Beatific Hearing
The Christian text that has been set to music more than any other—save the Ordinary of the Mass—is probably the song of the Virgin Mary designated by its initial Latin word, Magnificat (Luke 1:46–55). Churches that maintain a Daily Office sing or recite this text early every morning (in the East) or at evening prayers (in Western liturgical churches).
The narrative in the first chapter of St. Luke's Gospel describes briefly the historical occasion on which Mary's declaration of praise occurred. When the angel Gabriel announced to Mary her coming miraculous motherhood, he also informed her that her cousin Elizabeth, despite her advanced years, was six months pregnant: "Nothing will be impossible with God." Since Elizabeth had long suffered reproach for her barrenness (cf. Luke 1:25), we can imagine that Mary's hasty visit to the hill country was motivated by a desire to share in her cousin's joy, not to be congratulated for her own miraculous condition.
But with the arrival of Mary, Elizabeth's blessed gladness is quickly reoriented within an even more astonishing context. The joyful agitation of the very body of the blessing carried within her is the stimulus for her effusive response to her much younger—and unwed—kinswoman. After Mary's greeting, Elizabeth proclaims that Mary and the fruit of her womb are extraordinarily blessed. The Magnificat is Mary's grateful and eloquent response to the cause of her blessedness, framing her condition within the drama of God's specific redemptive work over millennia.
Elizabeth's Blessing
While the Magnificat has long enjoyed a daily presence in the lives of many believers, once a year many churches corporately celebrate this historical event in which Mary first uttered her hymn of praise. Since at least the thirteenth century, churches have honored the Feast of the Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary. In the West, the Offertory traditionally sung on this feast is Beata es, Virgo Maria. In this text, worshiping congregations reaffirm and echo Elizabeth's Spirit-filled exclamation: "Blessed art thou, O Virgin Mary, who didst bear the Lord, the Creator of all things. Thou brought forth him who made thee, and for ever remainest a virgin."
This text is also sung as an Offertory on many other Marian feast days or in Masses in honor of the Virgin. So it is a text that has been attended to lovingly by many composers. Below are a few of the most notable, some by composers who are famous, others by lesser-known figures. My hope is that readers will track down recordings of some (or all) of these settings and enrich their experience of meditation on the wonders commemorated in the Feast of the Visitation, observed in the West on May 31.
Byrd's Gradualia
In the preface to the first volume of his musical anthology Gradualia, published in 1605, William Byrd describes the works contained in this large compilation as "notes as a garland to adorn certain holy and delightful phrases of the Christian rite." (Etymological aside: Our English word "gradual"—like the words "grade," "gradation," and "graduate"—comes from a Latin word meaning "step." The medieval Latin term graduale referred to the parts of the Mass sung by the choir from the altar steps, most specifically the biblical text, the "proper," sung between the Epistle and the Gospel. Later the noun designated a book containing all of the choral portions of the Mass.)
Many of the 63 works in the first volume of Byrd's Gradualia are settings of texts with Marian associations. Byrd remained openly Roman Catholic under an Anglican regime in a time when suspicions toward papists were rife and often expressed violently. (As a chorister in an Anglican parish, I am exceedingly grateful for his ecumenical witness and for Queen Elizabeth I's tolerance toward him.) Among these Marian works is Byrd's five-voice setting of Beata es, Virgo Maria. Andrew Carwood (who has conducted and recorded performances of all of Byrd's Latin-language church music) has commented that this gem of composition "is a beautiful example of Byrd's late style of devotional writing."
That mature style results in a work that is confident and delicate. Byrd explains his meditative approach to composing for these texts in the Gradualia'spreface:
In the words themselves (as I have learned from experience) there is such obscure and hidden power that to a person thinking about divine things, gently and earnestly turning them over in his mind, the most appropriate musical phrases come, I know not how, and offer themselves freely to the mind that is not lazy or inert.
Ken Myers is the host and producer of the Mars Hill Audio Journal. Formerly an arts editor with National Public Radio, he also serves as music director at All Saints Anglican Church in Ivy, Virginia. He is a contributing editor for Touchstone.
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