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<\/a>My wife and I went out with Scott Gordon and his wife to the Salzburger Freilichtmuseum \u2014 the open-air museum \u2014 in Gro\u00dfgmain, not too far outside of Salzburg. \u00a0We walked around most of it, looking at the collection of traditional regional buildings (e.g., farmhouses, barns, a small chapel, and the like) that have been gathered there. \u00a0At least one of those that we visited dates back to the mid-1500s. \u00a0They remind me very much of the older mountain chalets and farmhouses that I saw every day in rural portions of the Berner Oberland in Switzerland, some of which were of approximately the same era.<\/p>\n A few days ago, I posted an entry here under the title of \u201cChristopher Hitchens and the Great Composers\u201d<\/a> in which I examined whether the late Mr. Hitchens\u2019s claim that \u201creligion poisons everything\u201d holds true for, say, classical music. \u00a0(Hint: I believe that it does not.) \u00a0That was a first installment. \u00a0Here is a second:<\/p>\n Like Bach, Franz Joseph Haydn (d. 1809) began his musical scores with In Nomine Jesu<\/em> and ended them with either Laus Deo<\/em> (\u201cPraise God\u201d) or Soli Deo Gloria<\/em>.\u00a0 He rose early and always prayed before he commenced his composing.\u00a0 He would sit at his clavier and search for a musical idea.\u00a0 \u201cIf it soon comes without much difficulty,\u201d he said, \u201cit expands.\u00a0 But if it does not make progress, I try to find out if I have erred in some way or other, thereby forfeiting grace; and I pray for mercy until I feel that I am forgiven.\u201d[1]<\/a> In this manner, he eventually produced such works as the oratorio The Creation<\/em>, The Lord Nelson Mass<\/em>, the Mass in Time of War<\/em>, and The Seven Last Words of Christ<\/em>.[2]<\/a><\/p>\n \u201cIt sometimes seems to me,\u201d remarked the great composer of art songs (Lieder<\/em>) Franz Schubert (d. 1828), \u201cas if I did not belong to this world at all.\u201d[3]<\/a>\u00a0 He criticized the kind of music that \u201crouses [people] to scornful laughter instead of lifting up their thoughts to God.\u201d[4]<\/a> In his Ave Maria<\/em> and in his seven masses (including the marvelous Mass No. 2 in G<\/em>and the Mass No. 6 in E-flat Major<\/em>), he made every effort to lift minds heavenward.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was not a fortuitous meeting of the chordal atoms that made the world,\u201d said Ludwig van Beethoven (d. 1829).\u00a0 \u201cIf order and beauty are reflected in the constitution of the universe, then there is a God.\u201d[5]<\/a>\u00a0 Along with all of his other works, he produced such deeply religious choral music as the Missa Solemnis<\/em>, the Mass in C<\/em>, and Christ on the Mount of Olives<\/em>.<\/p>\n Much like Bach and Haydn, Felix Mendelssohn (d. 1849) often included prayers in his musical manuscripts.\u00a0 Lass es gelingen Gott<\/em> (\u201cLet it succeed, God!\u201d), he would write, or Hilf du mit<\/em> (\u201cHelp thou along!\u201d).\u00a0 Among his works are the oratorios Elijah<\/em> and St. Paul<\/em>, as well as choral settings of the biblical Psalms and Hymns of Praise.<\/em>[6]<\/a><\/p>\n Richard Wagner (d. 1883) worked for months on the libretto for something he called Jesus of Nazareth<\/em> but never finished, composed a huge work for orchestra and three choruses entitled Love Feast of the Twelve Apostles<\/em>, and worked clearly Christian themes into many of his great music dramas, including Tannh\u00e4user<\/em>, Lohengren<\/em>, and, most obviously, Parzival<\/em>.<\/p>\n Franz Liszt (d. 1886) was both an incorrigible womanizer and a fervently devout Christian, who, in his fifties, finally entered the Third Order of St. Francis of Assisi in Rome.\u00a0 He was, says his biographer Eleanor Perenzi, \u201cprobably the nineteenth century\u2019s greatest composer of religious music.\u201d[7]<\/a> He himself declared that music\u2019s purpose was \u201cto ennoble, to comfort, to purify man, to bless and praise God.\u201d[8]<\/a>\u00a0 His piano pieces included the Harmonies poetiques et religieuses <\/em>and the Annees de pelerinage<\/em> [\u201cYears of Pilgrimage\u201d].\u00a0 He set numerous psalms to music, created a massive oratorio entitled Christus<\/em>, drew on Gregorian chant for his Via Crucis<\/em> (\u201cWay of the Cross\u201d), and wrote regarding one of his masses that he had \u201cprayed\u201d rather than \u201ccomposed\u201d it.[9]<\/a><\/p>\n Charles Gounod (d. 1893) was seriously tempted by the priesthood at various points in his early life.\u00a0 It is scarcely surprising that he composed several masses, including his famous Messe Solennelle<\/em> and a Requiem<\/em>.\u00a0 He also composed oratorios such as Redemption<\/em> and Mors et Vita<\/em> (\u201cDeath and Life\u201d) and religious songs such as Nazareth<\/em>, and combined his love for theology and opera in his great opera Faust<\/em>.\u00a0 His most performed work, however, is unquestionably his Ave Maria<\/em>.<\/p>\n Cesar Franck (d. 1890), organist at the church of Sainte-Clotilde in Paris for over thirty years, \u201cdid not play in order to be heard,\u201d said his student and fellow composer Vincent D\u2019Indy, \u201cbut to do his best for God and his conscience\u2019 sake.\u201d[10]<\/a>\u00a0 Similar motives impelled him to write oratorios on The Tower of Babel<\/em> and The Beatitudes<\/em>, choral music on Ruth <\/em>and Rebecca<\/em>, and the cantata Redemption.<\/em>\u00a0\u201cFranck\u2019s purpose in writing sacred cantatas was . . . not so much to comfort the believer as to arouse the potential convert.\u201d[11]<\/a><\/p>\n [1]<\/a> Ibid., 39.<\/p>\n [2]<\/a> Ibid., 37-43.<\/p>\n [3]<\/a> Alfred Einstein, Schubert, a Musical Portrait<\/em> (New York: Oxford University Press, 1951), 312-313.<\/p>\n [4]<\/a> Otto Erich Deutsch, ed., Franz Schubert\u2019s Letters and Other Writings<\/em> (London: Faber & Gwyer, Ltd., 1928), 29.<\/p>\n [5]<\/a> Friedrich Kerst, Beethoven, the Man and the Artist, As Revealed in His Own Words<\/em> (New York: Dover, 1964), 104.<\/p>\n [6]<\/a> Kavanaugh, Spiritual Lives of the Great Composers<\/em>, 75-81.<\/p>\n [7]<\/a> Ibid., 96.<\/p>\n [8]<\/a> Lina Ramann, Franz Liszt, Artist and Man<\/em> (London: W.H. Allen, 1882), 384.<\/p>\n [9]<\/a> Kavanaugh, Spiritual Lives of the Great Composers<\/em>, 96.<\/p>\n<\/a>
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