54

In this poem, God and country are being considered in the same breath: ―Ere yet we

loose the legions…Lord God of Battles, aid!‖ (lines 5-8). At the outset of war, certain

events have been put into motion that cannot be stopped. In the poem, Britain finds

itself in an hour of need and thus petitions God Almighty for blessing and strength for

the task at hand hoping that He might come to their defense…―We seek Thy mercy

now‖ (line 12).

The movement ends with a stark realization: if mercy be not God‘s plan and

answer, then at least may He ―grant us strength to die!‖ (line 16). No matter what the

54 Jyotsna G. Singh, Colonial Narratives Cultural Dialogues: ‗Discoveries‘ of India in the Language of

Colonialism (London: Routledge, 1996), 160.


44

future holds, Kipling charges the listener to never abandon one‘s honor and the

country that honor represents.

VII. Charge!

War is now inevitable. Charge opens with a seductive paean to martial glory,

building through trumpet calls and thundering military drums to the inevitable

consequence – war in all its uncontrolled cacophony of destruction. Then

comes the eerie silence of the battlefield after the battle and, finally, the burial

of the dead – the British bugle call The Last Post.55

Combining the texts of two poet second cousins, John Dryden and Jonathan

Swift, this movement speaks of the intensity leading up to the battle and the point of

no return. It is here that preparations are being made: the uniforms pressed, the boots

polished, the battle formations ready, swords brandished, and the crusader‘s march

toward victory begun. Each force is now committed, and they must fight to the death.

―Charge!!! ‗tis too late to retreat‖ (line 8). Jenkins accomplishes the battle scene

musically through the use of aleatoric and extended vocal and instrumental techniques

having each part sing a glissando up and down randomly in a massive crescendo that

concludes on a triple forte fermata twelve bars later. Jenkins indicates ‗Convey

horror!‘ in the score, giving directed expression to the intensity of the cacophonic

musical phrase (Fig. 1.9).56

What follows the battle scene is the silence of death, wherein each force comes

to the full knowledge and understanding of the effects of the choices each has made.

Each side takes stock of the losses sustained. Forces have fallen upon forces, and a

lone trumpet calls out with The Last Post, (a British bugle call akin to the American

55 Wilson, 2. 56 Jenkins, The Armed Man: Full Version, Full Score, 84, 86.


45

bugle call ‗Taps‘), breaking the silence and signifying the finality of the events and the

casualties brought on by war. ―How blest is he who for his country dies‖ (line 9). The

text of this movement is as follows:

The trumpet‘s loud clangor

Excites us to arms

With shrill notes of anger

And mortal alarms.

The double double beat

Of the thund‘ring drum

Cries, hark the foes come;

Charge, charge, ‘tis too late to retreat.57

How blest is he who for his country dies.58

Fig. 1.9: TAM „7. Charge!‟: Measures 147-149

57 Text by John Dryden, from ―A Song for St. Cecilia‘s Day‖ (1687), lines 25-32. 58

Text by Jonathan Swift, from a loose translation of ―Book III, Ode II by Horace: To the Earl of

Oxford, Late Lord Treasurer‖ (sent to him while he awaited his trial in the ―Tower‖ (of London); the

same ―Tower‖ which the Royal Armouries now run as a museum.) (1716).


46

VIII. Angry Flames

The text of this movement comes from the collection of poetry written by Tōgi

Sankichi (1921-1953) entitled, Poems of the Atomic Bomb. Sankichi was a witness to

and survivor of the first atomic bomb that was dropped on Hiroshima (6 August 1945)

and died eight years later from exposure to radiation. The dedication from the

collection reads as follows:

Dedicated to those whose lives were taken by the atomic bombs dropped

August 6, 1945, on Hiroshima and August 9, 1945, on Nagasaki, to those who

have continued down to the present to be tormented by the terror of death and

by pain, to those who as long as they live have no way of extinguishing their

agony and grief, and finally to those throughout the world who abhor atomic

bombs.59

This movement includes the first two of four stanzas of the poem Flames. The

poet asks the reader to consider what life must be like on the receiving end of war,

especially in this age and with the technology and science that mankind has harnessed.

Herein one discovers the depth and degree of destruction that the world is capable of

committing. The stanzas from Flames are as follows:

Pushing up through smoke

From a world half-darkened

By overhanging cloud---

The shroud that mushroomed out

And struck the dome of the sky,

Black, red, blue---

Dance in the air,

Merge,

Scatter glittering sparks,

Already tower

Over the whole city.

59 Richard H. Minear, ed, Hiroshima: Three Witnesses (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990),

304.


47

Quivering like seaweed,

The mass of flames spurts forward.

Popping up in the dense smoke,

Crawling out

Wreathed in fire:

Countless human beings

On all fours.

In a heap of embers that erupt and subside,

Hair rent,

Rigid in death,

There smoulders a curse.60

TAM‘s Angry Flames provides the listener with a haunting recitative-like

musical expression to the visual images represented in the selected stanzas of

Sankichi‘s poem. Utilizing a quartet of SATB soloists to carry the main lines of the

poetry throughout the movement, the composer counters by interspersing a full chorus

at the major cadence points found in the poetry (Fig.1.10).61

Fig.1.10: TAM „8. Angry Flames‟: Measures 21-25

60

Text from ―Flames‖ by Sankichi in Hiroshima: Three Witnesses ed. and trans. by Richard H. Minear

(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990), 311. 61 Jenkins, The Armed Man: Full Version, Full Score, 89.


48

Sankichi desired peace more than anything else, but having lived through the

atomic bomb, he had his doubts as to whether or not real peace could ever come to

fruition:

I sing in my poems of this desire for peace; yet the times are going in such a

backward direction that people must be stripped of even their basic human

freedoms. This collection of poems is a gift to all people who love humankind;

at the same time, it is a book of admonition to those others.62

IX. Torches

In Section CCXXVIII of the Adi Parva, Khandava-daha Parva, (known as the

Bhagavad-Gita) of the ancient Indian Sanskrit epic, The Mahàbhàrata (c. sixth

century B.C.), a graphic account of one of several battles is told. The text conveys the

message that war is not a new concept; it is a tragic and reoccurring theme as old as

time itself. The music and text of this movement conjure up images of an Indian

story-teller repainting the ancient account, bringing new depth and meaning through

the use of graphic imagery to the far-reaching effects of war upon the world‘s creation.

In war, not even nature is safe.

The animals scattered in all directions,

Screaming terrible screams.

Many were burning, others were burnt.

All were shattered and scattered mindlessly,

Their eyes bulging.

Some hugged their sons,

Others their fathers and mothers,

Unable to let them go,

And so they died.

62 This quote is from the ‗Afterward‘ of Poems of the Atomic Bomb, written by the poet and reproduced

in its entirety in Minear, 368-369.


49

Others leapt up in their thousands,

Faces disfigured,

And were consumed by the fire,

Everywhere were bodies squirming on the ground,

Wings eyes and paws all burning.

They breathed their last as living torches.63

One of the most unique aspects about this movement is that after opening with

a pair of polytonal cluster chords, (spelled Eb-E-G-Bb-B and C-C#-E-G-G#

respectively) Jenkins accomplishes the remainder of his musical ends by employing a

rhythmic ostinato accompaniment pattern throughout, using only two alternating

chords: the first chord written A-B-E and the second chord F-Ab-C-E (Fig.1.11a/Fig.

1.11b).64

From beginning to conclusion, Jenkins builds this entire movement on the

foundation laid out by these two chords.

Fig.1.11a: TAM „9. Torches‟: Measures 1-2

X. Agnus Dei

The Agnus Dei, which is traditionally the fifth section of the Christian Mass

Ordinary, serves as a prayer for peace after the observance of Christ‘s sacrifice in the

LORD‘s Supper. The image presented in the Agnus Dei, of the ―Lamb of God, who

63

Pratap Chandra Roy, C.I.E. trans. The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa., 2nd

ed., 1:Adi

Parva, (Calcutta, Oriental Publishing Co., 1962), 470-471. 64

Jenkins, The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace, Complete Vocal Score, 73.


50

takes away the sins of the world,‖ demonstrates that even in death, salvation can come

and, with it, bring peace to all who would receive it.

Fig.1.11b: TAM „9. Torches‟: Measures 1-11

Written using a series of blocked chords, in slow-harmonic motion,

reminiscent of the ‗Lacrimosa‘ from the Requiem Mass, this particular setting of the

Agnus Dei serves as a lamentation prayer crying out for peace and reconciliation from

the ills of war (Fig.1.12).65

65 Ibid, 78.


51

Fig.1.12: TAM „10. Agnus Dei‟: Measures 1-12

By incorporating the above compositional technique, the message of the text rises to

the fore. The Latin text with its English translation is as follows:

Agnus Dei, Lamb of God,

qui tollis peccata mundi, who takes away the sins of the world,

miserere nobis. have mercy on us.


qui tollis peccata mundi who takes away the sings of the world,

miserere nobis. have mercy on us.


qui tollis peccata mundi, who takes away the sins of the world,

dona nobis pacem. grant us peace.66

66 Text and translation of Agnus Dei found in Bonds, 673.


52

XI. Now the Guns Have Stopped

The Agnus Dei is followed by a setting of some lines I wrote (to accompany

one of the dramatic interpretations we use in the museum) about the feelings of

loss and guilt that so many of the survivors of the First World War felt when

they came home but their friends did not. This reminds us that even the

survivors can be hurt to destruction by war.67

At the Royal Armouries museum in Leeds, characters dressed in period

costumes daily perform a series of dramatic monologues from a collection of more

than sixty dramatic interpretations. ―When the Guns Stop Firing: 1918‖ is a dramatic

reflection performed in the Leeds ‗War Gallery‘ of ―a soldier who has survived the

horrors on the battlefields of Northern Europe reflecting on his experiences on the

Western Front, November 11th; the day the guns stopped firing.‖68

Adapted from this

interpretation, Wilson penned the text for this movement:

Silent,

So silent now,

Now the guns have stopped.

I have survived all,

I, who knew I would not.

But now you are not here.

I shall go home alone;

And must try to live life as before,

And hide my grief

For you, my dearest friend,

Who should be with me now,

Not cold, too soon,

And in your grave,

Alone.69

67 Wilson, 2. 68 Source: Royal Armouries: Leeds Galleries ―War Gallery Interpretations‖

http://www.royalarmouries.org/extsite/view.jsp?sectionId=1264 <Accessed: 03/08/08>. 69 Guy Wilson, ―11. Now The Guns Have Stopped,‖ (Text Copyright 2000 by The Trustees of the

Armouries,) in Jenkins, The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace, Complete Vocal Score, 84-85.


53

This movement opens with the stylistic and tempo marking, Adagissimo e

sostenuto establishing a mood reminiscent of Samuel Barber‘s Adagio for Strings: a

single-movement work built around sustained melodic lines and a dense and slow-

moving chord construction which evokes a somber mood in the listener (Fig. 1.13).70

Using only a string quartet for accompaniment, Jenkins overlays the text in the solo

soprano voice, which carries the melody throughout the entire movement.

Fig.1.13: TAM „11. Now The Guns Have Stopped‟: Measures 1-13

XII. Benedictus

This movement sets the text of the ‗Benedictus‘, a derivative of the account of

Christ‘s celebrated entrance into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday found in the Gospels of



54

Matthew (21:9), Mark (11:9-10), Luke (19:38), and John (12:13), understood

traditionally to be a prayer for healing, whose timely message speaks to the heart of

those desiring peace instead of war. The Benedictus thus requires faith in peace today,

in order to yield the possibility of a more peaceful tomorrow. The Latin text confirms

this:

Benedictus qui venit, Blessed is He,

in nomine Domini who comes in the name of the LORD.

Hosanna in excelsis. Hosanna in the highest.71

The Benedictus movement consists of two separate, yet identical parts; the first

major section (measures 1-36) is composed entirely of a cello solo with orchestral

accompaniment, wherein the entire form, harmonic and melodic material of this

movement is presented complete; the second section (measures 37-75) is a complete

restatement of the cello solo and accompaniment, only this time using SATB voices

and the text of the Benedictus (Fig.1.14).72

Therefore, it can be argued that the formal

structure of this movement may be defined as AA‘.

71

Richard Sherr, ―Benedictus‖, Grove Music Online ed. L. Macy, http://www.grovemusic.com.lib-

e1.lib.ttu.edu, (Accessed: 9 June 2008). 72 Jenkins, The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace, Complete Vocal Score, 86.


55

Fig.1.14: TAM „12. Benedictus‟: Measures 1-18

XIII. Better is Peace

This leads us to the positive conclusion of the work that begins back where we

started in the 15th century with Sir Thomas Malory‘s Lancelot and Guinevere‘s

declaration, born of bitter experience, that peace is better than war. The

menace of the ―Armed Man‖ theme returns and vies for a time with Malory‘s

desire for peace. But time moves on and we come to our moment of

commitment. Do we want the new millennium to be like the last? Or do we

join with Alfred Lord Tennyson when he tells us to ―Ring out the thousand

wars of old, Ring in the thousand years of peace?‖ It may seem an impossible

dream, we may not have begun too well, but the Mass ends with the

affirmation from Revelations that change is possible, that sorrow, pain and

death can be overcome.73

The closing movement of The Armed Man, which is comprised of two major

parts, brings together texts from L‘homme Armé, Sir Thomas Malory‘s Le Morte

d‘Arthur, Alfred Lord Tennyson‘s In Memoriam, and The Book of the Revelation

from the Holy Bible.

73 Wilson, 2.


56

In the first section of the final installment, the theme from the L‘homme Armé

that opened the whole work comes back to vie for position with text demanding peace

spoken with conviction, learned through experience by Guinevere and Lancelot in Le

Morte d‘Arthur. Here, the military drums are traded for a drum and fife dance-like jig,

giving cause for celebration (Fig.1.15).74

Fig.1.15: TAM „13. Better is Peace‟: Measures 27-29 (Dance-like jig)

Peace can be found through experiences of pain and suffering and as a result,

can ―ring out the old and bring in the new‖ as Lord Tennyson writes in his work, In

Memoriam: a work born out of tragedy and written on the occasion of the loss of his

nephew.

In the second and final section of The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace, the

composer turns to the Book of Revelation from The Holy Bible wherein ultimately,

peace will prevail; that there will come a point in time when war is no more; and that

tears, pain, and death will come to an end. Jenkins closes his work with an a cappella



57

chorale setting of this text. The unaccompanied homophonic treatment of the vocal

lines is an appropriate conclusion for the work as a final giving of thanks and praise to

God for His hand in the ultimate realization of this more peaceful tomorrow

(Fig.1.16).75

Fig.1.16: TAM “13.Better Is Peace”: Measures 143-145 (A cappella chorale)

The text for the final movement is as follows:

Better is peace than always war

And better is peace than evermore war76

L‘homme armé, doit on douter, doit on douter.

The armed man, should be feared, should be feared.77

Ring out the thousand wars of old.

Ring in the thousand years of peace.

Ring out the old, ring in the new,

Ring happy bells, across the snow.

75 Ibid, 120. 76 Sir Thomas Malory, Le Morte D‘Arthur: The Book of King Arthur and his Knights of the Round

Table (New York: University Books, Inc., 1961), 414, 471. (Text taken from Book XIX – Chapter V, Of Meliagrance and the Queen: How Sir Meliagrance required forgiveness of the queen, and how she

appeased Sir Lancelot, and other matters; and Book XX – Chapter XIX, Of King Arthur and Gawaine:

How King Arthur and Sir Gawaine made a great host ready to go over sea to make war on Sir

Launcelot). 77 Text and translation of LHA found in Burkholder/Grout/Palisca, 185.


58

The year is going, let him go,

Ring out the false, ring in the true.

Ring out old shapes of foul disease.

Ring out the narrowing lust of gold;

Ring out the thousand years of old,

Ring in the thousand years of peace.

Ring in the valiant man and free,

The larger heart, the kindler hand.

Ring out the darkness of the land,

Ring in the Christ that is to be.

The year is going, let him go,

Ring out the false, ring in the true.78

God shall wipe away all tears

And there shall be no more death,

Neither sorrow nor crying,

Neither shall there be any more pain.

Praise the LORD.79


A wider consideration of a range of evidence surrounding the creation of TAM:

(the mission of the Royal Armouries and the design of their new Leeds campus, the

eclectic style and educational background of the composer, and a movement-by-

movement narrative analysis of the entire work), one begins to redefine the work‘s

context. These seemingly disparate ideas do in fact yield a sense of the zeitgeist of the

work. Each of these components, in its own right, speaks to concepts that resonate

with the war-torn twentieth century, the ultimate context in which TAM and its

predecessors are based.

78

Susan Shatto and Marion Shaw, eds., In Memoriam (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1982), 124. (Text

taken from Lord Tennyson‘s In Memoriam (begun 1833) Section 106: Stanzas 2, 7, 8). 79

Text taken from The Book of the Revelation 21:4, (King James Version of The Holy Bible).


59

CHAPTER TWO

STRUCTURAL COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF THE PIECES

In looking at the characteristics necessary for classification of these three

choral works, The Armed Man: A Mass For Peace by Karl Jenkins, War Requiem by

Benjamin Britten, and Dona Nobis Pacem by Ralph Vaughan Williams, into the

proposed sub-genre of large-scale, twentieth-century, British choral works with an

anti-war message, one must consider the patterns of structural similarity that exist

between each of these three pieces. Let me reiterate that while the analysis in this

chapter will include some musical-theoretical examination, the overarching purpose

here is to consider and compare the formal holistic organization of these three works.

Therefore, this discussion of the structural organization will be limited to the

following two major areas: textual and musical. The focus on these two attributes will

give further credence to the proposed sub-genre; combining these two structural areas

therefore reveals a hitherto unexplored thematic structure that applies to all three of

the works under consideration.

In addition to possessing strong musical and religious concepts, each work is

also highly narrative. This narrative, I am suggesting, is that of war, its consequences,

and the choice to reconcile one‘s differences, through change, providing hope for the

future. Representing this narrative process, Baker writes of the dramatic nature of

DNP:

DNP appears in a dramatic sequence of six uninterrupted movements: 1)

opening prayer for peace, 2) call to arms, 3) sight of dead soldiers, 4) funeral

march, 5) destruction assessment, 6) final vision of a future peace. The fact

that he used so many textual sources to develop this dramatic sequence is an


60

indication that he must have had a preconceived notion of the literary scheme

of DNP.80

Structurally, the three works can be divided up into three major parts, or

sections, as I will refer to them. I am thus proposing the following tri-partite structural

breakdown of each of these three works: ‗War, Aftermath, Hope and Resolution‘.

Table 2.1 below, provides an overview and side-by-side comparison of this tri-partite

structural breakdown for all three works. A structural consideration of TAM, begins

the exploration of this new tri-partite structural context.

The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace can thus best be understood as a three-part

portrayal of war: from its beginnings to its full-scale force (War), the effects and

devastation left by war‘s wake (Aftermath), and the final resting place either as a

precursor to more war, or as the end of the old and the beginning of something new

found only in peaceful resolution (Resolution and Hope). Please note that while TAM

does fit into this tri-partite structure, some overlapping of the proposed sections does

occur. The following discussion, argues that all three pieces use a similar progression

in their structural formulation (War leading to Aftermath, which leads to Resolution

and Hope), noting that each work concludes with an unaccompanied vocal chorale—a

final unadulterated ‗cry for peace‘—an important musical similarity that strongly links

all three.

80 Norma Louise Baker, Concerning the Dona Nobis Pacem of Ralph Vaughan Williams and War

Requiem of Benjamin Britten (Masters thesis, University of Southern California, 1969), 4.


61

Table 2.1: Organization of Thematic Structures

The Armed Man

War Requiem Dona Nobis Pacem

Section One: ‘War’

The Armed Man Requiem Aeternam

(Introit/Kyrie)

Agnus Dei

Call To Prayers

Kyrie

Save Me From

Bloody Men

Sanctus Dies Irae

(Sequence)

Beat! Beat!

Drums!

Hymn Before

Action

Offertorium

(Offertory)

Section Two: ‘Aftermath’

Charge! Sanctus

(Sanctus/Benedictus)

Reconciliation

Angry Flames Agnus Dei

(Agnus Dei)

Torches

Agnus Dei

Now The Guns

Have Stopped

Dirge For Two

Veterans

Section Three: ‘Resolution and Hope’

Benedictus Libera Me

(Responsory of

Absolution)

The Angel Of

Death

Better Is Peace O Man

Greatly

Beloved


62

Within the first major section, ‗War‘, TAM provides the following movements:

‗The Armed Man, Call to Prayers, Kyrie, Save Me From Bloody Men, Sanctus, and

Hymn Before Action‘ (Table 2.1). Grouping these six movements together has more

to do with the text that overlies the music than with their individual musical elements.

For example, in movement one, Jenkins introduces the entire text/theme of ‗L‘homme

Armé‘ against the backdrop of a martial assembly, presented by the presence of

driving ostinato percussion lines. Here the soldiers are being warned of the dangers of

the ‗Armed Man‘. ‗Fear him; fear him!‘ In essence, ‗we must be ready for any and all

offensives from the enemy.‘ The threat of war has been made known.

WAR:

Musically speaking in TAM, Jenkins‘ use of the snare drum, which opens the

first movement and pervades the remainder of the entire work, serves as a signaling

device, heralding the approach of a particular mood, musical, or textual narrative

change. Likewise, Britten‘s use of the bells serves much the same role: that of a

signal. Additionally, the use of fanfare-like trumpets in TAM‘s opening movement

and throughout the remainder of the work mimics at times Britten‘s use of the fanfare-

like horn at rehearsal marker number twelve and elsewhere throughout the work

(Table 2.2).


63

Table 2.2: ‘War’ Texts & Music

The Armed Man


Text Music Text Music Text Music

The Armed

Man

Snare Drum

Signifier

Trumpet

Fanfare

Requiem

Aeternam

(Introit/Kyrie)

Bell

Signifier

Horn

Fanfare

Chant-like

Tenor Line

Use of

Tritone

Figure to

Transition

Agnus Dei

Use of

Raised

Second

Scale

Degree to

Transition

Call To

Prayers

N.A.

Kyrie N.A.

Save Me

From

Bloody

Men

Chant-like

Tenor/Bass

Lines

Sanctus N.A. Dies Irae

(Sequence)

Recitative-

like Tenor

Line

Musical

Intensity

and

Driving

Pulse

Beat! Beat!

Drums!

Musical

Intensity

and Driving

Pulse

Hymn

Before

Action

N.A. Offertorium

(Offertory)

In the second movement, Jenkins introduces a call to prayer. In situations of

conflict, it is not uncommon to hear/learn of each opponent praying. In this case, an


64

unaccompanied Islamic ‗call to prayer‘ is presented by an Imam.81

The subsequent

four movements that follow present several variants of people praying.

Most striking about the ‗War‘ section in TAM is that, for the first time, there is

a blatant juxtaposition of a non-Christian influence, (in this case, an Islamic

text/practice) imbedded into the framework of the Christian Mass. Jenkins takes this

paradox one step further in the third movement, where the ‗Kyrie‘, a penitent Christian

prayer is the unexpected reply to the Islamic call to prayer. If this ‗fictitious battle‘

were real, it is interesting to note that both sides, East vs. West, are lifting up ‗prayers‘

to their respective deity(s) in preparation for the approaching conflict.

In movement four, ‗Save Me From Bloody Men‘, quoting from ‗Psalms‘ in

The Holy Bible, one finds an example of an ancient Jewish king praying to his God as

he prepares for battle. The strength and numbers of the enemy have been identified

and specific requests are now being lifted up. In movement five, the ‗Sanctus‘ calls

for the purification of oneself before battle so that all men, as one, may be ready and

worthy to fight and in turn, can solicit God‘s help in securing their victory. The

presence of the military drums returns, giving the declaration that conflict is imminent.

The expressive and chant-like quality of the male vocal lines heard in ‗Save

Me From Bloody Men‘ mimics those found in the tenor solo in the Owen text of WR,

‗What passing bells for these who die as cattle?...‘ (Table 2.2).

In the last movement of this section, one discovers troops singing a battle hymn in

hope to gain strength and build camaraderie among the legions. This is the final

81 An Imam is an Islamic leader who often serves in a mosque setting as the lead voice in corporate

prayer gatherings.


65

preparation for war and both sides are readying themselves for whatever they might

face upon the battlefield.

In the Dona Nobis Pacem of Vaughan Williams, ‗War‘ encompasses the first

two movements (Table 2.1).82

The first, ‗Agnus Dei‘, which by its very nature speaks

of sacrifice, ―the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world,‖ is joined by the

calling out of ‗Dona Nobis Pacem‘, a prayer for peace. Instead, perhaps to frustrate

the mood set in the opening installment, the second movement, ‗Beat! Beat! Drums!‘

utilizes the poetry of Walt Whitman to bring out the intensity and ruthless fervor

indicative of armed conflict: ―Into the solemn church, and scatter the congregation,…

mind not the weeper or prayer.‖ Musicologist A.V. Butcher writes of the presence of

Whitman in the second movement of DNP: ―Nothing must interfere with the

wholehearted preparation for war, the only thing that matters just now.‖83

Musically

speaking, the musical and textual intensity and driving rhythmic pulse found in

Vaughan Williams‘ ‗Beat! Beat! Drums!‘ mimics the same intensity and fervor found

in the ‗Dies Irae‘ of WR where Britten employs a similar driving rhythmic figure

throughout the entirety of the movement (Table 2.2).

The opening section of Britten‘s War Requiem provides still another example

of the progression leading to ‗War‘. In WR, the ‗War‘ section includes three

movements (Table 2.1). The first movement, ‗Requiem Aeternam‘, begins as a prayer

for the dead. As this work is based on the Requiem Mass, one is faced with the

82 Let a word be said at this point, that while both Britten and Vaughan Williams‘ works are written in

retrospection, after the fact of conflict, I believe that substantial enough evidence exists to continue with

the patterns already laid out and discussed above with regards to TAM. 83 A.V. Butcher ―Walt Whitman and the English Composer‖ Music & Letters, 28:2, (Apr., 1947), 158.


66

realization that someone has died. From here, however, the work takes an unexpected

aside altering the chronological layout of the piece in retrospection from the opening

movement, for in the second movement, as the ‗Dies Irae‘ enters, Britten warns of the

coming Day of Judgment, (War). The addition of the Owen text to the traditional

Latin text brings new weight upon the conscience of the soul, adding the conviction to

need to prepare oneself for the arrival of something tremendous, ―Be slowly lifted up,

thou long black arm, great gun towering above Heaven, about to curse.‖

Musically speaking, much has been said of Britten‘s use of the tritone

throughout WR.84

However, in a similar vein, Vaughan Williams‘ use of the raised

second scale degree mimics the tritone in WR as transition material throughout his

work giving added emphasis to the text (Table 2.2).

The third movement, ‗Offertorium‘, makes what I consider to be one of the

strongest arguments for the inclusion of the WR into the larger proposed sub-genre.

Here, the major warring factions, personified in the character Abram, from the Biblical

story of Abram and Isaac, sit on a precipice considering whether or not to enter into an

act of violence. At the point of no return, they cross the threshold, choosing to

slaughter ‗half of Europe‘ rather than renounce the bloodshed and embrace peace

instead. At this transitional moment in WR as well as in the other two works, the

battle has begun, it cannot be stopped, and the move is therefore made to venture into

the second major section, ‗Aftermath‘.

84 For a more detailed discussion on Britten‘s use of the tritone in WR, see Philip Rupprecht, Britten‘s

Musical Language (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001).


67

AFTERMATH:

TAM provides five additional movements to this next major section,

‗Aftermath‘ (Table 2.1). The included movements are ‗Charge!, Angry Flames,

Torches, Agnus Dei, and Now The Guns Have Stopped.‘ As was mentioned earlier,

classification of TAM into these three major sections involves a few overlapping

movements. Among those is the first movement of this new section, ‗Charge!‘. The

driving narrative force at work behind ‗Charge!‘ is seen as the final stages of an army

getting ready for battle. The formations are set, the weapons are in place, the flags are

raised, and the drums and bugles are awaiting orders to sound the attack. What

follows is a clash of opponents, exemplified by the eight-measure long molto

crescendo of aleatoric vocal lines on the syllable ‗Ah‘, found toward the end of this

movement. After that comes a scripted thirty seconds of complete silence in the

performance.

This silence, I would argue, is the pivot point around which the whole work of

TAM is based. Everything leading up to this point in the work is preparation for and

execution of War, and everything after this moment of silence is associated with

‗Aftermath and Resolution.‘ It is for this reason that some overlap between the three

sections of TAM occurs.

Musically speaking, the aleatoric qualities present in the end section of TAM‘s

‗Charge!‘, wherein the choir sings random pitches on the open syllable ‗Ah‘, are

similar to the chance-like musical quality of the ‗Pleni sunt coeli‘ section found in the

‗Sanctus‘ movement of WR (Table 2.3).


68

Table 2.3: ‘Aftermath’ Texts & Music

The Armed Man



Charge! Aleatoric ‘Ah’ section

Sanctus

(Sanctus/Benedictus)

Aleatoric ‘Pleni sunt coeli’ section

Reconciliation Plaintive Baritone Solo

Angry

Flames

Recitative-like Lines

Torches N.A. Agnus Dei

(Agnus Dei)

N.A.

Agnus Dei N.A.

Now The

Guns Have

Stopped

Plaintive Soprano Solo (Table 2.4)

Dirge for Two Veterans

N.A.

The next two movements, ‗Angry Flames and Torches‘ work better, I would

argue, as a single unit than they do separately on the basis of their textual and musical

content. ‗Angry Flames‘ captures the moments immediately following the dropping

of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan during WWII. ―Pushing up through smoke

from a world half-darkened by overhanging cloud…Countless human beings on all

fours…There smoulders a curse.‖ In an eerily similar account, ‗Torches‘, recalls the

effects of fire‘s destruction upon animals/people during an ancient battle in India.

―Others leapt up in their thousands…and were consumed by the fire…everywhere

were bodies squirming on the ground…they breathed their last as living torches.‖

Both movements document the destruction caused by war‘s wake and its ensuing

effects upon those involved, innocent and otherwise.


69

Musically speaking, the recitative-like vocal solo lines in TAM‘s ‗Angry

Flames‘ mimics the similarly composed treatment of the solo tenor line found at

rehearsal marker fifty-six in WR on the Owen text, ‗Move him into the sun…‘ (Table

2.3). The recitative-like reduction in instrumentation, consisting of a solo voice line

with a simplified block-chordal accompaniment, helps to bring out the essence of the

melody without sacrificing the content and context of the text.

The next movement, ‗Agnus Dei‘ recalls the nature of sacrifice, that, in

choosing to give of oneself, losses will be sustained and death will have to be dealt

with head-on. Based on the text of the same name from the Christian Mass, this

movement reminds the listener of the sacrifice of the Christ for His followers, that

death might not reign supreme in the end. Again, the ‗Dona Nobis Pacem‘ rings out,

bringing this movement to a close.

Completing the second major section of TAM is ‗Now The Guns Have

Stopped‘. Written from the perspective of a soldier who has lost a close friend in the

war, the text of this movement tells his story as one who must live out the remainder

of his life dealing with the emotions inherent in ‗Aftermath‘ knowing that his loss can

never be reconciled. His friend is gone. ―But now you are not here. I shall go home

alone.‖

The second section ‗Aftermath‘ concludes as the soldier, personified in ‗Now

The Guns Have Stopped‘, recognizes and eventually—through the grieving process—

comes to terms with the loss of his friend, one who has been killed through the ills

inherent in armed conflict. Correspondingly, the other two choral works offer a


70

similar perspective on the loss of human life and the grieving process that follows,

which will be discussed presently.

Musically speaking, the plaintive quality of the solo soprano line in TAM‘s

‗Now the Guns Have Stopped‘ mimics Britten‘s treatment of the tenor solo crying out

the Owen text, ‗It seemed that out of battle I escaped‘ heard at rehearsal marking one

hundred eighteen (Tables 2.3 and 2.4). These are both high voice parts, conveying at

once the innocence and loneliness of the part—emphasizing the perceived loss,

musically signifying the shock of war‘s aftermath. Furthermore, the baritone solo in

DNP‘s ‗Reconciliation‘, like the tenor solo in WR, also echoes and embodies the

plaintive cry of the soprano solo in TAM.

DNP contributes two movements to the second section, ‗Aftermath‘, (Table

2.1). The first, ‗Reconciliation‘, evokes a mood and message similar to Jenkins‘ ‗Now

The Guns Have Stopped.‖ Here Vaughan Williams exposes the realization that war

takes the lives of soldiers on both sides and that each has offered up lives for a cause

that to them was as honorable as the other‘s. ―For my enemy is dead, a man divine as

myself is dead.‖ Only time and reconciliation together can repair the wounds

sustained by war. At the end of this section, Vaughan Williams brings back the ‗Dona

Nobis Pacem‘ statement in the solo soprano, linking this movement to the ‗Agnus Dei‘

of TAM as well as providing centrality to the entire work.

The final movement in this section is ‗Dirge for Two Veterans‘, a funeral

march for a father and son killed in war. Whitman‘s poem and Vaughan Williams‘

musical setting utilize the same company of drums and bugles that originally called


71

the troops into battle to now commemorate and honor the memory of the deceased. ―I

see a sad procession, and I hear the sound of coming full-keyed bugles…I hear the

great drums pounding, and the small drums steady whirring…strikes me through and

through. And the strong dead-march enwraps me.‖

War Requiem, like DNP, contributes two movements to the second major

section, ‗Aftermath‘ (Table 2.1). The first movement, ‗Sanctus‘, borrows the

traditional texts of the ‗Sanctus and Benedictus‘ and adds a new one, Owen‘s text,

‗The End‘. Britten begins this movement with a Gamelan-style orchestration

incorporating the use of bells and percussion instruments, inferring perhaps, that this

‗battle‘ was not just between two forces generalized, but more specifically against

those representing ‗Eastern and Western‘ cultures. Noted choral conductor and

pedagogue, Robert J. Summer, writes of Britten‘s decision to use this particular poem

and its subsequent influence upon his choices in orchestration:

The poem opens with the phrase, ‗After the blast of lightning from the East‘

which may have suggested to Britten the idea of opening the ‗Sanctus‘ with

music of a distinctively Far Eastern flavor.85

On this basis, I believe it is easy enough to draw a parallel in structure and

organization between this movement and the ‗Angry Flames‘ and ‗Torches‘

movements of Jenkins‘ TAM, both of which deal with the effects of war upon Middle

and Far Eastern cultures; whether they be impacted by an outside Western force as in

‗Angry Flames‘ or from within, as part of a civil war, as in ‗Torches.‘

85 Robert J. Summer, Choral Masterworks from Bach to Britten: Reflections of a Conductor (Lanham,

The Scarecrow Press, Inc., 2007), 148.


72

The second movement from WR to be included in ‗Aftermath‘ is the ‗Agnus

Dei‘. In this movement, Owen‘s text personifies Christ (the Lamb of God) as a soldier

on the battlefield who loses a limb, in sacrificing himself for the sins of his people. At

the conclusion of this movement, Britten substitutes the text ‗Dona Nobis Pacem‘ for

the traditional ‗dona eis requiem sempiternam‘, making this prayer one offered on

behalf of those still living and not just for the departed; further linking it to the ‗Agnus

Dei‘ of the Christian Mass and consequently to the movements of the same name in

both TAM and DNP rather than exclusively to the ‗Requiem‘.

In the final section, as each work‘s central message, the listener is confronted

with a choice. That choice, conveyed via text and music, is whether or not to learn

from the experience of war and loss and to make a change for a more peaceful future,

or to ignore the warning signs given along the way, setting up future battles and more

bloodshed. I call this final section, ‗Resolution and Hope.‘

RESOLUTION AND HOPE:

Table 2.4: Resolution and Hope Texts & Music

The Armed Man

War Requiem

Dona Nobis Pacem


Benedictus

N.A. Libera Me

(Responsory

of

Absolution)

Plaintive

Tenor Solo

(Table 2.3)

The

Angel Of

Death

N.A.

Better Is

Peace

A cappella

homophonic

final prayer

A cappella

homophonic

final prayer

O Man

Greatly

Beloved

A cappella

homophonic

final prayer


73

TAM contributes two movements to this final section (Table 2.1). The first,

‗Benedictus‘, draws on the Biblical account of the Christ and His heralded entry into

Jerusalem; He who was to bring peace and to restore order in a world suffering from

the lack of both. The text of the ‗Benedictus‘ is, ―Blessed is He, who comes in the

name of the LORD.‖ Here the LORD is personified as One who brings peace and

blessing in His coming. This movement comes as a salve to open wounds at nearly

the end of the whole work and serves as a final precursor to the celebration of healing

and restoration found in the final movement.

TAM‘s final movement, ‗Better is Peace‘, is composed of three major sections

itself, archetyping the idea of a tri-partite division of the entire work. The opening

measures bring back the theme and text of L‘homme Armé, while juxtaposing two

texts from Sir Thomas Malory‘s Le Morte D‘Arthur that deal with wisdom gained

through the experience of great loss. ‗Better is peace than always war, than evermore

war.‘ What follows in the second section is a final tribute, heralded by ringing bells

proclaiming the truth, that while this past millennium has been by far the bloodiest in

history, the next holds the promise that it can and perhaps will be different. Jenkins

draws upon the experience and tragedy of another, quoting Alfred Lord Tennyson‘s In

Memoriam: ―Ring out the thousand years of old, ring in the new…ring in the thousand

years of peace.‖

The final section is an unaccompanied vocal chorale with texts taken directly

from the final chapters of the ‗Book of Revelation‘ in the Holy Bible. TAM ends with


74

its own version of the quintessential ‗Dona Nobis Pacem‘: ‗God shall wipe away all

tears, and there shall be no more death, sorrow, crying, or pain. Praise the LORD!‘

DNP offers one movement to the final section ‗Resolution and Hope‘,

(Table 2.1). ‗The Angel of Death/O Man Greatly Beloved‘, like the final movement

of TAM, is perhaps best understood as involving multiple parts, the first being ‗The

Angel of Death‘, and the second ‗O Man Greatly Beloved.‘

The first part includes excerpts from the now famous John Bright ‗Angel of

Death‘ speech to Parliament (23 February 1855) on the ills of governmental

condoning of war partnered with quotations on a similar subject matter, taken from the

words of the Old Testament prophet, Jeremiah, of the Holy Bible. Bright, like

Vaughan Williams, juxtaposes two different themes, in this case, from time periods –

‗Ancient vs. Modern‘, in his argument against war. The first, ‗Ancient‘, is taken from

the Old Testament account of the Angel of Death, who passed over the sons of Israel‘s

homes during the night of the final plague against Egypt (Exodus 12), a pivotal

moment in Israel‘s history celebrated annually to this day through the observance of

the Feast of Passover.

The second time period, ‗Modern‘, is the nineteenth century, when Bright

challenged Parliament on its foreign policy and its ‗seemingly unnecessary‘

involvement in the Crimean War. His speech, delivered to the House of Parliament,

emphasized that once a declaration of war had been made, no one could prevent the

war from taking place and allowing peace to reign in exchange.


75

Vaughan Williams begins this movement with selected words from that

speech, ―The Angel of Death has been abroad…There is no one as of old…to sprinkle

blood on the lintel and the two-side posts of our door, that he may spare and pass on.‖

Concluding the first part of the last section, Vaughan Williams quotes from the

prophet Jeremiah. Building on Bright‘s argument, the use of Jeremiah in DNP implies

the necessity of a moral life, as Baker has noted:

Jeremiah emphasized the importance of the moral and spiritual life, and

discounted the value of ritual and sacrifice…involving the idea that after

people had led unethical lives they could not expect the blessings of peace.86

It is upon this premise of culpability and resignation that DNP makes the transition

towards ‗Resolution and Hope.‘ Choices have been made, people have died, and the

responsibility now rests with those who have the power to evoke change for the future.

The second sub-part of this final section of DNP draws from a myriad of

sources including the Old Testament prophet Daniel, his contemporary, Haggai, and a

host of other references found throughout Scripture, wherein a force stronger than man

steps in to provide the rescuing solution to a mounting problem, the ubiquitous ‗Deus

ex Machina‘87

. In this case, the outside force is the God of the Holy Bible. Through

Daniel, Haggai, and the others, mankind is exhorted that in spite of his past behavior,

the past can and will be atoned for and a new and better future is promised; one that is

greater than any before seen and one that includes an eternal peace:

Fear not, peace be unto thee…the glory of this latter house shall be greater than

of the former…and in this place will I give peace…For as the new heavens and

86 Baker, 11. 87

Webster defines ‗Deus ex Machina‘ as a person or thing (as in fiction or drama) that appears or is

introduced suddenly and unexpectedly and provides a contrived solution to an apparently insoluble

difficulty.


76

the new earth…which I will make, so shall your seed and your name remain

forever.88

In the end, Vaughan Williams concludes with the same prayerful proclamation of

‗Dona Nobis Pacem‘ that began his work, bringing a cyclical harmony to the whole.

The only movement that WR provides in this final section is the ‗Libera Me‘

(Table 2.1). This final movement, arguably one of Britten‘s most complex in the War

Requiem, utilizes every performance force involved in the work. From the full

orchestra to the smaller chamber choir, from the full chorus to the smaller boys‘

chorus, from the organ, to all three soloists, from the traditional ‗Libera Me‘ text to

Owen‘s ‗Strange Meeting‘, Britten literally and figuratively pulls out all the stops

here. By employing every performance force available, the focus of the final

movement becomes a figurative as well as literal ‗statement of peace for all

mankind‘89

:

Its message of reconciliation between friend and foe, in the eerie subterranean

cavern after one has been killed by the other, transcends its ostensible

surrealism to create the simple statement of peace between all mankind to

which every musical event up to this point has tended.90

Like the final movement of DNP, the focus of attention is turned to God, who

in His great mercy can deliver mankind not only from death, but to an eternal peace

instead. Summer writes of the prospect of this exchange:

With all the musical forces sharing the same music, the work ends with the two

soldiers lamenting the waste of life and opportunity, and turning to a feeling of

reconciliation at the end by singing to one another ‗Let us sleep now‘… while

the boy choir chants ‗Requiem aeternam.‘91

88 Ralph Vaughan Williams, Dona Nobis Pacem (London: Oxford University Press, 1971), 95-129. 89

Summer, 149. 90 Mervyn Cooke, Britten: War Requiem (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), 74. 91 Summer, 149.


77

As in the other two works, Britten concludes with an a cappella ‗prayer for peace‘

ringing out the final, ‗Requiescant in pace. Amen‘ (Table 2.4).

As was discussed at the onset of this chapter, all three works follow a similar

progression. To quote Baker again:

(All three) works begin with a discussion of the good intentions of the

protagonists—the soldiers—and they arrive at the same unfortunate result that

is history. It may, of course, be hoped that somehow the course of history

may be changed. The fact that many members of the intelligentsia of this

world have expressed a negative attitude toward war, may contribute to this

change.92


A final note of structural/musical comparison bears mentioning: that all three

works were commissioned under the auspices of commemorating the arrival and

subsequent passing of momentous socio-political events. Both TAM and DNP were

commissioned as a part of a celebration of the passing of time, the Millennium for

TAM and the centenary of the Huddersfield Choral Society for DNP. WR is unique in

that it does not celebrate the passing of time in a traditional sense, but rather celebrates

and memorializes the passing of the past into the present, a sort of marking of time in

itself, the passing of the life of Coventry Cathedral from war into peace, a universal

theme that all three works share. The significance of these musically and textually-

based patterns of structural similarity, lend further support to the argument that a

newly-formed sub-genre of large scale, twentieth-century, British choral works with

an anti-war emphasis need exist.

92 Baker, 110 (Parenthesis mine).


78

CHAPTER THREE

ICONOGRAPHICAL COMPARISON OF THE PIECES

Iconography, in a distilled sense, is the study of the meaning of images. The

Latin origin of the word ‗Icon‘ means a true representation of something. Therefore, it

is the purpose of this chapter to seek to better understand the images associated with

the three major choral works, The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace by Karl Jenkins,

War Requiem by Benjamin Britten and Dona Nobis Pacem by Ralph Vaughan

Williams. The importance of these selected images is that they each make

iconographical allusions to the central message of the music and the text, that of war

and a hope for peace. By analyzing these icons, one can a truer understanding of the

subject material toward the classification of these three works into a newly-proposed

sub-genre of large-scale, British, sacred, anti-war, choral works of the twentieth

century.

As evidenced in the previous chapter, when identifiable patterns repeat, a

foundation is laid for an overarching organizational scheme that, in turn, helps to

support the conditions necessary for the classification of a work within the specified

sub-genre. In the realm of iconography, again, a set of identifiable patterns is present.

Within this chapter, I will examine the images associated with the music and the

established iconographic patterns as they manifest themselves in each of the three

works.

The visual accompaniments to the performance of the three musical works in

this chapter include: two full-length films, The Armed Man by Opus TF, a major

documentary film production house in Wales, and the War Requiem by Derek Jarman,


79

and the Map of the Galleries of the Royal Armouries in Leeds. In addition to the two

films, there are several other comparable images associated with the three musical

works. Those images are of: Fire, as used in the Burnt Offering scene from

‗Offertorium‘ in the film WR; Fire, as seen in the Old Coventry Cathedral and in

‗Torches‘ in TAM; Angels, personified by the Archangel Michael from Coventry

Cathedral and in ‗Offertorium‘ in the film WR; and sculptures and plaques, found near

the bell tower at the Old Coventry Cathedral compared with the text, ‗The Latter

House Shall Be Greater Than The Former‘ from DNP.

With regard to the two full-length films, WR by Derek Jarman and TAM by

Opus TF, it can be stated that each creates a visual narrative which comments on the

message of the music and text found in the score. This body of iconography presents a

corollary to critical reception, due to its patterning of allusion, which is further

confirmed by my own analysis. These two films are thus included in the scope of this

paper because each employs a shared set of iconographical allusions.

Some critics believe that the original musical scores should have remained

unadulterated. Among those critics expressing strong views against the making of the

films, some have even argued that the new visual accompaniment is entirely

pointless.93

Of specific reaction to Derek Jarman‘s film, WR, Mervyn Cooke writes,

―Critical reaction to the film was mixed, few reviewers finding the result as satisfying

as Jarman might have wished.‖94

93 In Mervyn Cooke‘s Britten: War Requiem, 90, the author recounts expressed disappointment over the

new Jarman film, stating that the cinematic work is entirely pointless and that Britten‘s work is too

monumental on its own for any accompanying film to ever do justice to the original work. 94 Ibid.


80

Regardless of the critical reception to the works, which is explored in much

greater depth in the following chapter, the films made to accompany performances of

the two musical works require further examination, which will be done within the

following pages of this chapter.

The following discussion of related iconography will begin with a

consideration of TAM and its correlated images and will then relate that work to its

predecessors and their respective iconography and cultural contexts.

THE ARMED MAN:

The Opus TF film, The Armed Man, premiered on 11 January 2004 at St.

David‘s Hall, Cardiff, Wales, as part of a birthday celebration concert for the

composer, Karl Jenkins, who, present for the event, conducted his work with the

newly-created accompanying film. Following the success of the original, a newer

version of the film was produced and released on 17 August 2007 to the general public

for use in future performances of TAM. I will examine, in greater detail, excerpts from

the latter of these two films, as I have had the greatest access to that version.

The second Opus TF film, like the first, was produced in cooperation with The

Royal Armouries, Images of War, S4/C, Barcud Derwen, and EMI Classics.95

At its

premiere, the critics heralded its success, and since then, the work has been made

95 In addition to The Royal Armouries, whose history and purpose was reviewed in greater depth in

chapter one of this paper, the collaborative entities involved in the making of TAM the film include the

following: Images of War, an exclusive library archive of war films specializing in footage from the World Wars and Korean conflicts of the twentieth century; S4/C, a local television broadcast company

specializing in the arts and more specifically Welsh-language films; Barcud Derwen, an editorial post-

production house for audio/visual projects, specializing in documentary films; and EMI Classics, a UK-

based audio/video recording company specializing in the music performances of classical and modern

crossover artists.


81

available to the general public to be used in conjunction with a live performance of

TAM. The orchestral parts of the work are available for hire through Boosey and

Hawkes, a major music publishing house based in the UK, and the accompanying film

available for hire through Opus TF.

The film consists of thirteen movements, corresponding to the thirteen

movements in the musical score. The thirteen are further sub-divided into a total of

thirty-eight consecutive chapters. (For a musical score-specific breakdown of the

timing and progression of the chapters within each movement of the film, please refer

to Table 3.5 at the conclusion of this chapter.) As in the musical score itself,

throughout the sequential presentation of these movements, a progressive narrative of

war takes place. Hefin Owen, producer of the film, recalls that, ―upon first hearing the

work, he was struck by how visual the work was.‖96

It was this visually-connective

association that eventually led Owen to undertake the production of the film project.

The story that unfolds throughout the presentation of the images in the film is

that of war, not of a specific war, but rather of a collection of war-related images

showing the progression of war from its inception to its resolution. Each movement,

as it develops through its corresponding chapters, tells the story of war: its

preparations, its actions, its consequences, and the eventual secession of war and

armed conflict and the peace that follows. (For a more complete chapter by chapter

breakdown of the film, with a general listing of the types of images contained in each,

please refer to Table 3.6 at the end of this chapter.) Since a complete analysis of this

96 In-person interview with Hefin Owen by the author (31 October 2007).


82

film has not yet been undertaken, I offer the following movement-selective discussion

as a summation of the images included in the film.

The opening movement, which consists of three chapters, shows the

preparations being made for war, through a series of military exercises and parade

formations, representing nations from all over the world. This opening collection of

images personifies the approach of the armed man, the magnitude and precision of the

forces involved showing that he is indeed a man to be feared, echoing the drum taps

and corresponding L‘homme Armé theme in the accompanying musical score. This

first movement ends with an image of a white dove, in flight, set against a seascape

background of black and gray; it should be noted here that this particular image has

become the one most often identified with TAM, one which is befitting as an

internationally-recognized symbol for peace (Fig.3.1).

Fig.3.1: The White Dove from The Armed Man Film97

97

Image taken from the opening scene of The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace, DVD, Orchestra of

Welsh National Opera and Côr Caerdydd and Cywair and John S Davies Singers and Serendipity, Karl

Jenkins (London, UK: EMI Records, Ltd., 2005).


83

The third movement of The Armed Man film, Kyrie, involves chapters Five

through Eight. Of particular interest is the progression of the images as they move

through three markedly different vantage points, each corresponding to the three major

sections of the Kyrie: opening Kyrie, Christe, and closing Kyrie.

The first two chapters, (Five and Six), depict images of men and women

working in factories, fulfilling their given or perhaps assumed role in the development

of the ‗war machine‘. The workers are busy building munitions, weapons, and

vehicles for war. In contrast, the second section, Christe¸ displays images of a

cathedral, or basilica of worship, with its high arches, and bar tracery stained glass,

complete with the sun radiating in through its windows; indicative of the piece‘s

reference to the late Renaissance composer, Palestrina, and the sacred vocation he

kept. The final section, Kyrie, brings on the commission and subsequent departure of

the created weapons and vehicles seen in the first section, concluding with a collection

of candid snapshots showing soldiers saying goodbye to their loved ones as they go

off to serve in the war.

The Sanctus movement offers the most diverse presentation of the world‘s

nations represented in the film to this point. This movement, which encompasses

chapters Eleven through Fifteen, begins with the image of The White Dove and moves

through a sequence of scenes, highlighting consequences brought on by conflict

throughout the world. The iconographic montage found in the Sanctus sequence‘s

images depicts world leaders, book burnings, burning villages, refugees fleeing their

homes, rioting in the streets, enforcement of martial law, guerilla warfare, and the


84

disbursement of humanitarian aid. This movement concludes with a fading profile

shot of a woman in tears, slowly bowing her head down into her hands. Sanctus is a

collage of suffering brought on by the world‘s military conflicts.

The sixth movement, Charge!, encompasses seven distinctly different

chapters: Seventeen through Twenty-Three. This septuplet division is due partially to

the four major musical sections that make up this movement: that of the build-up, the

battle scene, the moment of silence, and ‗The Last Post‘.98

Of particular interest to

this discussion are the images found in chapters Twenty through Twenty-Three:

scenes of military forces representing all nationalities charge head-on into battle

(Twenty); the battle begins, initiated by the now infamous image of the second

airplane crashing into what was the north building of the Twin Towers in New York

City (Twenty-One); rain falls upon a lake at sunset following the battle (Twenty-

Two); and finally, a Royal Air Force plane lands and uniformed soldiers carry the

Union-Jack draped coffin of a fallen comrade to the playing of ‗The Last Post‘

(Twenty-Three). Here in this movement, one finds the full pictorial progression of

war, from its initial inception to its ultimate destructive power.

The movement, Angry Flames, is comprised of only three chapters. The first,

(Twenty-Four), to the sound of tolling bells, portrays the burning of buildings,

churches, and even whole cities. The second (Twenty-Five) depicts, through a

panorama of images, the moments immediately preceding and following the dropping

of the Atomic Bomb, the damage that resulted, and the extensive burns suffered by

98 For a more detailed description of Charge!, please refer to Chapter One where this movement is

discussed in greater depth.


85

humans in the radioactive fallout. The third and final chapter (Twenty-Six) concludes

with selected video footage of an atomic cloud, its ensuing flames, and a close-up of a

severely burned victim, caused again, presumably, by the bomb‘s intense radiation.

The movement Agnus Dei contains only one chapter (Twenty-Nine), which

begins with an image of a helmet hanging on a gun, indicative of a fallen soldier and

of a battlefield burial. From the gun/helmet image, the camera pans over to show rows

upon rows of white crosses set atop graves in a military graveyard before fading into a

field of red poppies. The chapter concludes with the same image it began with, that of

the helmet perched on top of the gun.

The choice of this particular sequence of images reveals a much larger context,

that of death, not only the death of one fallen soldier, signified by the helmet and gun,

but also of the death of many, signified by the military graveyard and field of poppies.

By concluding with the same image that began this movement, the progressive act of

remembrance has come full circle.

The final movement of the film TAM, ‗Better is Peace‘, consists of four

chapters, the combined product of which symbolizes a break from the past and a move

towards a more peaceful tomorrow: a cause for celebration. The first of the four

chapters (Thirty-Five) begins with the now ubiquitous white dove, and a variety of

international military processions. The second chapter (Thirty-Six) showcases the

homecoming of the troops, with family reunions and the like. Chapter Thirty-Seven

depicts people from all nationalities dancing in the streets; the end of war is truly a

cause for celebration. The final chapter of this movement, and of the entire work


86

(Thirty-Eight), memorializes the fallen through the lighting of candles and services

held in remembrance and suggests that through religion and prayer, mankind can come

to a complete and perhaps lasting reconciliation world-wide. The film ends with the

same image of The White Dove that it opened with, symbolizing an overarching need

for lasting peace and reconciliation.

WAR REQUIEM:

Like its successor, The Armed Man, Derek Jarman‘s earlier film War Requiem,

also paints a powerful anti-war narrative. Shot entirely on location at a condemned

insane asylum, the Darenth Park hospital (near Dartford, Kent), the film War Requiem

recreates the vantage-point of the military life of WWI poet, Wilfred Owen, portraying

the ugliness of war. Prohibited by contract from modifying Britten‘s original musical

score in any way, Jarman worked to create a completely silent full-length companion

film to the original work. He discusses some of the perceived challenges faced in the

undertaking of this endeavor: ―In a way, the music is merely a vehicle. What place do

I have in all of this? A conductor? An interpreter? A bridge to other audiences and

other times?‖99

Here Jarman has mentioned the fact that his images are a response–

one that can be understood as part of the larger body of critical responses to this work.

The film, War Requiem opened on 6 January 1989 in London at the Cannon Cinema.

Like the latter film TAM, WR utilizes many similar images. Among those

similarities are images of soldiers exercising on parade grounds, drummers and

dancers, world leadership personified, the use of live war footage, cities burning,

99 Derek Jarman, War Requiem: The Film (London: Faber and Faber, Ltd., 1989), 10.


87

angels intervening, surveys of destruction, refugees fleeing, atomic bomb footage with

burning victims, fields of poppies, candles burning and memorial services. The

discussion that follows will consider the relationship of recurring patterns in the above

images, as they appear in WR, to those found similarly in The Armed Man. (For a

more complete chapter by chapter breakdown of the film, with a general listing of the

types of images contained in each, please refer to Table 3.7 at the end of this chapter.)

In the first movement, ‗Requiem‘, the opening scene unfolds upon a group of

soldiers exercising in parade formation, preparing themselves for war. This scene is

similar to the one found in the opening movement of The Armed Man wherein several

groups of soldiers, each representing different nations, march in parade formation,

uniformed and ready for battle (Table 3.1).100

Table 3.1: TAM/WR Film – Chapter Comparison #1

TAM The Armed Man Ch. 2 Military

Parade/Field

Routines – Armed

Demonstrations

WR Requiem Ch. 2 Soldiers Exercise

In the second movement, ‗Dies Irae‘, Jarman employs a new technique, one of

juxtaposing color schemes: black and white vs. color. In the opening scene, a chorus,

wearing black and white, sings in the foreground while images of war, in full color,

flash in the background. In TAM, Opus TF employed a similar technique of color

contrast in the Kyrie movement to symbolize the stark coldness of the industrial

context that built the war machine, with that of the brilliant colors found in the stained

glass windows of cathedrals.

100 Table 3.1 extracted and adapted from Tables 3.6 and 3.7 found at the conclusion of this chapter.


88

In the middle of the ‗Dies Irae‘, a drummer boy plays as a chorus line dances

in a smoke-filled room for a central figure draped in a Union Jack flag, a symbol of

imperialism and the undying support of all things of the Nation. This particular scene

is ironic in that it depicts a small, innocent child, indicative of the youth of Britain,

surrendering himself to the greater, imperialistic call of the Nation, personified by the

Union Jack-draped figure, while the entire time, a chorus-line dances in the

background apparently making light of the whole situation. It is also interesting to

note that the room is smoke-filled because it appears to indicate that the future for both

this child, as well as the imperialistic urges of Britain, seem uncertain.

A similar scene is found in the opening material of the ‗Sanctus‘ movement in

TAM, where a montage of pictures of world leaders flashes on the screen before fading

into a military procession of drums and bugles. These images link conflict to conquest

at the hands of national leadership (Table 3.2).101


TAM Kyrie Ch. 5 Industrial

Revolution/

Building the War

Machine

Ch. 7 Cathedral/Stained

Glass/Light Shining

Sanctus Ch. 11 World Leaders

WR Dies Irae Ch. 3 Black and White

Chorus

Ch. 4 Drummer Boy and

Dancers with Seated

Imperialism in a

Smoke-filled Room



89

The third movement, ‗Offertorium‘ provides several points of iconographical

association between the two films, TAM and WR, and the three choral works. The first

major connection appears in the opening scene wherein a choir of boys, dressed in red

robes, sings against a backdrop of white crosses. A similar scene can be found in the

‗Agnus Dei‘ movement, in TAM film as a camera pans through a military graveyard

showing row upon row of white crosses (Table 3.3).102

The second major iconographical connection in this movement comes through

the image of a soldier holding a cross, a standard, against the backdrop of an indistinct

burning city, ultimately symbolic of every burning city. Throughout The Armed Man

film, but especially in the movement ‗Torches‘, churches, non-descript buildings, and

entire cities are seen burning after battles in those locales have taken place. It is

interesting to note that, at this juncture in Britten‘s work, Jarman chose to show

images of a burning city against the foreground of a solitary cross; an internationally

recognized symbol for the Christian Church. The ‗Cross of Nails‘ set above the high

altar at Coventry, was formed from nails found amongst the ruins of the old Cathedral,

the structure of which was destroyed by German bombs in WWII. Consequently, the

new structure, built alongside the old one, was the basis for WR‘s commission. The

combination of the two buildings side-by-side later became the church-sanctioned

symbol of peace and reconciliation for Coventry and its mission for the same

worldwide (Fig.3.2).103

102 Table 3.3 extracted and adapted from Tables 3.6 and 3.7 found at the conclusion of this chapter. 103

Image gleaned from Neothemi – The New Network of Thematic Museums and Institutes,

http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/soc/wie/NEOTHEMI/About/approaches/Secondary/CrossOfNails/higha

ltarcross.jpg <Accessed: 12/24/08>.


90


TAM Angry Flames Ch. 24 Burning Cities/

Churches

Ch. 25 Dropping Of Atomic

Bomb/Survey of

Damage/Burn

Victims

Torches Ch. 27 Burning Buildings/

Animal-Human

Carnage/Mass

Graves

Agnus Dei Ch. 29 Military Graveyard/

Row Upon Row of

White Crosses/

Red Poppies

WR Offertorium Ch. 7 Boys Choir in Red

Robes against White

Crosses Backdrop/

Burning of City

Ch. 9 Boys Choir amidst

Scenes of Black and

White Military

Troops/Graveyards

Filled with Soldiers

Agnus Dei Ch. 12 Field of Poppies

Libera Me Ch. 13 Field of Skulls/War

Montage/Firefight/

Atomic Bomb

Fig.3.2: Cross of Nails, (1962), High Altar - New Coventry Cathedral.


91

A third iconographical allusion occurs through the presence of angels, or

perhaps more significantly, a single angel, the Archangel Michael. In Christian

theology, Michael is understood to be the commander of God‘s host of angelic

warriors, who, at the end of all things (see ‗The Revelation of St. John‘ in The Holy

Bible) slays the dragon Satan. There is a powerful force of irony at work in this

movement. As the boys‘ chorus sings ‗sed signifier sanctus Michael‘, referring to the

Archangel himself, the Owen poem, ‗The Parable of the Old Man and the Young‘,

begins to unfold.

In Owen‘s account, an angel, whom it can be inferred by the surrounding Latin

text of the musical score is Michael, tries to intercede to keep Owen, personified as the

Old Testament Patriarch Abraham, from sacrificing his son, Isaac, representing the

son‘s and daughters of Europe. Try as he may to dissuade him from doing so, the

angel ultimately fails, and Abraham carries through with the sacrifice anyway, slaying

half the seed of Europe in the action‘s course.

Paradoxically, at the new Cathedral of St. Michael in Coventry, (built in 1961-

2), a giant sculpture of the Archangel adorns the exterior eastern wall, standing

triumphant over a defeated Satan, who cowers beneath him (Fig.3.3). Thus, at

Coventry, Owen‘s poetic reinterpretation of the original Biblical account has again

been reversed and good triumphs over evil. The current Bishop of Coventry, speaking

near the time of the church‘s consecration, remarked about this symbolic sculpture:

This particular piece of work has captured the imagination of very many

people who . . . have seen, in this quite lovely work, something of the simple,


92

profound message of good triumphant over evil, of God having the final word

over the forces of Evil.104

Fig.3.3: (Jacob Epstein) Saint Michael and the Devil, bronze, (1962), New Coventry Cathedral.

Photo: Author, 2007.

In the fifth movement, ‗Agnus Dei‘, as the chorus is singing the Mass text,

Jarman opens with a scene commemorating those who have fallen. Here, Jarman

again invokes color juxtaposition by presenting first, a field of red poppies, followed

by a scene consisting of rows upon rows of white crosses.105

By comparison, in the

‗Agnus Dei‘ movement of The Armed Man film, one finds a strikingly similar visual

treatment of the memory of the dead, wherein the fallen are placed beneath white cross

104 James D. Herbert, ―Bad Faith at Coventry: Spence‘s Cathedral and Britten‘s War Requiem‖, Critical

Inquiry, 25:3, (Spring 1999), 548. 105 From the 1915 poem, now become legend, ‗In Flanders Field‘, by Canadian poet John McCrae, the

poppy and more specifically its red strain, growing amongst row upon row of white cross-shaped

tombstones, has become the British national symbol of remembrance. Beginning in October each year,

members of the British Legion sell red poppies to raise money for their Field of Remembrance project, a memorial for Britain‘s fallen soldiers consisting of thousands upon of thousands of white crosses

planted in the yard in front of Westminster Chapel. Recipients wear the poppies on their garments

leading up to the memorial services held on Remembrance Day, 11 November. Both WR and TAM play

upon this national sentiment in their use of the image of the poppy against rows and rows of white cross

tombstones.


93

tombstones in a field of red poppies. This scene possesses a symbolic beauty in its

color exchange between the pure white-washed crosses and the blood-red stained

poppies; it is an allegory of war and peace held fast, side-by-side, in this single image

(see Table 3.3 above).

The opening section of the final movement of the film, ‗Libera me‘, begins

with a montage of carnage and destruction. A field of human skulls serves as the

bookend opening and closing of this section which fades into actual war footage of

various types including ground and air combat with intense firefights throughout.

These scenes eventually transition into images taken from footage of the dropping of

the atomic bomb in Japan and survey the destructive power unleashed by its wake.

By comparison, one may draw a parallel with ‗Angry Flames‘ in The Armed

Man film, where images of the aftermath caused by the dropping of the atomic bomb

consume the entirety of the screen. In both the Jarman and Opus TF films, the sanctity

of human life and the countryside in which they were living are not spared in the

portrayal of war in these horrific scenes.

A further iconographic corollary to this section of the film is found in a set of

images amongst the ruins of the Old Coventry Cathedral. Two provide a thought-

provoking connection between the people of Coventry and those of Japan, linking the

people of those two nations (East and West) together. Two copies of a sculpture titled

―Reconciliation‖ are placed within Coventry and in the Peace Garden in Hiroshima.

Both are sites commemorating annihilation by fire, and now, both nations find

reconciliation through the installation of a single metallic image, created and


94

fashioned through flame. The plaque that adorns the sculpture reads, ―Both sculptures

remind us that, in the face of destructive forces, human dignity and love will triumph

over disaster and bring nations together in respect and peace‖ (Fig.3.4).

Fig.3.4: Commemorative Plaque from Josefina de Vasconcellos, Reconciliation, bronze, 1995, on

the site of the ruins of Old Coventry Cathedral. Photo: Author, 2007.

The sculpture itself depicts two figures, male and female, held in an eternal

embrace; one of understanding the other‘s suffering and loss, purified and held fast by

a single common bond, that of fire. I believe that this sculpture provides as strikingly

powerful an argument for the patterns of iconographic connectivity as any of the other

examples found in this chapter. It epitomizes the complexity of struggle and the desire

for reconciliation that all three of these choral works seek to accomplish (Fig.3.5).


95

Fig.3.5: Josefina de Vasconcellos, Reconciliation, bronze, 1995 Old Coventry Cathedral. Photo:

Author, 2007.

The final movement of the War Requiem film concludes with the scene of a

memorial service, wherein a solitary worshipper, in an attitude of prayer and

supplication, brings an offering of a memorial wreath made up of red and white

poppies, to lay to rest upon a candle-lit altar in remembrance of those fallen in the war.

As the film draws to a close, one is reminded again, in much the same way as in the

final movement of The Armed Man film, that the world, through religion and prayer,

may eventually find peace and reconciliation from war and armed conflict (Table

3.4).106

As Britten so poignantly reminds us in the closing strains of his work, what is

done is done, therefore, ‗Let us sleep now, in paradise.‘



96


TAM Better Is Peace Ch. 38 Candles Burning/

Services of

Remembrance/

Nations Returning to

Religion and Prayer

WR Libera Me Ch. 15 Red Poppy Wreath/

Memorial Altar

Ch. 16 Basket of White

Poppies/Lone

Candle Burning on

Altar- ‗Everlasting

Light‘

DONA NOBIS PACEM:

Similarly to TAM and WR, DNP also displays examples of related

iconography. One such example can be found among the ruins of the Old Coventry

Cathedral, where a plaque erected on the exterior wall of the bell tower bears the

following inscription, ―The latter glory of this house shall be greater than the former

saith the Lord of Hosts and in this place will I give peace‖ (Fig.3.6).

Fig.3.6: Plaque from the Bell Tower, Old Coventry Cathedral. Photo: Author, 2007.


97

This visionary text, taken directly from the words of the prophet Haggai of the

Old Testament of The Holy Bible, (Chapter 2: Verse 9) echoes those found slightly

paraphrased in the fifth and final movement, of DNP of Vaughan Williams: ‗The glory

of this latter house shall be greater than the former…and in this place will I give

peace.‘ In its context at Coventry, the text serves as a three-fold reference: first, to the

rebuilding of the temple structure in Jerusalem; second, symbolizing the rebuilding of

the new Cathedral structure in Coventry; lastly, to the final days of life on this earth

when war and conflict will cease and the saints will rise to join the Lord in heaven and

make their eternal home with Him there. In all three contexts, the plaque serves as a

message of hope and respite for the future, echoing the purpose and thrust of all three

major choral works.

In taking a closer look at the text of DNP, one would discover that the

following lines occur immediately following those discussed above: ‗Nation shall not

lift up a sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more‘. This text is

taken directly from the words of the prophet Micah (Chapter 4: Verse 3), also of the

Old Testament, and a contemporary of Haggai.

In a more contemporary context, in the same general area of the Old Coventry

Cathedral ruins where the plaque discussed above rests, one can find another set upon

an opposing wall. (Note the inscription born on Fig.3.7 below). This second plaque

bears the same inscription found in the text of DNP. As such, the argument can be

made that the choice of the text on the plaque and the placement of that plaque near

the first one, gives further support to the case that recurring patterns of association


98

between the iconography of Coventry and Britten exist with those of Vaughan

Williams and DNP.

Fig.3.7: Plaque from interior wall, Old Coventry Cathedral. Photo: Author, 2007.

A final source of comparative iconography can be found in a rather unlikely

place: the Map of the Galleries of the Royal Armouries (Leeds). In the same way that

Britten selected his text and made complementary musical choices in WR to

compensate for and exploit the strengths of the performance venue of Coventry

Cathedral, it can be argued that Jenkins‘ librettist, Guy Wilson, similarly compiled his

chosen texts of TAM to reflect the organizational pattern of the galleries of the Leeds

campus of The Royal Armouries, the choral work‘s commissioning body (Fig.3.8).


99

Fig.3.8: The Royal Armouries-Leeds, Map of the Galleries

107

While this particular point serves more as speculation than proven fact, it is

interesting to note that the organization of the movements in TAM bear an uncanny

resemblance to the structural lay-out of the Leeds campus of The Royal Armouries.

For instance, TAM focuses on three major people groups: British, the Near, and Far

107 Map of Galleries, The Royal Armouries-Leeds Website, http://www.royalarmouries.org/leeds/

<Accessed: 5 April 2008>.


100

East. Comparatively, among its diversified collection, the galleries specialize in the

following focal points: British arms and armour and Oriental arms and armour, both

reflective of their respective people groups.

Secondly, the museum galleries chronicle a history of war through many

different periods of time, including those reaching into the far distant past (Antiquity)

through those of the present-day (The World Wars/Iraq/Afghanistan). TAM also spans

many periods of combat history, beginning with the The Mahàbhàrata of ancient India

through to L‘homme Armé, of the late Medieval and early Renaissance periods and

finally embracing the World Wars and other conflicts of the Twentieth Century. One

is reminded that Jenkins, himself, dedicated his choral work to the victims of the

Kosovo crisis that raged in the last decade of the Twentieth Century.

An additional consideration that bears mentioning is that at the time of TAM‘s

commission, The Royal Armouries had recently completed the construction of their

new Leeds campus. As was mentioned above, there are remarkable similarities

between the lay-out of the Leeds-Armouries and the structural and textual layout of

TAM. In an recent interview with historian and museum director/curator, Guy Wilson,

former Master of the Royal Armouries, he remarked that while he may not have

intentionally selected the texts for TAM based on the layout of the building and its

galleries, the fact that he was so intimately involved in the construction of the campus

may have had an influence upon his vision for and the subsequent selection of the

texts used in the work.


101

Wilson began the text selection process at the behest of a friend and fellow co-

worker at the Armouries, Bob Smith, who is himself an early music specialist. In his

compilation of texts, Wilson fashioned the movement ‗Now the Guns Have Stopped‘,

the verses of which are borrowed from a script entitled, ‗When the Guns Stopped

Firing: 1918‘, which Wilson himself wrote several years previous to the commission

of TAM. This script is used by the Armouries in their educational program of dramatic

interpretations: a series of theatrical monologues, which are performed daily, by actors

in period costumes, throughout the galleries, recounting actual events found in war

and armed conflict (Fig.3.9).108

Fig. 3.9: When the Guns Stop Firing: 1918


Iconography can offer the researcher an additional perspective into the cultural,

social, and even religious constraints directing the creation of a particular work. By

108 Craven‘s Part in the Great War ‗News Article‘ (Original image gleaned from The Royal Armouries

marketing materials) http://www.cpgw.org.uk/news.cfm?ar=1 <Accessed: 03/17/08>.


102

examining the images available, one gains a truer insight into the time period and

context that a work and its related images reflect.

Whether one examines the linear progression of the photo/video montages that

make up the two full length films, or images found amongst the ruins of a building a

specific work commemorated, or whether considers a map of a museum complex, one

recognizes recurrent patterns between the images and the works that they represent.

The examination of the available iconography related to the three major choral works

discussed in this chapter lends credence and further support to the proposal of a new

classification of large-scale, British, sacred, choral works of the Twentieth Century

with an anti-war theme.


103

Table 3.5: The Armed Man Film – Chapter Locations

Provided by Opus TF109

Movement Chapter Music Location Sound Effects The Armed Man 1 Start Marching Feet

2 Bar 5

3 A Call to Prayer 4 Start

Kyrie 5 Start

6 B

7 F

8 G Save Me from Bloody Men 9 Start

10 Bar 17 beat 3 Sanctus 11 Start

12 D

13 F

14 G

15 H Hymn Before Action 16 Start

Charge! 17 Start

18 Bar 68

19 Bar 112

20 H

21 Bar 145 Screams Echo

22 K (Rain) Rain

23 L (Last Post) Angry Flames 24 Start Bells

25 Bar 3

26 Bar 40 Torches 27 Start

28 C Agnus Dei 29 Start

Now The Guns Have Stopped 30 Pre Music

31 Start Benedictus 32 Start

33 B

34 D Better Is Peace 35 Start

36 E

37 J

109 Table details provided by Hefin Owen-Opus TF, The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace Film.


104

38 K Roll Credits 39 Start


105

Table 3.6: The Armed Man Film - Thematic Image Summary

Movement Chapter Description of Images

The Armed Man 1 Begins with a Welsh Countryside Flyover

2 Military Parade/Field Routines –

Armed Demonstrations

Many Nations Represented

(European/Asian/American)

3 Drums/Bugles/Fifes/Welsh Country/Seaside

Flyover/The White Dove

Call to Prayer 4 Sun Shimmering on Water/Hagia

Sophia/Minarets/Foot Washing/Preparation/Wailing

Wall/People From Many Nations Praying/ A Church/Cross

Kyrie 5 Industrial Revolution/Building the War

Machine/Women and Men

6 Munitions/Planes/Tanks/Submarines/Vehicles

7 Basilica/Cathedral/Stained Glass/Pillars/

Light shining through glass

8 Launching the Carrier/Boarding the Train/Soldiers

Saying Goodbye/Leaving Women - Children Behind

Save Me From Bloody Men 9 The White Dove/Lakeside Storm Front/Photo

Montage of World Leaders

10 Explosions/Britain/US Leaders

Sanctus 11 The White Dove/World Leaders/Parades Featuring

Young and Old People/Book Burnings

12 Asian Villages Burning/Extradition/Refugees Fleeing

13 Rioting/Protests/Enforcement of Martial Law

14 Guerilla Warfare/Fighting in the Streets/Trenches

15 Refugee Camps/Humanitarian Aid/Woman Crying

Hymn Before Action 16 The White Dove/Landscape/Watching and

Waiting/D-Day/Generic Landscape/The White Dove

Charge! 17 Submarine Breaking Through the Water/Planes

Taking Off Carriers/Soldiers Running/

Submarine Diving

18 Mortars/Missiles Exploding/

Soldiers at the Ready/Bombs Falling

19 Agincourt Old vs. New/Arrows Flying/

Guns Firing/Mortars Falling

20 Charging Forces

21 Airplane Crashing Into The Twin Towers (Crash/Burning/Fall)

22 Lakeside Storm Front

23 Military Gun Salute/Burials/Graveyards/RAF Cargo

Plane Landing/Military Casket Procession

Angry Flames 24 Destruction/Burning of Cities/Churches

25 Survey of Damage/Approach of the Atomic Bomb on

Plane/The Dropping Of The Atomic Bomb/Survey of

Hiroshima and Nagasaki Damage/Burn Victims

26 Atomic Cloud/Flames/Close-Up Burn Victim

Torches 27 Mad Cow/Hoof and Mouth


106

Burnings/Flamethrowers/Dual-Panel Footage/

Burning Buildings/Animal-Human Carnage/

Nazi Furnaces/Mass Graves

28 Blood-Red Sunset at Sea/

Waves Crashing Against the Rocks

Agnus Dei 29 Helmet Hanging on Gun/Lakeside at Sunset/Military

Graveyard/Row after Row of White Crosses/

Flanders Field/Red Poppies/

Lakeside at Sunset/Gun-Helmet

Now The Guns Have Stopped 30 A Mountain Range

31 People Dead and Dying and Severely Wounded/Photo-Montage-Faces of

Emotion/Grief/The Forgotten/

Ground Zero-New York/

Angel Statue Profile Against A Sunset

Benedictus 32 The White Dove/Lakeside Storm Front/

Captured POWs/Troops Surrendering/Deportation

33 Homeless/Refugees/People Showing Mercy/

Concentration Camps/Ghetto

34 The Earth Haloed/Clean-up and Rebuild/

Out of the Ashes/Clean Water/

Fresh Grain Again/Welsh Rural Countryside

Better Is Peace 35 The White Dove/Military on Parade/

Humanitarian Aid

36 Victory/Freedom/Homecoming Celebrations

37 People From All Nations Dancing in the Streets/Sea

Waves Rolling and Crashing on the Rocky Shore

38 Candles Burning/Services of Remembrance/ Nations

Returning to Religion and Prayer/ Welsh Country and Seaside/The White Dove

Credits 39 Opus TF

Producer: Hefin Owen

Editor: Chris Lawrence

Picture Research: Luned Phillips

With Thanks to:

Royal Armouries

Images of War

S4/C

Barcud Derwen


107

Table 3.7: War Requiem Film - Thematic Image Summary

Movement Chapter/Scene Description

Requiem 1 Opening monologue from ―Strange Meeting‖ (Lawrence Olivier)

Soldier in wheelchair with nurse

2 WR begins with (corpse) Owen and Nurse (T. Swanson) and

single lit candle – ―Anthem for Doomed Youth‖ found in hand

of Owen/Soldiers exercise – ‗passing bells for those who die as

cattle‘ – then flowers, wheat, then Owen beside altar in church

– reading Keats

Dies Irae 3 Black and white chorus – war footage in background vs.

trenches (digging and actual dug-out scenes)/Owen seated at table writing ‗bugles sang‘/―Liber scriptus‖ – soprano nurse

tending to the infirm vs. battle scenes (soldier w/ book–Keats?)

4 Owen surveying the destruction/Drummer boy/dancers and

seated imperialism smoky haze in room – ―The Next

War‖/nurse blindfolded/Owen seated with map and journal/

‗Recodare‘ – nurses cutting and disinfecting bandages/soldiers

picking up arms – smiles vs. seriousness (letters from war read

by nurses)/Muddy wounded soldier brought in to change the

mood with baritone solo ―Sonnet: On Seeing a Piece of Our

Artillery Brought into Action‖

5 Restatement of ‗Dies‘ brings into action artillery shots in black

and white (war footage)/soprano solo - soldier playing on piano

in the snow (snowballs, attack w/ knife/shot/Owen on scene/use bayonet/trumpet used to parley)/Owen finds friend dead on

barricade in snow/weeps (Baritone sings ‗Futility‘)

6 Children lighting tannenbaum/Laying of dead soldier (friend)

on stretcher and Owen helping to carry him out – chorus sings

‗Requiem‘ (mistletoe)

Offertorium 7 Boys Choir singing ‗Domine‘ in red robes against a backdrop

of white crosses – burying of solider friend in white sheet –

guards sitting on all four corners around tomb – back to old

soldier in wheelchair remembering – burning of city with

soldier holding cross as standard – chorus singing ‗sed signifier

sanctus Michael‘/Baritone/Tenor Solos

8 Duet ‗The Parable of the Old Man and the Young‘ – Owen at

desk with grass covered helmet/taking and recalling his

communion and Abraham/Isaac story – when lo...angel boy

arrives on scene to stop – lamb caught in the thicket – mockers/scoffers in the perimeter of the scene approving of and

cheering on the sacrifice of Owen ‗half of Europe instead‘

9 Boys Choir sings ‗Hostias et preces‘ amidst black and white

scenes of military troops ‗one by one‘, then graveyards filled

with soldiers (British namely)

Sanctus 10 Nurse braiding hair near tomb – soprano sings ‗Sanctus‘ with

bells/nurse begins crying and rocking with entrance of chorus

‗Pleni sunt coeli‘/tries to console herself with ‗Benedictus‘/

fear takes over the nurse ‗Hosanna‘/ends with candle burning

11 Scenes of mounted cavalry amidst destruction (burning tanks

and the like) soldiers marching/flames burning everything/

refugees retreating/water/candle smoking perhaps extinguished


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– Baritone sings solo ‗The End‘

Agnus Dei 12 Thorn crowned (Christ) figure carries wounded soldier (Owen)

amongst the devastation – Tenor sings ‗At Calvary near the

Ancre‘/Chorus sings ‗Agnus Dei‘/Nurse picks up crown of

thorns from barbed wire and examines it – Tenor sings next

stanza/Owen is dead and field of poppies are shown – chorus

sings ‗Agnus Dei‘ again

Libera me 13 A field of skulls opens this section – intense war footage

montage (Cambodia?) of death and destruction – chorus and soprano singing ‗Libera me‘/drums and brass –firefight/

bombing/full-scale attack!!!/atomic bomb dropped at climax of

‗Libera me‘... pictures of destruction in Japan – ends with field

of skulls

14 Tenor solo ‗Strange Meeting‘ – Owen (dead) walking down

tunnel led by candlelight examining families covered in ash

everywhere and comes across the ‗Strange Friend‘ he slew

earlier/Baritone solo ‗Strange Meeting‘– ‗Strange Friend‘

responds/boy and mother blow bubbles while Owen surveys

scenes of life – ‗friend‘ as boy to man bugle player/gives sign

of peace to Owen/Tenor/Baritone Duet – ‗Let Us Sleep Now‘

against Boys Chorus/Chorus/Soprano singing ‗In paradisum‘

15 ‗Friend‘, holding a wreath of red poppies, processes through lines of soldiers bearing crosses/moves into next room and

meets flag-enrobed figure with haloed diadem and nurses

folding up white sheets and approaches the memorial altar and

lays down red poppy wreath and repents (presence of stigmata)

16 Final bells begin to toll and Christ-figure in linens alone on

altar with nurse and attendant holding a basket of white

poppies-lone candle burning on altar again ‗everlasting light‘ as

nurse begins to leave – leaves basket of poppies in doorway and

closes door ‗ grant them rest in peace eternal...amen‘

Roll Credits 17


109

CHAPTER FOUR

COMPARISON OF THE CRITICAL RECEPTION OF THE PIECES

I would argue that the consideration of critical reception helps to broaden one‘s

understanding of each of the three works. Additionally, a better understanding of the

ways in which these pieces, The Armed Man: A Mass For Peace by Karl Jenkins, War

Requiem by Benjamin Britten, and Dona Nobis Pacem by Ralph Vaughan Williams

were received by critics and historians can clarify the patterns and relationships that

link these works not only in structure and text but also in mission and spirit, further

supporting the idea of a new musical sub-genre: one of large-scale, British, sacred,

choral works of the Twentieth Century with an anti-war bent.

The previous chapters dealt primarily with recurring patterns of structural

organization and iconography that can be observed in all three works. Likewise, the

consideration of the critical reception of these works also reveals comparative

patterns. The study of reception in this case is not meant to debate the notion of

authorial intention, but rather to consider a set of qualitative responses that musically-

educated audiences yielded in reaction to the performance of these works. These

culled responses, or criticisms, provide the researcher with a set of criteria that help to

better understand these three works within their appropriate cultural contexts. This

also underscores the fact that these pieces are participating in their respective

contexts—influencing and being influenced by those contexts—making the music,

then, indicative of ‗the sign of the times‘.

The discussion that follows in this chapter consists of three major components.

The first is a discussion of reception surrounding the performances of TAM in its


110

premiere contexts; the second, a discussion of WR in its premiere contexts; and the

third, a discussion of DNP in its premiere contexts. The overall goal of this chapter is

to create a comparative discussion of all three works‘ critical reception providing

evidence that recurrent patterns exist between each, giving further support to the

establishment of the new sub-genre.

THE ARMED MAN:

As mentioned in Chapter One, the musical style of Karl Jenkins is sometimes

hard to classify. Due to his cosmopolitan musical background, the approach that he

often draws upon when composing is eclectic at best.110

Critical reception, then, by

the greater musical public of Jenkins‘ work, has been as varied as his musical style.

It may be argued that the work is, by its very nature, also eclectic; drawing

upon a variety of musical styles and textual sources. As such, critics have struggled to

determine exactly what they are listening to and to develop a strong justification for

their particular responses to the work: ―Not classical, then, but a hybrid, eclectic

approach to classical music, in which he attempts to bring seemingly disparate

elements and traditions into a new and coherent whole.‖111

Regardless of whether or not his musical style is classifiable, or that critics

appreciate or recognize Jenkins‘ ability to synthesize various musical styles, the music

sells. Consider the following facts concerning the commercial success of TAM:

The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace, which had its premiere in 2000, has now

sold 152,000 copies on CD in the UK alone. His publisher, Boosey &

Hawkes, has sold more than 53,000 copies of the work's vocal score.

110 For more information on the evolution of Jenkins‘ compositional style, please see Chapter One. 111 Ibid.


111

Performances since its premiere now stand at 537 worldwide. Of the 348

performances in the UK, the vast majority come from amateur choirs rather

than from professional (and publicly subsidised) organisations.112

Despite the apparent confusion by the general public as to what kind of

musical style Jenkins writes in, critics of TAM have consistently given their

overwhelming praise for both the work and the perceived message within the work.

Nick Boole, spokesperson for the Royal Armouries (Leeds) says of TAM, "Its primary

intention is to expose the futility of war and express the desire for man to live in peace

and harmony."113

Critics praise the work‘s ability to communicate its message

through the music:

Jenkins' innovative work might not be a musical revolution but it remains

emotionally satisfying and strangely inspirational. Drawing on an eclectic

variety of cultural and musical sources ranging from the 15th-century French

song that launches the work to Islamic and Hindu scriptures, he provides his

audience/ congregation with a highly textured, tightly composed structure

which relies on a total commitment from singers and orchestra to fully convey

its complexities. It's a work which can be absorbed on two levels—as a piece

of significant and accessible contemporary music and as a source of spiritual

comfort. There's no weakness in Jenkins' message and music—at times it's

uncompromising and tough, at others lyrical. Love it or hate it, it deserves a

hearing.114

The critical response that the work is ―inspirational, significant and accessible

contemporary music, and a source of spiritual comfort‖ suggests that the Royal

Armouries‘ intention for TAM and Jenkins‘ realization of that intention is successful.

On a local level, in the United Kingdom alone, TAM has been highly

successful, selling hundreds of thousands of copies and yielding hundreds of

112

―What makes him the Marmite man of music‖ The Times (London), 03/07/08. 113 ―Armouries Peace Call‖ The Times (London), 12/27/99. 114 ―Art Beat‖ The Press (Christchurch, New Zealand), 07/24/04.


112

performances by many of the country‘s leading choruses. Based on the UK‘s positive

reaction to the work, combined with the poignancy of its message, the work has

gained an international following as well. Rod Grosvenor, director of The Friends

Singers, an amateur chorus that premiered TAM in Australia on 12 November 2005,

wrote the following about the work, ―It is a major work and one of the most serious

religious pieces to be performed in the UK in the past 50 years. It is a very personal,

very haunting piece.‖115

The work‘s premiere in Canada on 27 November 2004, nearly a year before

the Australian premiere, garnered a very similar response. Music director Darryl

Nixon of St Andrew‘s-Wesley Church in Vancouver, Canada writes of the nation‘s

premiere of TAM:

It was making a lot of noise in Britain and we started to hear the noise…a very

effective work…there‘s a place for composers who know how to write very

attractive music, music that attracts a wide public to the world of classical

music…I thought of the three witches in Macbeth for some of the women‘s

choruses...the seductiveness of power. And I don‘t know that it‘s what Jenkins

had in mind but I deduced that there is logic in moving from a medieval text to

the Middle East. I thought of the Crusades.116

It is interesting to note that Nixon makes reference to the presence of an

unstated, but inferred, conflict between the cultures of East and West. As mentioned

in previous chapters, Jenkins‘ borrowed use of the music and text from the L‘homme

Armé tradition, juxtaposed against the Islamic ‗Call to Prayer,‘ places two world

religious cultures (Christian and Muslim) in direct conflict with one another.

115

―Moving Music Transcends Horrors Of War‖ Hobart Mercury (Australia), 11/10/05. 116 ―Church Hears ‗Noise‘ Of Armed Man From Britain‖ The Vancouver Sun (British Columbia),

11/27/04.


113

Therefore, it can be suggested that Nixon‘s conclusion is consistent with earlier

presuppositions on the nature of religious and physical conflict provided in discussions

found in the Introduction, Chapter One, and Chapter Two of this paper.

The United States premiere of TAM coincided with a memorial service

marking the event in US history that took place on 11 September 2001, when two

airplanes crashed into the World Trade Center complex in New York City, while

another followed a similar course crashing into the Pentagon in Washington, D.C.,

killing thousands of people in their wake. Musical director, Michael Kamenski of the

Menomonee Falls Symphony Orchestra, writes of TAM and the timeliness of the US

premiere on 11 September 2006: ―People are trying to find meaningful ways to pay

tribute to and respect the events that happened on September 11…this is a full hour

involving the drama of music and the power of words.‖117

In addition to providing reconciliation and offering a salve to wounds, TAM

has been programmed unilaterally in an attempt to foster peace, unity, and to manifest

good will and brotherhood among volatile nations and their warring people groups.

To this end, one of the most interesting premieres of the work took place in March of

2008 in Cape Town, South Africa where Karl Jenkins, himself, was present to conduct

the work. As part of a multi-national movement for peace, the work was presented in

South Africa by British singers using local instrumentalists. The following report

recounts the significance of this particular premiere event:

117 ―Storms Of War, Prayer For Peace: Orchestra, Chorus To Present Concert Mass At Cathedral‖ The

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 09/11/06.


114

The Cape Town performance in March, led by the Salisbury Community

Choir, formed part of an historic collaboration with South African musicians.

The Mass was the centrepiece of a ‗Rainbow Nation‘ programme at City Hall

for Freedom Day, benefiting the Desmond Tutu Peace Centre and joining

hands with Cape Town communities in a great celebration of choral music.118

The Armed Man, and the War Requiem, before it have both served

communities previously broken by warring factions as a beacon of light, bearing the

message of peace unto an environment that had previously been void of that

possibility. TAM, in the South African setting, served the Desmond Tutu Peace Centre

as part of an international celebration for peace, while WR, in England, served the

religious community of Coventry as the centerpiece for the rededication of their

Cathedral and later, a much wider audience through the establishment of the

International Centre for Peace.

The ability of TAM to impact its listening audience has been further enhanced

by the recent availability of an accompanying film. OPUS TF, a Welsh-based

documentary film maker, has produced and made available for hire a full-length silent

film designed to be used in conjunction with a live performance of TAM. Among the

first ensembles and nations to take advantage of this new resource was a choir from

Cork, Ireland, the West Cork Choral Singers under the direction of Diana Llewellyn (3

November 2007). Critics present at the premiere event wrote of the concert

experience, the use of the corresponding film, and the relevance of the work to areas

of present-day suffering throughout the world:

118 ―Jenkins‘ Mass for Peace Performed in South Africa‖ http://www.boosey.com/cr/news/Jenkins-

Mass-for-Peace-performed-in-South-Africa/11429&LangID=1, <Accessed: 15 July 2008>.


115

The images were suitably powerful. The head of Amnesty in Ireland, Sean

Love, introduced the concert and talked about the abuses in Darfur and we

dedicated the performance to the victims of Darfur. The concert was a

considerable success. All the tickets were sold. Many in the audience were

moved to tears and responded as one body at the end of the performance

with a standing ovation. Dare we hope that this could provide one small

intervention in the impetus for peace worldwide.119

Again, the critical response that the ―audience was moved to tears and the hope that

TAM could be part of an impetus for peace worldwide‖ suggests that the Royal

Armouries‘ intention for TAM and Jenkins‘ realization of that intention is successful.

As evidenced above, TAM‘s musical critics hold the work in high regard,

esteeming the piece among the greatest ranks of both contemporary and elder choral

works of its relative size and weight. In the examination of WR, it comes as no

surprise that the work holds a similar degree of respect and influence amongst its own

music critics.

WAR REQUIEM:

Before the sounding of the first notes of its premiere, WR overwhelmed and

inspired its audiences by the sheer power and thrust of the musical/textual packaging

Britten created within this momentous work. One of the most fascinating critiques

was offered by William Mann, a music critic of The Times (London), who, five days

before the piece was given its premiere performance, wrote of his impressions of the

yet unheard work, based on the musical score alone, in an article entitled, ‗Britten‘s

Masterpiece Denounces War‘:

It is not a Requiem to console the living; sometimes it does not even help the

dead to sleep soundly. It can only disturb every living soul, for it denounces

119 Author‘s Correspondence with Hefin Owen (15 November 2007).


116

the barbarism more or less awake in mankind with all the authority that a

great composer can muster. There is no doubt at all, even before next

Wednesday‘s performance, that it is Britten‘s masterpiece.120

Despite the criticisms brought upon him by his premature report of Britten‘s

yet-unheard masterpiece, Mann‘s judgment was immediately redeemed following the

work‘s premiere on 30 May 1962. Peter Shaffer, music critic for Time & Tide, penned

the following statement just a week after the opening performance, sustaining Mann‘s

defense of the genius of Britten‘s work:

I believe it to be the most impressive and moving piece of sacred music ever

to be composed in this country, and one of the greatest musical compositions

of the 20th

century…I am at a loss to know how to praise the greatness of this

piece of music…the climax of this War Requiem is the most profound and

moving thing which this most committed of geniuses has so far achieved. It

makes criticism impertinent…Here the glorifying in technical skill is a sign

of spiritual fulfillment in a brilliant artist.121

Here again, the critical response recognizes not only technical virtuosity but, more

significantly, the use of that virtuosity in service of a spiritual message.

The profundity of Britten‘s so-called ‗masterpiece‘, like TAM decades later,

challenged the listener to reconsider the horrors of war. However, while arguably a

moving work in both form and content, WR‘s ability to impact an audience to stand

against armed conflict by evoking a change in future behavior is not easily

quantifiable:

One might almost think that so beautiful and emotionally powerful a piece of

music, built on poems of like beauty and power, would lead hearers to become

emissaries for a society free of war. Of course, many thousands have heard the

120 Michael Kennedy, The Master Musicians: Britten (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001), 74. 121 Mervyn Cooke, Britten: War Requiem (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), 79.


117

War Requiem either in concert or from recordings, and that has not

happened.122

Herein lies the problem with subjective criticism for any work, regardless of

size or scope. It can be fairly easily argued that WR makes a great impact upon those

who have heard it. However, it cannot be easily proven that those present in the

audience leave said performances being changed, or for that matter even altered in the

slightest way with regards to taking a public stand against war and armed conflict as a

result.

On the other hand, defending the position that the work has had a lasting

impact and possesses a significant influence upon its hearers, English scholar Janis P.

Scott synthesized the thoughts of musicologist David B. Greene and art historian

James Herbert:

In any event, the emotions expressed and evoked (in the listener) through both

words and music—as well as through the visual dramatization of the work‘s

staging, especially in its premiere performance at Coventry Cathedral—are so

strong and clear that their intention is unmistakable. The WR becomes a

clearly pacifist work lamenting the cruelties of war and offering a hopeful

vision of redemption.123

Scott argues that WR‘s apparent power, lasting impression, and successful fulfillment

of artistic intention is felt upon and understood by its premiere audience and is

therefore successful in evoking change in the listener.

In desiring an additional alternate vantage point of the many criticisms of the

War Requiem available for consideration, some of the most profitable come from

122

Janis P. Stout, Coming Out of War: Poetry, Grieving, and the Culture of the World Wars

(Tuscaloosa, The University of Alabama Press, 2005), 218. 123 Ibid, 213.


118

those gleaned from the perspective of the performers themselves. Musicologist

Michael Kennedy relates the following:

No one who was in Coventry Cathedral on the evening of 30 May will ever

forget the emotional effect of the first performance. At the end of the

performance, Fischer-Dieskau was so upset that Pears had difficulty

persuading him to leave the choirstalls. ‗I was completely undone,‘ the

baritone wrote in his memoirs Echoes of a Lifetime (English edition 1989), ‗I

did not know where to hide my face. Dead friends and past suffering arose in

my mind.‘124

Additionally, late criticism or that provided by subsequent generations

following a work‘s premiere, give the researcher a uniquely distanced, but equally

useful perspective into the lasting impact of a piece. The following critique, offered

by the late choral conducting legend Robert Shaw, denotes the longevity and ageless

impact of Britten‘s WR:

When the histories of this troubled century are written in ages to come, there is

reason for confidence and hope that the WR will be ranked among its finest

treasures, an unparalleled expression of artistic outrage and cathartic

reconciliation. Juxtaposing two disparate literary sources and building on

musical precedents set by many previous composers...Vaughan Williams

(DNP), Britten achieved a synthesis at once convincing, disturbing, personal

and universal.125

At the center of Shaw‘s tribute, he argues that for a work to endure, it must be

reflective of the time period in which it was written; in the case of WR and the other

two choral works, that contemporary context was that of war-time. Of the works

examined thus far, each reflects its contemporary culture as a proverbial ‗sign of the

times‘. Therefore, it can be concluded that one of the main qualifications a work must

124

Kennedy, 74-76. 125 ―Britten, War Requiem, Op. 66‖ (Text by Robert Shaw-taken from liner notes), CD-80157, Telarc

Digital, 1989.


119

possess to withstand a greater ‗test of time‘ is that of relevance, not only in a

contemporary context, but also in the time periods to come. Music criticism, in

premiere as well as hindsight contexts, provides the researcher with vantage points

into the past while simultaneously relating to the future. Shaw defended the need for

multivalent criticism when he connected WR‘s lineage to the earlier Vaughan

Williams work, DNP.

DONA NOBIS PACEM:

A contextual discussion involving the music of Vaughan Williams must take

into account the nationalistic fervor that the man and his music both encountered and

reflected. Alain Frogley, writes of the necessity of considering Vaughan Williams in a

nationalistic context when examining his work in the various mediums of music

criticism available:

…If scholars of Western music decide to devote sustained attention to the

cultural politics of nationalism and imperialism, they will need to give close

consideration to the British scene around the turn of the century: here is a case-

history of music situated at an unusually crucial position in the ideological

fault-lines of an imperial power par excellence. The composer nearest to the

epicenter was and is Ralph Vaughan Williams. I believe that the reception of

Vaughan Williams‘ music has been blighted by broader cultural forces, in

particular by tensions in the national self-image, and that an understanding of

these is essential if we are to achieve a more accurate assessment of his overall

achievement, and a less prejudiced response to this music.126

Frogley argues that for one to properly understand Vaughan Williams‘

compositional output, one must place him within an appropriate cultural context. That

culture is the early to mid-Twentieth Century, imperialistic, nationalistic, British

Musical Renaissance, war-time context. Vaughan Williams‘ DNP, and both Britten‘s

126 Alain Frogley, ed., Vaughan Williams Studies (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), 4.


120

and Jenkins‘ anti-war works that came after his, accurately reflect the time period in

which they were written. Musicologist James Day explicates the impact that culture

had upon RVW‘s composition of Dona Nobis Pacem:

The premiere of DNP on 2 October…This work was no rumbustious

celebratory paean. It was composed under the growing shadow of the Second

World War. Vaughan Williams was issuing an unmistakable warning here,

based on personal experience in the trenches, as well as expressing the hope

that conflict could be averted and the blessings of peace enjoyed. This was

music with a message. ‗All that a poet can do is warn‘, to quote Wilfred

Owen.127

Musicologist Frank Howes further maintains the position that Vaughan

Williams accurately portrayed the culture and context of his time in this music:

The immediate impression that it made was that, more than most works of art,

it was a tract for the times. Vaughan Williams‘s artistic creed has always been

that a composer must not live a life apart, that he must ‗cultivate a sense of

musical citizenship‘, that he must not ‗shut himself up and think about art, he

must live with his fellows and make his art an expression of the whole life of

the community‘. The distracted political life of the nineteen-thirties and its

overshadowing fear of universal war are not here being used as a quarry for

matter subsequently to be turned into art by recollection in tranquility; rather it

called for a pamphlet from a composer who is aware of the claims of his

citizenship.128

Day‘s and Howes‘ observations are critical if one is to fully understand the

impact of the newly proposed sub-genre. Each of the three works devote themselves

to challenging, through their message and music, the generations that came before as

well as those that would come after: to evoke change, while remaining culturally

relevant throughout the whole transformative process.

127

James Day, Vaughan Williams (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998), 138. 128 Frank Howes, The Music of Ralph Vaughan Williams (London: Oxford University Press, 1954), 165-

166.


121

Day‘s citation of Wilfred Owen links DNP to Britten‘s War Requiem.

Vaughan Williams‘ work, like both WR and TAM that would come later, exemplifies

the composer‘s ability to bring together both music and message into a solitary

cohesive unit. DNP is an occasional oratorio and the central message of the work is

man‘s struggle to find peace and reconciliation in a world apparently void of both.129

Vaughan Williams biographer, A.E.F. Dickinson expands on the cultural

context that bore occasion for DNP:

DNP is occasional in a deeper sense. It springs from a determination, roused

by the menace of resurgent nationalism, once more to drive home the iniquities

and tragedies of war, the permanent qualities of a reconciled world, the need to

put them in the forefront of human endeavor, and first and last, the strong

imitations of an immanent will, that a new earth must be created in this

generation. The way to this dynamic and Christian conception of peace is

sought by a certain sublimation of wartime impulses and reflections, each

epitomized in a short movement, for horror and desperate need are not

enough.130

Critics and researchers alike have wondered why a work as powerful and

moving as DNP did not immediately receive such public favor as did the later two

choral works. At the time of its premiere, DNP was without equal, ―precursing the

War Requiem and as powerful as anything in the (Britten),‖ (though over time, DNP

fell into a period of performance obscurity).131

Music performer/scholar A.V. Butcher

shares his personal experience of an early London performance of the work, in the

same venue that would later premiere TAM, Royal Albert Hall:

129 An occasional oratorio is a large-scale, non-dramatized, choral work with an orchestral

accompaniment, written for a specific occasion. In the case of DNP, that occasion was two-fold: first, it was commissioned for the centenary of the Huddersfield Choral Society; second, and perhaps most

importantly, the work was written as a response by the composer to the wake left by the First World

War. 130 A.E.F. Dickinson, Vaughan Williams (London: Faber and Faber, Ltd., 1963), 231. 131 http://www.kith.org/jimmosk/schwartzV.html <Accessed: 03/17/08>, (Parenthesis mine).


122

Dona Nobis Pacem was regarded as a sort of occasional oratorio, written, it

would appear, because of the troubled state of Europe in the middle nineteen-

thirties. When the Royal Choral Society performed it at the Albert Hall under

Dr. Malcolm Sargent, I did not sing in the choir. I used my complimentary

ticket myself; very improper, I know, but I particularly wanted to hear this

work, for I knew that there would not be many opportunities of hearing it. But

why? ‗Give peace in our time, O Lord‘ is a daily intercession in our cathedrals

and a weekly one in our parish churches. It is not suitable only for troubled

times and times of war. Surely it does not take a Hitler to get such a work

performed?132

Some critics have argued that DNP is only propaganda. I suggest that

Vaughan Williams was, in fact, trying to convince listeners of something important

and transported that message through the vehicle of his music. Musicologist Simona

Pakenham confirms this perspective:

The DNP is a passionate appeal for peace in which art and propaganda struggle

for supremacy with somewhat confusing effect. DNP is a bewildering work.

It is propaganda without a doubt; VW was here preoccupied with something

momentarily more vital to him even than music, and he drives at us with the

fervour of a nonconformist preacher. VW‘s message, melting and fusing in its

passionate heat all the diverse elements that went to the music‘s construction,

comes over with remarkable force.133

Whether DNP is or has been considered as propagandistic is not so much the main

issue here, the key insight is that audiences heard and understood a message. That

message may not have been one that many were ready or interested to hear in the

charged period between the World Wars, but regardless, the work stands on its own

merit as one of the first installations in the newly-proposed sub-genre.

132 A.V. Butcher, ―Walt Whitman and the English Composer‖, Music and Letters, 28:2 (Apr., 1947),

154. 133 Simona Pakenham, Ralph Vaughan Williams: A Discovery of His Music (London: MacMillan and

Co., Ltd., 1957), 105-106.


123


The critical reception, though somewhat varied, points in several directions

that can help to better explain these pieces and their relationship to one another. One

of the more musically interesting connections that emerges is the acknowledgment

among several scholars that these pieces represent new compositional directions for

the composers involved—a re-evaluation, not just of musical style but of political

stance as well. Additionally, critical reception reveals that the socio-political genesis

of the respective works has also been recognized, linking these works, both musically

and in message.

Embodied within the melodies, strains, chords and texts that make up DNP,

Vaughan Williams synthesized his own musical style into a new cohesive whole.

Echoing the times, as an anti-war voice, while simultaneously forging new paths as a

self-proclaimed champion of musically-expressed British nationalism, Vaughan

Williams‘ music underwent a form of quasi-regeneration in DNP. Vaughan Williams

scholar, Simon Heffer, comments on this regenerative phenomenon found in the

composers‘ musical output:

In the years leading up to the war, this fact (that his music was now truly

‗ultimately national‘) would seem to have been underlined by the frequency

with which festivals and concert arrangers programmed DNP, often with the

composer conducting: he had caught, with unerring accuracy, the mood of the

times, and it had given his music a new lease of life.134

Britten and Jenkins likewise experienced a synthesis of their own musical

styles in the composition of WR and TAM, respectively. Each of these two pieces

134 Simon Heffer, Vaughn Williams (Boston: Northeastern University Press, 2000), 92-93.


124

hearkens back to an earlier period of compositional output, borrowing stylistic

concepts from their previous works. However, neither composer had ever created

anything previously as profound or large-scale as was conceived in their anti-war

works. It would appear then, that Vaughan Williams established the foundational

criteria, setting the standard for British composers creating anti-war works, and that

Britten and Jenkins followed suit. Hence, I suggest creating a new classification of

large-scale, British choral music of the Twentieth Century with an anti-war message.

Musicologist Oliver Neighbor relates the third movement of Vaughan

Williams‘ work to the later Britten masterpiece, referencing Britten‘s favor for the

other composer‘s work in the same tradition:

In ‗Reconciliation‘, the third movement of DNP, Whitman‘s poem anticipates

the theme of Wilfred Owen‘s ‗Strange Meeting‘ which Britten included in his

WR just before the ‗In paradisum‘. Britten had always disliked Vaughan

Williams‘s music, but when the older composer died he wrote movingly of

their shared beliefs (Kennedy, Works, p. 346). That the ‗In paradisum‘ may be

felt, perhaps uniquely in Britten‘s mature music, to carry the suggestion of

Vaughan Williams about it may be due to one of those (often short-lived)

reconciliations that death is apt to induce in the mind of the survivor.135

Therefore, all three works share a similar genesis. Each work comes out of the

tradition begun by Vaughan Williams of composing large-scale choral works with an

anti-war bent. Each work shares a kindred spirit with the others as a reaction to the

time period in which it was conceived. Each work generated a frenzy of critical

musical excitement from representatives of the local media, most especially the local

newspapers and radio stations, where the works were praised in print and highlighted

in radio broadcasts. Britten scholar, Mervyn Cooke, using WR as a point of departure,

135 Frogley, 221.


125

elucidated this point perhaps the most clearly, when he remarked that a larger

tradition, such as the one that constitutes the newly-proposed sub-genre, owes a great

deal to its predecessors, as well as to those works that would follow after it in the

years to come:

Because of the extraordinary reception of the work in 1961, it has often been

overlooked or at least underestimated how much WR owed to those works that

in effect constitute the work‘s ancestry, a creative history that was to continue

as innovatively and vigorously as ever, long after WR was done.136

The overwhelming presence of consistent patterns in the realm of the musical

criticism of these works by their premiere audiences and subsequent scholarly

investigation shows the continuation of the creative history that Cooke suggests. This

continuation then, provides the author and reader with a solid justification for the

establishment of a new sub-genre: that of large-scale, British, sacred, choral works,

written in the Twentieth Century, with an anti-war message.

136 Mervyn Cooke, ed., The Cambridge Companion to Benjamin Britten (Cambridge: Cambridge

University Press, 1999), 206.


126

CONCLUSION

Music‘s renewed interest in its own past…was the revival of the concept of

composition as a continuing criticism. While its origins are in the origins of

polyphony itself, a moment of extraordinary vitality is observable in the

Renaissance, when the best composers acknowledged that their art was

premised on cultural memory and a shared system of artistic and intellectual

conventions. Authority was to be found in tradition and the development of an

inexhaustible memory; originality was discoverable through ‗imitatio‘ and

‗emulatio‘, through a critique that involved not only homage but the struggle to

surpass a venerable model.137

Watkins‘ thoughts summarize, to an extent, the major thrust of this paper. The

argument that present-day music can be understood as derived from a previous model

in the music of the past, suggests that comparing works contemporaneous to one

another can yield new insights.

In working with the various cultural, musical, textual, iconographical, and

critical contexts surrounding the composition of the three major works in this paper,

Dona Nobis Pacem by Ralph Vaughan Williams, War Requiem by Benjamin Britten,

and The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace by Karl Jenkins, I have come to the

conclusion that the recognition of a new sub-genre of large-scale, sacred, British,

choral works of the Twentieth Century with an anti-war message is now necessary.

While all three works are individually important, together they appear to form

a greater corpus of compositions stemming from the British Musical Renaissance of

the early Twentieth Century. All three composers were products of this modern

Renaissance, having studied at British music institutions that espoused similar

teachings—those of British Nationalism, and the mimicry of former models of

137 Glenn Watkins, Soundings: Music in the Twentieth Century (New York: Schirmer Books, 1995),

656.


127

composition and thought that formed the foundation of a new and uniquely British

musical tradition.

The foundation for this new sub-genre begins with Ralph Vaughan Williams.

Ursula Vaughan Williams, in addressing the Royal Musical Association in 1972-73,

spoke of RVW‘s educational background and the subsequent evolution of his musical

style that later brought forth DNP:

I think it goes back to his early familiarity with the Scriptures, his lifelong

pleasure in Gothic architecture and his love for early English music. All these

are valid articles of faith. If the modern versions of Bible and Prayer Book had

been what he was nurtured on I think that he would have gone elsewhere for

words. I think it was the historian in Ralph (for that was the subject in

which he took his degree at Cambridge, and which remained a strong and

shaping factor in his life) who gave to the soprano soloist the last and

desperate cry of 'Dona nobis pacem' with which the work ends.138

Vaughan Williams, like both Britten and Jenkins, reflected this cultural upbringing,

the result being that the past shaped his music.

It is interesting, however, to note that while both Britten and Jenkins claimed

to have followed their own purposes and direction in composition, both composers

would most certainly have been aware of the musical tradition that was shaped by

Vaughan Williams through their educational upbringing and place in the greater line

of British musical history. To that end, Watkins comments further on the inescapable

knowledge of the lineage of tradition that (today‘s) Twentieth-Century composers

(Britten and Jenkins) possess:

(Today‘s) composer has exhibited knowledge of the music of the past and

present without parallel in the history of art, and at the same time has

138 Ursula Vaughan Williams, ―Ralph Vaughan Williams and His Choice of Words for Music‖

Proceedings of the Royal Musical Association, 99, (1972-73): 85-86.


128

demonstrated the potential for renewal through such awareness. The

composer‘s unusual willingness to discuss his aims is undoubtedly indicative

of his awareness of the potential for misunderstanding.139

In considering the genesis of its origin, through its flourishing in the works of

these three composers, my research has examined three major subject areas: musical

and textual, iconographical, and music performance criticism. In the subsequent

analysis, I discovered that a historical thread did in fact exist, which supported by

respective musical, textual, and iconographical qualities related to their cultural

periods gave rise to a contextual ―zeitgeist.‖ This zeitgeist then influenced newer and

more contemporaneous works of art. The Twentieth-Century, British, large-scale,

sacred choral, anti-war genesis that was once begun by Vaughan Williams continued

to manifest itself through the works of Britten and Jenkins and can be seen to greater

or lesser degrees in the works of other composers. Although their place within this

newly-established sub-genre will have to be determined by future scholarship, other

works that may be worth considering include but are certainly not limited to: African

Sanctus by David Fanshawe, Sancta Civitatis by Benjamin Britten, and Hymnus

Paradisi by Herbert Howells.

In the above list of works, and in the case of the African Sanctus and Britten‘s

and Jenkins‘ compositions in particular, one discovers the emergence of a relatively

new movement in British, Twentieth-Century, choral composition. This new trend in

composition appears to model an eclecticism in which composers are moving towards

a greater blending of styles drawn from a large range of subject and musical material,

139 Watkins, 655.


129

especially in their borrowing from a sacred framework and in the incorporation of

sources from world music. The end result is the creation of a more synthesized, or

even syncretic, direction in British choral music. However, as this movement appears

to be still in its initial stages, scholars are not in complete agreement as to the final

direction and end product yet to be achieved:

Where are the new frontiers? Who is there? What is being composed and what

is it like? The questions were asked yesterday and will be restated tomorrow,

and by the time the answers come conditions will already have changed. Even

a brief search for contemporary interest in recurrent trends of the past quickly

proves the elusiveness of fixing the present.140

While the choral works considered in this paper are clearly products of

different decades, composers have been borrowing the sacred structure by combining

it with secular musical messages for propagandistic ends for quite some time. With

respect to the evidence of musical and structural borrowing and its subsequent

manipulation for propagandistic purposes found in the works of Twentieth-Century

composers and their currently yet unnamed classification in modern musicological

research, Watkins offers the following explanation:

‗Post-Avant-Garde‘ or ‗Post-Modern‘ may be important indicators that many

composers are currently less interested in insistently probing frontiers that

appear to point to some unknown, unconceivable and perhaps glorious future

than in surveying and synthesizing the vast sonic terrain of human cultures past

and present.141

Patterns recognized throughout these works link them to a specific and unique

musical aesthetic born out of a Twentieth-Century British Musical Renaissance

―zeitgeist‖; one that is dependent upon social change affected through cultural means.

140 Ibid, 683. 141 Ibid, 688.


130

Consequently, all three works are both prescriptive and cathartic, showing through

their respective syntheses of musical styles and subject matter that in spite of the

history of conflict apparently inherent to the human condition, humanity may yet

achieve a state of lasting peace.

By providing three major content areas of analysis (structural, iconographical,

and critical) in the internal chapters of this paper, it can be now be shown that Jenkins‘

TAM need not stand alone at the end of the Twentieth Century, but, rather, takes its

place at the end of a long musical tradition of British composers, beginning with

Vaughan Williams, searching for a way to give expression to the horror and anxiety

experienced in the mid- and post-World Wars period:

If the Futurists‘ glorification of speed and the machine can be seen as a natural

reflection of man‘s technological prowess but also of his periodic compulsion

to make war, it must not be concluded that the capacity of music to aspire to

man‘s nobler instincts (the quest for peace) remained dormant during the

period between the end of World War I and the renewal of global combat in

the 1940s. By turns the composer sought to express man‘s alarm and outrage

at the carnal ravage of international conflict and to turn to the Scriptures as

well as to the contemporary poets as a source of spiritual sustenance. At

various junctures throughout the twentieth century, man‘s search for spiritual

values has surfaced in…the Mass.142

Chapter One of this paper began with an examination of the commissioning

body behind TAM, The Royal Armouries, leading into a discussion of the process by

which The Royal Armouries came to select the program behind and the body‘s

ultimate commissioning of TAM and its selection of Karl Jenkins as the composer for

the project. From there, this paper provided a discussion and dissection of TAM in the

142 Ibid, 464, (Parenthesis mine).


131

form of a movement-by-movement narrative analysis of its music and texts, which to

my knowledge, is the first of its kind.

The need for an in-depth analysis of TAM stems largely from my own desire to

frame the contemporary work within the larger context of the twentieth-century British

Musical Renaissance, which to this point in the history books ends largely with

Britten‘s contribution to that movement. Thus, through the exposition of relative

background evidence surrounding the creation of TAM including: the raison d‘être of

the Royal Armouries, overview of the eclectic style of the composer Karl Jenkins, and

movement-by-movement narrative of the entire work, one develops a holistic grasp of

its context. Each of these generative aspects when considered together, further relates

these ideas back to the war-torn Twentieth Century and to the British Musical

Renaissance: the ultimate context in which TAM and its predecessors are to be

understood.

Chapter Two examined recurrent patterns found in the major structural,

textual, and musical characteristics of each work. Beginning with an analysis of TAM

and following with a look at analogous characteristics present in WR and DNP, a

hitherto unexplored tripartite thematic structure is revealed that links all three works

together; the organization of which seems to pervade all three works both musically

and textually. This organization, as it is based on the sacred framework of the

Catholic Mass, seems to reveal an even greater tripartite organization: an archetype of

the Christian Trinity, which may help to link more pieces into this sub-genre.


132

Chapter Three examined recurrent patterns found in the available iconography

related to these three choral works. Iconography, as a multi-layered study of the

meaning of images/icons as they relate to their given contexts, offers the researcher a

new perspective into the cultural ‗zeitgeist‘ influencing the creation of a work. This

comparative analysis thus provides enhanced contextual insight into the legitimacy of

recognizing these works within a newly established sub-genre.

Additionally, the analysis of the film accompanying TAM shows the tripartite

(Trinitarian) structure at work again, in the narration of the three-fold progression of

war: preparations, actions and consequences, and the eventual secession of war with

the peace that follows. Since an overview of the film does not currently exist, chapter

three of this paper offers an initial look into the project in the form of a movement-

selective discussion summation of the contents of the film.

Chapter Four considers recurrent patterns found amongst primary and

secondary sources of critical reception for each of the three works. Since music is not

created within a vacuum, the criticisms supplied by scholars and performers provides a

better-defined perspective on their originating contexts, making the music highly

indicative of ‗the sign of the times‘. Therefore, the examination of recurrent patterns

in critical reception, when considered contextually on a work-to-work basis, link the

individual works to their greater cultural context and to one another.

The main thrust of this study was to conduct comparative formal, textual, and

structural, iconographical, and critical analyses of recurrent musical patterns found

throughout selected sections to determine individually each work‘s main cultural,


133

historical, political, religious content and to argue for the placement of said works

collectively into a larger context. Therefore, while this project provides the interested

reader with selected formal analyses of The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace, War

Requiem, and Dona Nobis Pacem, it is my ultimate hope that my work will make

available, for future scholars working in this selected field of musicology and in

related cross-discipline research pursuits, a new sub-genre of classification for better

understanding the various catholic, universal, textual, musical, iconographical, and

critical elements at play within such works.

A final consideration is that though this collection of works, by these

Twentieth-Century British composers, should constitute a new sub-genre, this new

canon lays claim to a more universal phenomenon identifying a group of

musician/composers who worked a prescriptive for change into their music. Through

their ease of accessibility to a wealth of influence found in and through contemporary

culture, as well as that which can be gleaned from cultures past, they drew upon their

own understanding and reactions to the dramatic changes brought about in their own

time periods through the devastation wrought by war. Therefore, this new sub-genre

might not simply need to be a classification by which one sets a select group of

Twentieth-Century composers and their musical output into place, but rather

establishes a new framework for scholars wishing to explore similar trends in other

cultures and time periods, past, present, and future; a trend that might be useful in

interpreting music‘s message and melody as a greater ‗sign of those times‘.


134


A final take away point, then, is that music acts as a cultural mirror in these

works, looking upon war and prescribing the need for an accompanying change, which

may yield a momentary, if not longer-lasting peace. Jenkins‘ final musical setting in

TAM is taken from Malory and the Holy Bible, where he offers, to those who would

listen, a sense of closure through a prayer for peace:

Better is peace than always war,

And better is peace than evermore war…

God shall wipe away all tears

And there shall be no more death,

Neither sorrow nor crying,

Neither shall there be anymore pain.

Praise the LORD!143

143

Karl Jenkins, The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace, Complete Vocal Score (Boosey and Hawkes

Music Publishers, Ltd., 2003), 92, 120-1.


135

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APPENDIX

PROGRAM NOTES

(WRITTEN FOR THE LUBBOCK CHORALE‘S FALL 2006

PERFORMANCE OF: THE ARMED MAN: A MASS FOR PEACE)

The Armed Man: A Mass For Peace

By: Karl Jenkins

The Armed Man was commissioned by the Britain‘s Royal Armouries to mark the

passing of the millennium, ―the most war-torn and destructive century in human

history‖ (Guy Wilson-Master of the Royal Armouries 2000).

The work, which was dedicated to the war-torn victims of the Kosovo conflict that

raged during the turn of the last century, is meant to ask each of us to consider the far-

reaching effects of war upon all ages, those now, those past, and those yet to come.

The Mass was commissioned to be educational in nature. It is the hope of both the

composer and the Royal Armouries that the texts, score, and images accompanying the

performance of this work will lead the concert-goer to reconsider the ramifications of

loss, horror, and pain resulting from the eternal struggle (since the beginning of time

until now) between two factions, those declaring war and those desiring peace.

War affects each and every one of us from all walks of life, from all races, genders,

nationalities, and religions. Therefore, The Armed Man borrows texts from all the

world‘s major religions and sets them musically within the framework of the Christian

Mass. By juxtaposing these texts within the score, the work creates a single unifying

character that crosses barriers and unites all mankind in its struggle between war and

peace: the universal struggle by which the impact of our choices can ultimately end in

peace.

Since its premiere at Britain‘s Royal Albert Hall, London on 25 April 2000, the work

has become a standard in the UK‘s classical music repertoire as one of the top ten

most requested pieces on Classical FM; a position that The Armed Man has held now

for over 265 weeks!

I. The Armed Man

The L‘homme Armé, from which the first movement and this entire work takes its

name comes from a tune/text written c. 1450-1463. The original L‘homme Armé

became the basis for composer writing large-scale Masses throughout the Renaissance

period and beyond. As a result, this catchy tune became a tour de force for composers

working throughout the ages. As a compositional rite of passage, composers like

Ockeghem, Josquin, Busnois, Tinctoris, Obrecht, and Palestrina to name a few, each


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wrote masses using the L‘homme Armé either as complements to each other, thus

carrying on the tradition, or as a challenge to the next composer who may attempt a

similar feat. By the end of the 16th century, nearly thirty complete cycles of the

Christian Mass had been composed by setting this tune/text as the basis for those

works.

While the origin of the text/tune is still under investigation, musicologists and

historians have been able to trace back early appearances of the tune to the Court of

Charles the Bold of Burgundy at around the middle of the 15th century. Whether the

work was commissioned by Charles the Bold to promote a crusade to try and reclaim

fallen Constantinople from the Ottoman Turks, or was simply the name of a popular

nearby tavern, that we do not know for sure. One thing is for certain though, the text,

―the armed man must be feared... each man must arm themselves with an iron coat of

mail‖ still speaks to us today as we are charged to be aware of the inherent ravages of

war and to take the necessary preparations mankind must make to be ready for the

need to defend against anything that may arise to threaten our existence. This opening

movement takes on a militaristic treatment of the Renaissance tune complete with

trumpets and field drums signifying the approaching threat of war.

L’homme, l’homme, l’homme armé, l’homme armé, L’homme armé doit on douter, doit on doubter? On a fait par tout crier, que chacun se viegne armer

d’un haubregon de fer. L’homme, l’homme, l’homme armé, l’homme armé, L’homme armé doit on douter, doit on douter?

The man, the man, the armed man, the armed man, The armed man should be feared, should be feared? Everywhere it has been proclaimed that each man should arm

themselves with a iron coat of mail. The man, the man, the armed man, the armed man,

The armed man should be feared, should be feared? II. Call to Prayers (Adhaan)

The origin of the Adhaan or Call to Prayers comes to us from the Islamic Qur‘an

(Fussilat 041:033) wherein ―The Muadhin‖ is charged and blessed to call God‘s

people to prayer. The Adhaan is performed several times a day, with each instance

taking place facing the Qiblah; or the direction of Ka‘bah at Mecca. In giving the Call

to Prayers, ―The Muadhin‖ raises both his hands to his ears and calls out in a loud

voice. The significance of the Adhaan is so central to the Islamic faith that even the

Iraqi and Iranian flags carry this text in their centers.


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Allahu Akbar Allahu Akbar Allah: God is (the) Great(est)!

Allahu Akbar Allahu Akbar Allah: God is (the) Great(est)! Ashadu An La Illa-L-Lah

Ahsadu An La Illa-L-Lah I (testify) bear witness that there is no god but the One God! Ashadu Anna Muhammadan Rasulu-l-lah Ashadu Anna Muhammadan Rasulu-l-lah I (testify) bear witness that Muhammad is the Messenger of God!

Hayya Ala-s-salah Hayya Ala-s-salah Come fast to prayer (face right) Hayya Ala-l-Falah

Hayya Ala-l-Falah Come fast to success (face left) Allahu Akbar Allahu Akbar Allah: God is (the) Great(est)!

La Illaha il la-lah There is no god but the One and true God! III. Kyrie

The Kyrie is the first installment of the Mass Ordinary wherein the worshipper

humbles himself before the LORD requesting mercy from pending judgment, conflict,

and pain. The composer indicates the marking, ―pietoso‖, symbolizing a need for

penitent supplication, or plea by one who needs to be rescued from the pain and

turmoil at work in the depths of their soul towards a better end result than what

apparently continually haunts them.

The Kyrie movement of a Mass is traditionally performed in three parts. The first part,

or Kyrie, is almost always in triple meter and often contains great lyrical passages and

long phrases. This rendition of the Kyrie does not disappoint.

The second section, or Christe, is almost always contrasting in style and in a duple

meter with a push towards greater movement and energy as the penitent‘s prayer takes


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flight to the One who can intercede on their behalf. For this section, the composer

indicates, ―after Palestrina‖, fitting since Palestrina, himself, also wrote a L‘Homme

Armé Mass on the tune of the same name.

The final section, Kyrie, is a restatement of the opening section‘s Kyrie themes and is

the section that brings this longing movement to a close.

Kyrie eleison. LORD, have mercy. Christe eleison. Christ, have mercy. Kyrie eleison. LORD, have mercy.

IV. Save Me from Bloody Men

This movement is unaccompanied and written in the style of a cappella Gregorian

chant. In accordance to the monastic rite set up by St. Benedict (c. 350), each monk

spent his day broken up into set hours of prayer and devotion wherein chant was to be

incorporated in the recitation of the Psalm texts and in the daily observance of the

Mass. This movement‘s text, from the King James Version of The Bible, is found in

the Book of the Psalms (56:1-2; 59:1b-2) and recounts two Old Testament stories.

The first account, a Mikhtam (Atonement Psalm, or Epigrammatic Poem) of David,

calls for protection and Divine intervention from the LORD when David was seized

by the Philistines while in Gath. The second, also a Mikhtam of David, calls for God‘s

Divine Justice to fall on David‘s enemies when the would-be King David was being

sought out by then King Saul to be brought forth and killed.

Be merciful unto me, O God: For man would swallow me up; He fighting daily oppresseth me. Mine enemies would daily swallow me up: For they be many that fight against me,

O thou most high. Defend me from them that rise up against me. Deliver me from the workers of iniquity, And save me from bloody men.

V. Sanctus

The Sanctus, is traditionally held as the fourth part of the Mass Ordinary, but in the

case of this particular work, the composer omits the second (Gloria) and third (Credo)

parts of the Ordinary. The Sanctus is performed as a hymn of purification and serves

as the worshipper‘s plea for blessing at the point in the Mass directly preceding the

observance of the LORD‘s Supper, recognized by Christians as symbolic of Christ‘s

sacrifice.


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The text of the Sanctus comes from the Old Testament prophet Isaiah‘s vision as

recorded in Chapter 6, verse 3 of the Book of Isaiah. In this experience, Isaiah is

completely transformed by his awareness that God is present in everything, even in

struggles and in insurmountable tasks. Therefore Isaiah elects to give God praise for

both the good and ill times before accepting his call to go forth and serve wherever he

is needed. Even in war, mankind often claims service to God in their pursuits and

conquests. This Sanctus text is underlaid with the similar driving military drum beat

that began the opening movement, echoing the inevitable conflict yet to come.

Sanctus, sanctus, sanctus Holy, holy, holy Dominus Deus Sabaoth. LORD God of hosts. Pleni sunt caeli et Heaven and earth are

terra gloria tua: full of Thy glory: Hosanna in excelsis. Hosanna in the highest. Benedictus qui venit Blessed is He that cometh in nomine Domini: in the name of the LORD: Hosanna in excelsis. Hosanna in the highest.

VI. Hymn Before Action

Rudyard Kipling wrote the text of Hymn Before Action in 1896. This movement takes

the first two of five stanzas and sets it to music. The text calls on God to defend and

to bless the warrior in his time of need. The poet cries out, when the battle lines are

drawn and Nation goes against Nation, may God have mercy on the souls of those

who are willing to die for what they believe. This text, set to music, becomes a battle

hymn. The initial stylistic marking reads, ―Eroico.‖ This is a song for the hero, sung

with gusto, in preparation for the honor and glory that will be gained, either through

life or death, upon the battle field. War is coming... yea, it is already here.

The earth is full of anger, The seas are dark with wrath, The Nations in their harness

Go up against our path: Ere yet we loose the legions – Ere yet we draw the blade, Jehovah of the Thunders, Lord God of Battles, aid!

High lust and froward bearing, Proud heart, rebellious brow – Deaf ear and soul uncaring, We seek Thy mercy now! The sinner that forswore Thee,

The fool that passed Thee by, Our times are known before Thee – Lord, grant us strength to die!


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VII. Charge!

Combining the texts of two poet cousins, John Dryden and Jonathan Swift, this

movement speaks of the intensity leading up to the battle and the point of no return. It

is here that we find the uniforms pressed, the boots polished, the battle formations

ready, swords brandished, and the crusader‘s march toward victory has begun. Very

quickly after which comes the point where each force is committed, and they must

fight to the death. ―Charge!!! ‗tis too late to retreat.‖ The battle has begun!

What follows the battle is the silence of death, wherein each force comes to the full

knowledge and understanding of the effects of the choices each has made. Each side

takes stock of the losses sustained. Forces have fallen upon forces, and a lone trumpet

calls out with The Last Post, (a British Bugle Call), breaking the silence and signifying

the finality of the effects and casualties brought on by war. ―How blest is he who for

his country dies!‖

The trumpet’s loud clangor Excites us to arms With shrill notes of anger And mortal alarms.

The double double beat Of the thund’ring drum Cries, hark the foes come; Charge, charge, ’tis too late to retreat.

John Dryden, 1687, from ―A Song for St. Cecilia‘s Day‖

How blest is he who for his country dies.

Jonathan Swift, 1716, from a loose translation of Book III, Ode II by Horace:

To the Earl of Oxford, Late Lord Treasurer (sent to him while he awaited his

trial in the ―Tower‖ (of London); the same ―Tower‖ which the Royal

Armouries now run as a museum.) VIII. Angry Flames

The text of this movement comes from the collection of poetry written by Togi

Sankichi (1921-1953) entitled, Poems of the Atomic Bomb. Sankichi was a witness

and survivor of the first atomic bomb that was dropped on Hiroshima and died eight

years later from exposure to radiation. The dedication from the collection reads as

follows:


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Dedicated to those whose lives were taken by the atomic bombs dropped

August 6, 1945, on Hiroshima and August 9, 1945, on Nagasaki, to those who

have continued down to the present to be tormented by the terror of death and

by pain, to those who as long as they live have no way of extinguishing their

agony and grief, and finally to those throughout the world who abhor atomic

bombs.

This movement includes the first two of four stanzas of the poem Flames. The poet

would ask us to consider what life must be like on the receiving end of war, especially

in this age and with the technology and science that mankind has harnessed. This is

the depth and degree of destruction that the world is capable of committing.

Pushing up through smoke From a world half-darkened By overhanging cloud---

The shroud that mushroomed out And struck the dome of the sky,

Black, red, blue--- Dance in the air, Merge,

Scatter glittering sparks, Already tower Over the whole city.

Quivering like seaweed, The mass of flames spurts forward.

Popping up in the dense smoke, Crawling out Wreathed in fire: Countless human beings On all fours.

In a heap of embers that erupt and subside, Hair rent, Rigid in death, There smoulders a curse.

IX. Torches

In Section CCXXVIII of the Adi Parva, Khandava-daha Parva, (known as the

Bhagavad-Gita) of the ancient Indian Sanskrit epic, The Mahàbhàrata (c. 6th century

B.C.), a graphic account of one of several battles is told; these battles contained a

slaughter that was so devastating that all other subsequent conflicts on Indian soil pale

in comparison. The composer wishes to convey the message that war is not a new

concept. It is a tragic and reoccurring theme that is as old as time itself. The music


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and text of this movement, set in the style of an Indian story-teller repainting the

ancient account, brings new depth and meaning through the use of graphic imagery to

the far-reaching effects of war upon the world‘s creation. In war, not even nature

itself is safe!

The animals scattered in all directions, Screaming terrible screams. Many were burning, others were burnt.

All were shattered and scattered mindlessly, Their eyes bulging. Some hugged their sons, Others their fathers and mothers,

Unable to let them go, And so they died. Others leapt up in their thousands, Faces disfigured, And were consumed by the fire,

Everywhere were bodies squirming on the ground, Wings eyes and paws all burning. They breathed their last as living torches.

X. Agnus Dei

The Agnus Dei, which is traditionally held as the fifth section of the Christian Mass

Ordinary, serves as a prayer for peace after the observance of Christ‘s sacrifice. The

image presented in the Agnus Dei of the ―Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of

the world,‖ demonstrates that even in death, salvation can come and, with it, bring

peace to all who would receive it. This particular setting of the Agnus Dei serves as a

prayer of lamentation that cries out for peace and reconciliation from the ills of war.

Agnus Dei, Lamb of God, qui tollis peccata mundi, who takes away the sins of the world, miserere nobis. have mercy on us. Agnus Dei, Lamb of God, qui tollis peccata mundi who takes away the sins of the world,

miserere nobis. have mercy on us. Agnus Dei, Lamb of God, qui tollis peccata mundi, who takes away the sins of the world, dona nobis pacem. Grant us peace.


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XI. Now the Guns have Stopped

Guy Wilson, who compiled the texts for The Armed Man and who served as Master of

the Royal Armouries at the time of the commission of this work wrote the text for this

movement. He writes of the feelings and long-lasting effects war has upon its victims:

The feelings of loss and guilt that so many of the survivors of the First World

War felt when they came home but their friends did not... reminds us that the

pain and evil of war does not end when war ends, that survivors carry wounds

for the rest of their lives.

Silent, So silent now, Now the guns have stopped. I have survived all, I, who knew I would not.

But now you are not here. I shall go home alone; And must try to live life as before, And hide my grief For you, my dearest friend, Who should be with me now,

Not cold, too soon, And in your grave, Alone.

XII. Benedictus

This movement sets the text of the Benedictus, a derivative of the account of Christ‘s

celebrated entrance into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday found in the Gospels of Matthew

(21:9), Mark (11:9-10), Luke (19:38), and John (12:13), held traditionally as a prayer

for healing, and whose timely message speaks to the heart of those desiring peace

instead of war. To pray the Benedictus requires that mankind believes and has faith in

peace today, in order to hope for the possibility of a better and more peaceful

tomorrow.

Benedictus qui venit, Blessed is He, in nomine Domini who comes in the name of the LORD.

Hosanna in excelsis. Hosanna in the highest. XIII. Better is Peace

The closing movement of The Armed Man, which is comprised of two major parts,

brings together texts from the L‘Homme Armé, Sir Thomas Malory‘s Le Morte

d‘Arthur, Alfred Lord Tennyson‘s In Memoriam, and The Book of the Revelation from

The Holy Bible.


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In the first part of the final installment, the theme from the L‘homme Armé that opened

the work comes back to vie for position with text demanding peace spoken with

conviction through experience by Guinevere and Lancelot in Le Morte d‘Arthur. The

military drums are traded for a drum and fife dance-like jig, giving us cause for

celebration. Peace can be found through pain and suffering and as a result, we can

―ring out the old and bring in the new‖ as Lord Tennyson writes in his work,

In Memoriam, a work born out of tragedy and written on the occasion of the loss of his

nephew.

In the second and final section of the The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace, the

composer leans on the Book of Revelation from The Bible wherein we can be assured

that ultimately peace will prevail; that there will come a point in time when war is no

more; and that tears, pain, and death will come to an end. The charge, then, is up to

us, and the ultimate message underlying this work can be summed up in these final

words by Guy Wilson:

Do we want the next millennium to be like the last? It may seem like an

impossible dream but change is possible and as the affirmation from

Revelation (tells us)... sorrow, pain, and death can be overcome.

Lancelot - Better is peace than always war Guinevere - And better is peace than evermore war

From Book XIX – Chapter V, Of Meliagrance and the Queen: How Sir

Meliagrance required forgiveness of the queen, and how she appeased Sir

Lancelot, and other matters; and Book XX – Chapter XIX, Of King Arthur and

Gawaine: How King Arthur and Sir Gawaine made a great host ready to go

over sea to make war on Sir Launcelot

L’homme armé, doit on douter, doit on douter. The armed man, should be feared, should be feared.

From L‘homme Armé

Ring out the thousand wars of old. Ring in the thousand years of peace.

Ring out the old, ring in the new, Ring happy bells, across the snow. The year is going, let him go, Ring out the false, ring in the true.


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Ring out old shapes of foul disease. Ring out the narrowing lust of gold; Ring out the thousand years of old,

Ring in the thousand years of peace. Ring in the valiant man and free, The larger heart, the kindler hand. Ring out the darkness of the land, Ring in the Christ that is to be.

The year is going, let him go, Ring out the false, ring in the true.

From Lord Tennyson‘s In Memoriam (begun 1833) Section 106: Stanzas 2,7,8

God shall wipe away all tears And there shall be no more death,

Neither sorrow nor crying, Neither shall there be any more pain. Praise the LORD.

From The Book of the Revelation 21:4, (King James Version of The Holy

Bible)

echoes of war the resonating patterns of influence: an

Documents