An Early Christmas Celebration

Hodie by British composer Ralph Vaughan Williams tells the Christmas story with enlightening poetry interspersed throughout. Brahms’ beautiful “Nanie” (Song of Lamentation) sets a poem by Friedrich von Shiller lamenting “even the beautiful must die,” but affirming the result of a life well-lived that the “beauty” of the departed will live on. J. S. Bach ended his ultimate masterwork, MASS IN B-MINOR, with a profound setting of “Dona nobis pacem” (Give us peace). In our world today, this affirming prayer is needed more than ever. Closing the program is “St. Patrick’s Hymn” a work commissioned by the Chorale from composer Dan Forrest. The text is both a prayer an affirmation that God will “pilot us” through difficult times; He will give us wisdom and protect and direct us and “always be ours this day and forevermore.”