Past Programs
Catholicism - 2008
The Rapping Priest
21/11/2008
Fr Stan Fortuna is a Catholic priest and a founding member of the Community of Franciscan Friars of the Renewal, an order established in the heart of the South Bronx in 1987. But he is also a musician known worldwide as 'the rapping priest'. Even after 20 years it's not a title he's totally comfortable with. "It sounds like, 'Oh, the chihuahua in the pet store', you know what I mean, but there's nothing novel about it because it's essentially all about the gospel."
With his salt-and-pepper hair and long grey robes, Fr Stan cuts an unlikely figure on stage. But as soon as he opens his mouth, it's clear this rapping priest is the real deal. He grew up in New York City becoming a professional jazz musician. But in his early adulthood he dedicated his life to God and became an ordained priest. While studying for the priesthood in Spanish Harlem, Fr Stan discovered the style he calls 'rhythm and rhyme' and noticing its similarity to jazz improvisation, decided this was a musical form he could work with.
David Fanshawe's <i>African Sanctus</i>, Pt 2
05/09/2008
A Masai milking song from Kenya and a lamentation for a dead fisherman in Uganda - these were some of the traditional songs of Africa recorded by composer David Fanshawe in the late 1960s and early 70s as he journeyed up the Nile from Cairo to Khartoum. As Fanshawe himself explains, songs like these inspired his setting of the Catholic Mass, African Sanctus, and opened up African music to the world.
David Fanshawe's <i>African Sanctus</i>, Pt 1
29/08/2008
First performed in 1972 African Sanctus is a setting of the Latin mass combining rock music with traditional African singing and drumming. English composer and explorer David Fanshawe recounts some of his amazing stories of travelling up the Nile and recording music in Egypt, Sudan, Uganda and Kenya in the 1960s and 70s.
Music for a Pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela
25/07/2008
Santiago de Compostela in northwestern Spain is the legendary resting place of the apostle St James the Greater (whose Feast Day is celebrated today), and along with Rome, Jerusalem and Mecca it's one of the world's most popular pilgrimage destinations. On our way there tonight we'll hear music from Galicia, the Celtic region that surrounds the city, with folk group Luar na Lubre. As well, there are pilgrims' anthems from the middle ages sung by The Chieftains and by Anonymous 4, and we'll hear from a modern-day pilgrim, Tony Kevin, who walked the Camino de Santiago in 2006.
Those Who Sing Pray Twice
18/07/2008
We take to the streets to hear the rousing songs of Catholic pilgrims in Australia for World Youth Day. From passionate Spanish hymns sung on the steps of St Mary's Cathedral to the soulful songs of Malaysian and Central American pilgrims, and from Korean chants to Australia's own 'singing seminarian', Robert Galea.
We also hear some of the official music for World Youth Day, including the WYD08 theme song 'Receive the Power', sung by Guy Sebastian and Paulini, and an excerpt from the Mass Setting commissioned by George Palmer, a Gregorian chant version of the 'Pater noster'. And to round out an eclectic mix, there's a unique fusion of the secular and the sacred, acid jazz meets Gregorian Chant, with the Australian group Resonaxis.
Good Friday - Shadows and Light
21/03/2008
Good Friday is the darkest day of the Christian calendar, the day of the Crucifixion and death of Christ, so our music this week is tinged with sadness. We hear soprano Dawn Upshaw with the 2nd movement of Gorecki's 'Symphony of Sorrowful Songs', and an excerpt from the 'Tenebrae Responses for Good Friday', a work for 6 voices by the brooding and ill-starred Italian Renaissance prince, Gesualdo.
Carlo Gesualdo was one of those astonishing Renaissance noblemen who seemed to have it all. He was the Prince of Venosa in Italy and this gave him the education, the money and the leisure time to write some 140 madrigals during his lifetime. But he lived and died on the edge of madness. In 1590 he punished his wife's adultery by killing her and her lover. This shocking act seems to have weighed heavily on his conscience and in 1611 he composed a work for Holy Week filled with a dark grief, of intense regret.
Gesualdo was lamenting the death of Christ but also I think lamenting his own blighted life, which included a second unsuccessful marriage and the death of his only son in childhood. The work is known as the 'Tenebrae Responses' and it is sacred music with text in Latin for the three days leading up to Easter. Tenebrae is Latin for shadows or darkness and it refers to the darkness of Christ's death but also more literally, this music was written for the church service just as evening was falling when candles would be lit and one by as the evening service and the singing continued the candles would be extinguished, leaving the chapel in darkness.
The music for each day consisted of antiphons and psalms which were chanted and then nine readings from the Hebrew Bible, the Old Testament, chanted by a single voice, followed by nine responses sung by the six-voice choir. So we'll hear just a portion from the Good Friday service, with the first reading, chanted, from the Lamentations of Jeremiah, followed by its response.
We'll end with two works that take us out of the dark and claustrophobic world of Gesualdo and into the brighter light of the Elizabethan Englishman Orlando Gibbons, with his tiny gem of a hymn 'Drop Drop Slow Tears', followed by the 'Crucifixus' for 8 voices by the Venetian composer Antonio Lotti, a near contemporary of Bach. Both works sung by the choir of St Paul's Cathedral in London under John Scott and if you enjoyed last week's show about the sounds of sacred space you'll appreciate the reverb of the choir under St Paul's massive dome.
Easter is a remarkable time with melancholy followed by joy, darkness leading to light, over the course of three days, and so whether you're celebrating Easter or just taking time out, I hope you give yourself the chance to reflect on the relationship between sadness and renewed hope, and the part it plays in all our lives.
And that's the rhythm divine.
The Sounds of Sacred Space
14/03/2008
Medieval cathedrals did more than simply inspire awe. They acted as superb resonating spaces to enhance the power of the liturgy and the human voice. In fact, sacred spaces from many traditions have acted in just this way. Our 'architectural instruments' this week include the Cathedral of Notre Dame de Paris, Westminster Abbey, the Abbey du Thoronet in Provence, the Cathedral of St John the Divine in New York city, and the Taj Mahal.
1685
29/02/2008
It was a very good year for music. 1685 saw the birth of George Frideric Handel on 23 February, Johann Sebastian Bach on 21 March and Domenico Scarlatti on 26 October. Handel and Bach were German Lutherans while Scarlatti was an Italian Catholic who became maestro of the Cappella Giulia in Rome. Our music includes an excerpt from the Biblical oratorio Israel in Egypt by Handel and one of the ever-popular arias from Bach's sacred cantata BWV 82 ('Ich habe genug').
