"The Sacred Veil": In Which A Piece of Music Gives Me Many Feels

Happy Easter again, y'all! (The season keeps going! I can tell you Happy Easter until Pentecost. That's after the semester is over...) I have a lot of posts in my drafts that I could share with you, but I decided instead that I wanted, as a 'celebration' of coming back from my unplanned hiatus, to post this post which I wrote last week when I was supposed to be working on homework. It's not *exactly* a cheerful Easter post, but I hope you like it, all the same.

I recently went back to a piece of music I had listened to a couple of times a while ago, to listen to it again. It was a bit of a random choice. I was tired of everything else I'd been listening to recently and thought it would be a good change. 

The piece of music was The Sacred Veil by Eric Whitacre, and I guess I had forgotten exactly what it entailed...I listened to parts of it over and over again all day (which resulted in me being rather emotional by the end of the day...handle with care, I guess). I couldn't get enough, either of the story, or of the music itself.

The Sacred Veil is based on text written by a couple, Charles Anthony Silvestri and Julia Lawrence Silvestri (plus one piece of text written by Eric). Julia passed away from ovarian cancer--but she had left writings, poems, and blog posts behind, some of which are set to music here. Charles is Eric's best friend, and so he obviously knew the two of them well, and the way he sets their text--! 

As you can probably imagine, this ticked several boxes for me:
-Death
-Poetry
-Pathos
-Beautiful music 

I don't know exactly what I'm going to say about it in this post, but since the point of this blog is to share my thoughts especially vis a vis various media (books in particular, but I see no reason why music/poetry should be exempt), and because I had such a strong reaction to it, I thought I'd write a post about it. We'll see where this goes. (I'm emboldened by the fact that Megan also wrote a post about music recently. It must be a Thing, if she did it. ;))

I love all of the movements--they twine together in an extremely satisfying way, with repeated motifs throughout (if you want to read more about this, the composer talks about all that HERE). But there are a few that get to me in a way that I don't know if I can quite explain. (So, I'm going to try. What else is a blog for?)

Before we start, quick PSA: If either of my parents is reading this--don't listen to any of this music. Actually, maybe just stop reading this post right now. Also, if anyone who is reading this blog has experienced the loss or near loss of a spouse--I don't recommend listening.

"In a Dark and Distant Year"

In a dark and distant year,
A wand’rer ancient and austere,
He surrounds himself with books he’s
never read.
He was a child then, the world inside
his head. 

...

He would often wonder, “Who
Could love a dreamer such as you?”
...
Then quite to his surprise,
Passing there before his eyes,
A girl unlikely, gently laughing
by the shore.

I am, obviously, not a man, so there are some parts of this poem that I can't relate to. And yet still, the description that Charles writes of himself in the first paragraph of his poem rings true for me. I am surrounded mostly by books I have read, but also by books I've never read. And I still think I'm a child, with the world inside my head. (In fact, if I'm honest, I myself mostly exist inside my own head.)

And again, if I'm being honest, the question he asks himself rings true for me, too, on occasion. 

That is part of what makes it so poignant. But also, the way it's set to music! It opens with the basses singing fairly deep in their range, something that feels a bit like a chant, or like the soundtrack to a slightly dark fantasy movie. It sounds like something set in a fantasy book--one that has its notes of sadness and depression. Not a kids' book. And then the way the melody fits together...

GAH.

The whole melody captures the beautiful-scared-vulnerable feeling of finding that someone does love you, despite all of the broken parts, and that you love them, too. I don't know how, but it does.

"I'm Afraid"

"I'm Afraid" takes the moment when a doctor comes into the room and says "I'm afraid we've found something" and turns it into a complex musical work.

The women sing "I'm afraid we've found something", and every time they sing 'something', it splits into dissonance. Beneath them, the men sing the words for what the doctor told Charles and Julie. 

This one isn't my favorite because of some emotional connection--it's my favorite for the way it's written, and how effective the women are at conveying the way one's world shatters, while the men convey how it's just another day at the office for the doctor. The drone of "pathology confirms grades I, II, and III mucinous cystic adenocarcinoma..." is something that I never would have thought to hear in music, and yet, it works so well. 

"Delicious Times"

By Thursday [my hair] was making a terrible mess, so the kids helped me shave off whatever was left. 
...
She says, “Mommy, your hair went bye-bye but it’ll be back soon!”
...

Today I visited my oldest at school and he shouted, “Hey everybody! My mom has a wig!” He was the star of the class as all the kindergarten stared, open-mouthed, in wonderment. It’s been a very funny week.

This piece feels like a piece of dialogue or recitative. It's repetitive, swinging, quiet, almost light, but with a sadness and an uncertainty to it, a feeling of improvisation, or of making it up as one goes along. 

It seems like a piece Julie could sing herself--the women almost always (always?) sing in unison, or in consonant intervals (if that's even a thing?), so it almost sounds like one voice--and it truly seems like a setting-of-her-words to music. It's the piece in this whole thing that is, I think, most truly her. (Although I didn't know her, so I can't judge that very well.)

It's one of the movements that gets stuck in my head most often, too. It's hard to believe that death could touch someone with vitality and story like this, but it's part of the point of the whole piece that death touches everyone, no matter what, no matter how much everyone wants them to live.

"One Last Breath"

In a dark and distant year
The wand’rer weary, full of fear,
Confronts a fated force more powerful
than life —
A carriage made of sea
Has come to take his wife.

...

The waves too dark and deep to swim,
He hears his love cry out to him,
Her piercing anguish rising high above
the foam.

...

From the shore he sees his bride
As she fights hard against the tide.
He swears a sacred vow that every
loved one keeps.
He steels himself,
Takes one last breath, and leaps.

This piece makes me shiver a little--the next one really has claim to that distinction. What this one really brings me, though, is a sadness in my sternum.

It's impressive how much music can make one feel.

Bringing back the 'wand'rer' theme from when Charles & Julie were first falling in love is so incredibly effective in reminding the listener of exactly how much both of them a) love each other and b) have to lose. 

Like, the girl who was able to love a dreamer such as him? That is who he stands to lose. 

"A carriage made of sea/Has come to take his wife."

GAH. It reminds me of the Carriage Black in On The Edge of the Dark Sea of Darkness, and the image of a 'carriage made of sea' is so evocative.

One thing that I've just noticed--in the first stanza, Julie is his 'wife', in the second, his 'love', and in the third, his 'bride'. Each word connotes something different about their relationship, and in combination, the three give me FEELINGS. 

You know what else gives me feelings? "He hears his love cry out to him." AND THE SWELL OF MUSIC RIGHT THERE. Who gave Eric Whitacre permission to break my heart like this? 

((I'm not crying, you're crying.))

(And the music! The music! It starts out in a similar way to "In A Dark And Distant Year", but just slightly dissonant...and then it goes back to the IADADY tune, but not leaving behind that feeling of 'something-is-not-right'...it has more urgency to it, a sense of being swept along.)

"Dear Friends"

Dear friends: tonight I feel that I must ask you to pray.

...

The scan showed that I had numerous liver and peritoneal metastases. My doctor said this meant I most likely had about two months to live. 

...

I am now asking you to pray as you have never prayed before. Please don’t pray that I will have a peaceful death. Please don’t feel pity for me. Just pray hard. Pray that I will be healed in a miraculous, supernatural way. 

This text gives me shivers. Like, all over my body while I'm listening and writing this. And it's not just the words--it's the music that goes with them. 

The first part, where Julie is telling friends about what has happened, is almost monotone, like the weight of the news is still settling on her. The note barely changes, if at all. There's barely any instrumentation underneath, if any. And it's in minor. 

And THEN a violin (or maybe it's a cello?) comes in right before "I am now asking you to pray as you have never prayed before". And the whole thing turns major. Major, but still dissonant. GAH.

And then the chording under "just pray"...and the way the cello fades out...

There's probably more that I could say about all of this, especially that last piece, but I have decided only to let myself listen to this music once in one day (so as to avoid emotional breakdowns, y'know, as one does), and I've already broken that rule for the last three pieces I've mentioned. (As in, I've definitely listened to them at least twice today. *hides*)

(Also, I'm really supposed to be doing homework.)

So! Instead of me rambling on--you listen to these pieces (or the whole thing, no skin off my nose), and tell me what you think!