Mary Ann JOYCE-WALTER (b.1937)
Cantata for the Children of Terezín [37:21]
Aceldama [13:17]
Oxnaya Oleskaya (soprano), King Singers of Kiev, Kiev Philharmonic Orchestra/Robert
Ian Winstin
rec. 2007, National Radio Studio of Kiev, Ukraine
Texts of the cantata are included.
Full scores and extended liner-notes are on the CD, readable by a computer.
RAVELLO RR7845 [50:40]
In the years of the World War II the Czech town of Terezín (Theresienstadt)
hosted a large concentration camp. Thousands of people, mostly Jews, were
brought from Czechoslovakia and the nearby countries. 15,000 children passed
through the camp, but since the only way out of it led to the furnaces of
Auschwitz, barely a hundred were still alive by the time the war ended. The
grown-up prisoners did all they could in order to give the children some faint
shadow of life: they taught them, organized them into activity groups, played
and entertained them. The children published a clandestine magazine with their
stories, poems and drawings.
The Cantata for the Children of Terezin sets children’s poems
that were written in Terezín and here translated into English. Six
poems form its kernel, one of them indirectly - it is a song without words,
dedicated to the author of a poem. These are surrounded by two instrumental
parts, Transports 5:30 AM and Evening Transports: the former
brought the children to the camp, the latter carried them away to their death.
The cycle is closed by a poem whose author was killed when he was only eleven
years old.
The music does not depict the horrors. There are no direct images in the songs
themselves. The poems speak of hope and future. Some are just childish poems
that could be written any time anywhere, because children remain children,
and they want to be happy and have joy in everyday lives. In the music we
hear dark undercurrents that remind us where and when these poems were written,
and what was standing behind the little authors. The camp was not far from
Prague, which probably influenced the composer’s decision to start and
end the cantata with two chunks out of Smetana’s Moldau (Vltava),
which pictures the beautiful river that flows through the city. The composer
probably did it to show the normal and beautiful life, which should have been
but was interrupted and broken.
The music of the Transports is mechanistic and soulless; this is the
iron pace of the inevitable. Home is a plaintive and sad song about
a distant and hopelessly unreachable home. Birdsong, in contrast, is
full of happiness and innocence. It speaks about morning, birds, and the happiness
of being alive - which, considering the situation, is quite potent. Drums
and chunks of the mechanical music of the Transports remind us of the
context, like grey gaol walls that loom behind bright cardboard decorations.
The Mouse is not actually a song: a child recites the poem over sparse
orchestral comments. The poem is childish, but the music has spooky undertones.
A Little Garden has some of the melodic and harmonic traits of Jewish
music. The song starts sweet and peaceful, but gradually becomes tragic and
depressed. The poem is intertwined with the Biblical line about Rachel weeping,
for her children are no more. This prayer-like line serves as a leitmotif
of the entire cantata. A Little Song Without Words is purely instrumental,
melodic and bittersweet. It could be a Jewish folk-song or a lullaby. The
Rose is probably the most touching part of the cantata. The music is static
and heavy. The chorus sings about the scent of a dying rose, and over it the
celestial soprano chants the line of the weeping Rachel.
The sinister Evening Transports come to collect their prey.
Noise dies away. Then the last song, Some Day, begins with a fragile
boy’s voice. It sings about the day that will bring back hope and mirth
and peace. Other voices enter, expanding the borders of “we”.
The music is solemn and rises to Requiem-like intensity. This parallel is
strengthened by the Biblical references in the text. After a harsh marching
episode with drums and trumpets, the final part is sweet and soothing again,
led by angelic boys’ voices. The cantata ends with another Moldau
fragment, which seems to me too crumpled, hurried and cut abruptly: this ending
confuses more than it unifies, as if it was put there by mistake.
I’ve never heard of King Singers of Kiev before, and all the Internet
references seem to lead to this disc. Considering that there was never a King
in Kiev, the name sounds suspicious, like “Caliph’s Singers of
Paris”. Still the chorus is excellent: they sing with sensitivity and
good diction, and their English is perfectly clear. The soprano soloist is
very good; her voice has power without compromising beauty. She is well balanced
against the chorus.
Aceldama (Field of Blood) is the Aramaic name for the field that was purchased
at the price of Judas’s “bloody money”. As the liner-note
says, “this is a meditation on human suffering particularly that which
occurs on such a large scale that we cannot comprehend the enormity of it
all”. Unfortunately, such things did not end with Fascism and continue
into the 21st century. The work is purely orchestral. It begins
with doleful descending intonations. The sad flute enters - I am surprised
the booklet does not name the flautist. The music becomes more violent; the
flute winds its soliloquy through the aggression and desolation. It wanders
and wonders, asking questions and answering them. Over a sparse and grim orchestral
background it sings its pleas and prayers. The flute does not voice a call
to arms; it laments the existence of such sorrows in our world today. The
ending reflects the lugubrious opening. The music goes down, down, and sinks
enervated to the ground, as if drained of the will to live.
Aceldama is strong and poignant, and the performance here is expressive
and sensitive without carrying the heart on the sleeve. The pacing is just
right, and the solo flautist is very sensitive and has a beautiful tone.
All in all, I liked the music on this disc and its presentation. The composer’s
style is easily accessible; the music is not too sophisticated, yet is not
trivial. I liked particularly Aceldama with its orderly architecture
and clear meaning. The musical decisions of the Cantata seemed to me
a bit too obvious. This is music with a message, and this message adds a dimension.
The booklet is not especially verbose. One may insert the CD into a computer
to view full scores and extended liner-notes.
Oleg Ledeniov
Music with a message.
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