Chorus pro Musica – A Personal History
This essay is focused on music in general, and a particular choral ensemble in particular. It’s name is “Chorus pro Musica”, a Boston-based chorus that I participated in from 1968 until 1988, when travel for work – involving many missed rehearsals – sadly forced me to retire from the ensemble.
My personal background involved a fair amount of music. I was the youngest of 4 boys in my family, and we each had to start piano lessons by age 7. Both my Dad and Mom also sang and played the piano. Further, I was around choral music in those early years. By the time I was 8, my Dad became President of a small Christian college in Quincy Massachusetts, Eastern Nazarene College. And with four sons, we learned to sing parts for a gospel quartet.
But there were also music-oriented concerts that I was able to attend at the college, most numerous were the Messiah performances each year in early December. Additionally there was also a Spring concert, and several years, the choice was Mendelssohn’s Elijah. My mother sang the contralto solo several years. And there was also Brahm’s Requiem, which I sang 4 times between high school and college years. And every year, from grade 9 until senior year In college, I sang in Messiah. Also, as a college student, there were other choral concerts I sang in, including Bach’s Wachet Auf BWV 140, and Yesu Meine Freude BVW 227.
After college, I attended Princeton, and sang in a church choir nearby, as well as attending a number of choral concerts with the Westminster Choir. And after finishing at Princeton, I had a 2-yeqr post-doctoral position at University of Maryland, while also singing (with my wife) in a local church choir.
As the end of my post-doc, I was seeking around the country for a university position in Chemistry, and the job I landed was Boston University. I wasn’t trying to move back home, but I wasn’t sad about it either.
At B.U., I taught the course in Physical Chemistry, with about 50 or 60 students. In the Spring semester, I scheduled the important mid-term exam. However, my “best” student – Don Palumbo (straight A’s in everything!) – asked if he could take the exam at another time. I asked about his reason, and he explained that he was selling tickets at Boston Symphony Hall. He told me that he was helping out with Chorus pro Musica, and for the first time I heard of that organization. When I told Don of my experience with choral music, he invited me to audition for CPM that next Fall. I did.
The rehearsal location was in the Old South Church, at Copley Square, corner of Boylston and Dartmouth. The rehearsal hall was on the 3rd floor. Quite sizeable enough to easily fit 100 singers. Could walk up, or take the elevator. The choral director and founder of the chorus was Alfred Nash Patterson. Often referred to as “Bud”.
At my first rehearsal, Bud Paterson had the chorus working on a piece by Carissimi. It was not overly difficult, and it was BEAUTIFUL. I couldn’t imagine not going back
There was a two-part audition: the first week, sight reading, with the notes being read were purposely written to trick the inattentive. If you passed that audition, then the next week, you had to bring your own piece of music. The rehearsal pianist would accompany the candidates, and the other couple people in the audition listened. After the 2nd audition, the candidate had to wait while the audition people discussed what they heard. And finally, they informed the candidate of their “fate”, relative to joining CPM.
Note that a few years after joining the chorus, I became head of the audition committee for a year or two. In part because I worked so close to Old South, and could easily arrive early for auditions.
In the following are listed some of the choral pieces that I remember and sang in during my 20 or so years with the group. Also occasional comments:
Every Christmas, we sang at the Harvard Club on Commonwealth Ave near Kenmore Square, and also at the Massachusetts Statehouse. Tenors singing “Oh Thou that Tellest “solo.”
Sample Music
Here are composers using the same Latin Lyrics in a variety of styles, with a few comments about specific concerts in the 1970s and 1980e. (this is from history 40-50 years ago, only a selected few).
Mass: Missa Solemnis + (Bicentennial), Schubert, Mozart, many more
Requiem: Faure, Mozart, Verdi, Durufle, more…
Stabat Mater: various composers – one of the performances had friend Dean Wilder as Tenor soloist
Gloria: various composers, spanning several centuries. A single concert might contain “Gloria’s” from 3 or 4 different composers, as well as differing time frames.
And some other common lyrics, although less used:
Ave Verum Corpus
O Magnum Mysterion
Figure Humaine (VERY difficult)
For a concert in one of the Harvard halls, Ernst Toch’s Geographic Fuge. My Mom (n her 70s) attended, and told me later that it gave her the hee-bee-gee-bees!
Other pieces with full orchestra:
Mahler 2 – with Boston Philharmonic
Mahler 8 – with Worcester Chorus, Youth pro Musica and a small orchestra, plus piano and organ. Bud wanted to prove to the Boston classical music scene that Mahler 8 was actually possible to be performed. Sung in Worcester auditorium, and in Trinity Episcopal in Back Bay. There WERE problems with the choral music scores, and CPM had to deal with Salabert at the last moment before going through with the concerts.
Other concerts:
Carmina Burana – Orf (in German, at lleast!)
Joan of Arc at the stake – Honegger
Verdi sacred songs
- Ave Maria (1889) – A short work for unaccompanied four-part mixed chorus based on an enigmatic musical scale.
- Stabat Mater (1897) – A powerful setting for a four-part mixed chorus and full orchestra.
- Laudi alla Vergine Maria (1888) – A prayer for a four-part women’s chorus a cappella using text from Dante Alighieri’s Paradiso.
- Te Deum (1896) – A grand composition for a double mixed chorus and orchestra, which Verdi considered his favorite of the four. [1, 2, 3, 4]
Heinrich Schütz “Saul, Saul, was verfolgst du mich?” (SWV 415), published in 1650 as part of his collection Symphoniae sacrae
Ralph Vaughn Williams – Serenade to Music
Dave Brubeck – Gates of Justice (Brubeck and his “band” provided most of the instrumental music.)
Charles Ives – Circus Band (performed in Saturday “Children’s Concerts”.)
Maybe the craziest piece was Thomas Tallis’s Spem in Alium (c. 1570), whereby eight separate 5-part groups were distributed around the audience in Symphony Hall. It was VERY difficult. I’m not sure how it sounded, either.
Note incidentally that performance sites were numerous. Yes, some in Boston Symphony Hall. But others in New England Conservatory, Sanders Theatre, Worcester Auditorium, Providence (R.I.) Hall (for Verdi Requiem), other locations in Boston, Cambridge and similar.
We were able to take on the Beethoven choral music during the Beethoven Bicentennial. That involved multiple concerts in both symphony Hall and at Tanglewood. The two choral numbers chosen were the final movements of Symphony #9, and the Choral Fantasy.
A personal aspect came up relative to the Tanglewood concerts. The regular CPM pianist couldn’t make the trip, so I volunteered my friend Robert E. Brown (Music professor at Eastern Nazarene College in Quincy) to handle the practice sessions. Clearly the actual concert pianist played in the performances, but NOT in the rehearsals.
Another aspect was the 9th in Boston earlier that year. The BSO brought in Leonard Bernstein, and so he was there for the rehearsals and the performances. But MANY of the people didn’t like him. “He’s trying to tell us how we should feel…” was a popular complaint. I say, “Schmeichelnd hold” to all that! Here’s an AI definition of those opening lyrics :
In Beethoven’s Choral Fantasy (Op. 80), the first words sung by the chorus are “Schmeichelnd hold,” which translate from German to English as “Flatteringly sweet” or “Graceful and charming.” [1, 2, 3, 4]
Incidentally, several years later, we again did the 9th with the BSO in Boston, this time with Bernard Haitink. And in THIS case, the CPM people LOVED Haitink. So humble, yet completely in charge. A BIG contrast to Bernstein!
As years went by, my work began to take on more and more travel, mostly around the US. And about the time that I was backing out, Founder and Director Alford Nash Patterson passed away. His funeral was held in the Back Bay Church of the Advent, and we in the audience sang the Mozart Requiem. The new director became my former student, Donald Palumbo. Here is a link to another webpage that discusses Don, and his transition from Chemistry to Music as a profession,
Even though I was no longer a “regular” with CPM, I was allowed to join in several concerts (including the rehearsals!) under Don’s preparation of the chorus, and during those times, there was collaboration with Ben Zander and the Boston Philharmonic. Below is a link to a webpage on my thoughts about Missa Solemnis, and a little interaction with both Don and Ben. Another time, it was Mahler 2. In this case, a friend of mine from Park Street Church (in Boston) “directed” the off-stage instrumentalists.
As times went by, I began to take up positions in church choral music, including “regular” choirs, and also “Gospel” choirs. And I was still working a full-time job in High-Tech, so CPM was no longer an option.
However, those first 20 years with CPM full-time was a great experience, and excellent learning situation for some of what I would be able to accomplish in my callings.
Here are some additional webpages dealing with Don Palumbo and CPM:
From Pathological Science to Ascendant Artistry – The Berean Watch
Beethoven – Missa Solemnis – An Analysis of a Recording – The Berean Watch
Chorus pro Musica at 70 By Peter Pulsifer, October 2019 Based in part on the 50th anniversary essay by David Frieze: Musie BSO’s Beethoven | The Harvard Crimson
One final statement. At some point during our rehearsing for Bach St. John, I was helping sorting choral scores in the back room at Old South, when I encountered Bud Patterson. From my heart, I uttered a few thoughts of gratitude about the lyrics of St. John, and Bud’s reply was: “If you believe in Ghost stories”. I DO believe. Help my un-belief!
Bach St. John – Final Chorale – English Lyrics
Oh Lord, Thy little angel send
When e’er my mortal life shall end
To bear my soul to Heaven!
My body in its chamber sleep,
All torment do Thou distant keep,
Till Thy last call be given!
And then from death awaken me,
That these poor eyes their Lord may see,
See Son of God Thy Glorious face
My Savior and my fount of grace!
Lord Jesus Christ, O hear Thou me
O hear Thou me
Thee I will praise eternally.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=apWYzBxtT9Mc