Music for Seventh Sunday of Easter

Charles Callahan was a composer, teacher, and organist born in Cambridge, Massachusetts who studied at Catholic University of America and the Curtis Institute of Music. He quickly became one of the most sought-after composers of liturgical music on this continent, receiving hymn commissions from several Archdioceses in honour of Pope John Paul II’s 1999 visit to St. Louis and New York. Today, his Easter Prelude for flute and organ is played at communion by our choral scholar and cantor Aaron Lau, containing the seasonal hymn tune Lass uns erfeuen and the plainchant hymn Victimae paschali laudes.

The postlude comes from a collection of six “sonatas in trio” by J.S. Bach surviving in manuscripts held by his sons, likely designed as technical exercises for study at the pedal clavichord. Building on the chamber-music genre of trio sonatas popularized in France and Italy, these keyboard soli feature three fully independent lines – one played by each hand and one by the feet – that might just as easily be rendered by two violins with a gamba or harpsichord for the bass. They persevere as pedagogical tools in a young organist’s curriculum, as the task of rendering each voice precisely and independently instills critical techniques at the instrument. As with so many works of Bach, each sonata also serves as a cognisant synthesis of instrumental styles, displaying his mastery of musical grammar and form. This movement in G major hints at elements of the Italian concerto as well as the style galant.

Abraham Ross

Solemn Mass takes place at St. James’ Anglican Church, Vancouver at 10:30 am every Sunday.