Well, I am singing a bit of Hildegard-- involved in a production of "Ordo Virtutum" with S.F. Renaissance Voices that goes up the first three weekends of August, at venues around the Bay Area. What I can say right now is this: for being an Abbess, and therefore, a righteous sister, Hildegard was a mother of a composer! Memorization is really difficult because, unlike the "Play of Daniel", where there was thematically different music for each set of characters, rhyming text and enough movement through a vaguely familiar story line to get cues, "Ordo Virtutum" is a unique work based on visions of Hildegard. These visions were first sketched in her monumental work "Scivias", then developed into an "opera-like" piece, which, if it was ever performed, would have been heard at the dedication of the convent she founded at Rupertsburg.
The piece is textually highly rhetorical, musically quite modal, and very little physical movement is called for (although we are trying to create some for this presentation). Each of the virtues explains, to a soul about to be tempted, who and what they are and how they can help the soul remain free within sanctity. The Devil tempts and the Soul succumbs to the Devil's temptations, but turns back with repentance and allows the virtues to help her. The Virtues bind the Devil, to break his hold on the Soul, then guide the Soul back to the light.
The music is replete with little motives (some of these are described in the literature about Hildegard's music as being "typically Hildegardian motives". There is one motive in particular that is "Hildegard's signature": a four note motive of tonic rising to the perfect fifth, rising to the octave, declining to the minor seventh). These motives, either helpfully or unhelpfully, recur all over the place and I have painstakingly marked them all in my score, whenever I run across them, with a red pencil. (Someone should do a study on all the motives alone, to see if there is some sort of system there. A diverting search on the net revealed no such study...) Where these motives are applied, they are embellished and altered frequently. That is to say, there are no sequences to be seen in the tropes. It is almost like doing an hour-or-so-long song that resembles through-composed recitative, but without any helpfully jangling harpsichord cues!
Okay, all that having been said, I am confessing that it is quite a difficult task to memorize the parts of this music that need to be memorized [as some other PME women can attest to, as we sang a few Hildegard chants back in '94 and '95 (if I am recalling correctly)]. But, ladies, that was only 4 to 5 minutes of chanting at most, maybe less… "Ordo Virtutum" is just shy of an hour and a half in length, and though we don't need to have the entire piece memorized, each of the ten ladies involved needs to have a chunk memorized.
As you might be able to see in the adjacent photo, my score is scribbled over with English text, yellow highlights, red pencil markings over the recurring motivic bits, and other markings that show the necessary specifics of German Latin pronunciation. Voted "most likely to succeed with office products" in high school, I have been as inventive as possible, creating a card deck with the text of each number, marked with the pauses and signifiers over each word where there is a melisma. Wherever Hildegard's signature motive occurs in my portions of the music, I have marked a tilde (for Hilde…) over the portion of the text where it occurs. I have my tuning fork by my side, and am employing some 21st century technology in the form of an iPod Nano with a voice memo recorder attached.
I wake up in the middle of the night with random bits and pieces running through my head, but not full chants and not in any kind of recognizable order, from one to the next.
Add to my dilemma that this is summer, the twins need diversions (or, at least, to be taxied to and from their diversions…), my part-time job is still in full-swing, the husband is in and out of town, I have other projects, not to mention social obligations, pulling at me, and, whew (!), I have a lot weighing on my mind.
Nevertheless, I am having fun! It is a wonderful challenge to work on a piece like this, which is so seldom performed. It is great to be working with a new set of singers. The rehearsal process has been oddly soothing and low-key (perhaps a bit too low-key…). The amazing thing is that, in the church where we have been practicing, we have been able to keep the pitch center fairly constant as we move through the sung passages. Slaving over a hot score in the good ole summertime is, perhaps, not so much fun... But, I have been enjoying the challenge.
And this group speaks "singer-eater"! The Hildegyrlz, as we have been dubbed, went on an expedition together last weekend, first for lunch at Udupi Palace on University, then down the street to procure costumes, with the help of our choreographer (yes, there are some dance numbers, but this ain't Ziegfelds' Folly!), culminating in a casual rehearsal, fueled by glasses of fine wine. To the right of yours truly (in brilliant blue) you see Purnima Jha, our choreographer; she is known internationally for Jaipur style Kathak dancing.
If you are around in August, I hope you'll check out our show!
-Elisabeth Eliassen
July 2008