Bach's Mass in Goldberg

We made many friends from our choir, but the two most special were Fred and Dot Raftery, whom Rosemary and I took as role models for raising a family. Fred was and remains a musical treasure, with a enthusiasm for choral music unmatched by anyone I know. Fred was an experienced singer long before I showed up, but Dot, and her friend and fellow chorister Gerry Halpin, were musical amateurs. These two, however, turned out to be professional fixer-uppers.

Many of our adult members joined the choir when their children started singing and then got their parents interested. Once the parents got involved, they wouldn't let their kids quit, so the choir grew. Dot and Gerry joined because of their kids. They also brought in my future wife, who had just moved into town to begin her first year of teaching, and who made the mistake of saying that she loved to sing.

When I told Dot, right after Christmas, that Rosemary and I were engaged, but that we weren't going to tell anyone yet, she gave me a funny look and said, "Oh Ed, we know that." A few days later, my mother got a phone call from one of my aunts, asking about our engagement. A friend of hers had just heard about it while visiting a ladies retirement home, next door to the church. Knowing the family connection, the ladies told her our secret. My father had been born and raised in the next town down the road, and I had cousins living up the street, so aside from my church job, the ladies would have known all about my family. The surprise was that they also knew all about Rosemary, and all about our plans.

In the Spring of the year we were to be married, Rosemary and I sang the Saint John's Passion with Andy's group. This was an introduction for both of us into the great church music of the past and an overwhelming emotional experience. It was also a revelation into how high were the musical standards in the great Protestant tradition.

Although we have been gone from Lenox for many years, we still consider it our home, and hope to return when the time comes.

Coda

I've recently made the very interesting discovery that I'm not the first to spot a Mass in the Goldbergs. I might, though, still be the first to discover who got there ahead of me, but that's another story.

How have the Goldbergs kept their secret so well? I think there are a couple of reasons.

First, perhaps the musicians who have studied them are just a little too good, and like the favored ones I've known, comprehend music instantly. They don't have to think about it, they just do it and it comes out right. It's a gift, like being a natural athlete, and we don't all have it. It's possible, though, that a little mediocrity helps. I'm not a great musician. I don't mean it in the sense that I'm really bad, but that on a natural ability scale of one to ten, I'm about a six. When I learn anything new, it's a fight to the death. I once spent months trying to improve my bowling skills by calculating how a bowling ball rolls down the lane. You can guess how well that worked. On the other hand, I took my music seriously, and I had excellent teachers. I'm also a good engineer, and occasionally have solved problems which others could not.

Second, most professional musicians are not Catholic, and were not exposed to the Latin liturgy when young. For all practical purposes, both Latin and the Tridentine Mass were eliminated about forty years ago, and without personal exposure to them both, it's hard to make the connection between Bach's "secular" music and an obsolete liturgy in a strange tongue. I grew up with the old liturgy, and I heard enough music in Latin while young, and again during my choir director days, to suspect a Mass, even when it's not wearing its collar.

References

Some of the following books are still in the bookstores. Others can be found on-line or in a good library.

Johann Sebastian Bach by Philipp Spitta, English Translation by Bell and Fuller-Maitland, Dover's re-publication of the original 1889 edition.

J. S. Bach by Albert Schweitzer, English Translation by Ernest Newman, Dover's re-publication of the original 1911 edition. The "play me one of my variations" quote is from Schweitzer, who credits it to Forkel.

Incidentally, one of Schweitzer's own autobiographies, Out of My Life and Thought, (the title might not be exactly right) is a great musical read. It's about fifty percent Bach and fifty percent Schweitzer. He had a fine, dry sense of humor.

Landowska on Music, Collected, Edited, and Translated by Denise Restott, Assisted by Robert Hawkins, published by Stein and Day, New York, 1964. Contains Wanda Landowska's essays, insights, and speculations. I always felt that she was right in refusing to double dot the subject of the C Major Fugue in Book 1, and after the Goldbergs, I am sure of it.

The St. Gregory Hymnal and Catholic Choir Book, Compiled, Edited, and Arranged by Montani, published by the St. Gregory Guild, Inc., Philadelphia, 1940. Source of the traditional Latin texts for the Te Deum, the Nunc Dimittis, and the Sub Tuum Praesidium.

The Saint Joseph Daily Missal, published by the Catholic Book Publishing Co., New York, 1952. My source for the traditional Latin texts of the Ordinary of the Mass.

The Roman Missal, Translated into the English Language for the Use of the Laity, published by E. Cummiskey, Philadelphia, 1867. I found this in the New York Public Library, and used it to make sure that the Latin had not changed, at least since 1867, and to verify the English translations.

My Early Life, by Winston Churchill , has been published under various titles. In the United States, it was first published in 1930 by Charles Scribner's Sons under the title A Roving Commission: My Early Life. It was later published under the title Young Winston, after the Movie of the same name. Churchill's quote on Latin pronunciation is found in the Second Chapter, Harrow.

Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Leo F. Stelten, published by Hendrickson Publishers, Inc., Peabody, Mass., in 1995. An excellent dictionary.

Latin - Essentials of Grammar, W. Michael Wilson, published by Passport Books, Lincolnwood, Ill., in 1996. It’s a good pocket reference, although it's not indexed as well as it could be.

Harvard Dictionary of Music, Second Edition, Willi Apel, published by the Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass. In 1972.

Johann Sebastian Bach - Keyboard Music, Dover's 1970 reproduction of the Bach-Gesellschaft Edition, containing the Goldberg Variations. I based the notes on this compilation.

Oeuvres Completes pour Orgue de J. S. Bach, Trente deux Chorals divers (A a J), Volume XI, annotees et doigtees par Marcel Dupre, published by S. Bronemann, Paris, in 1941. Contains the German setting of the Te Deum, Herr Gott, Dich Loben Wir.

Wheelock's Latin, Frederic M. Wheelock, Revised by Richard A. LaFleur, 6th Edition, published by Harper-Collins, New York, in 2000.

Bach - The Goldberg Variations, Peter Williams, published by Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, in 2001. Very interesting musical background of the variations.

Ed Kotski
Endicott, New York
January 20, 2003

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