I never could get into the idea that Debussy's "Clair de Lune" was about a romantic scene, and at last YouTube served me up a pianist who read the poem Debussy read that inspired the music ... this is a song without the words given, and Mr. Daniel Anastasio somehow manages to both explain the story and play beautifully at the same time... a dancer reaches for all the beauty of life, under the light of the moon, and finds that beauty and sorrow are together, to high degree, in life, because of life's impermanence ...
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/Kfq-Vx6p2YA
Alas that he has not yet done a full-length recording, but we will enjoy Mr. Menahem Pressler, instead... at age 89, bringing the fullness of a life of music and piano and life itself to the fore ... his interpretation is that "Clair de Lune" is an ode to the night sky ... and we will accept that as well ...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Bxpm0EmOMU
... because piano midnights are wonderful, too, and this and dreamland also fit each other well, in all its light and shade ... here seen of course in a daytime manifestation on Alamo Square Hill...
The brighter the light, the deeper the shade ... my winter photography often shows that in stark detail, and the time will come for that. In the meantime, "Clair de Lune" and the summer scenes I am seeing and the discoveries about this new kind of life I have climbed into go together well.
Every note fades ... the breath can only be extended for so long, and the striking of the piano keys produces a vibration on the strings that also can only last so long. Music is impermanent ... so is life itself ... which brought my mind back to something the Ghost of Musical Greatness Past said last week...
You need no other grief that does not come with a compensating weight of love."
Now that required some thinking ... obviously there are ministry things where there can be no complete reciprocity from those ministered to for what you put in, but the compensating weight of love, for me, comes from the One Who assigned me the ministry, combined with the love I have for those I serve. That's more than enough.
This also means, looked out over the broad view of life, that outside of the assignment, these connections may not actually exist. I would say "any more," but the amount of getting away from people I have needed to do since age 16 suggests this was always what was going on. I just didn't realize it.
My mind went back to the great separations ... age 16 ... ages 24-25 ... ages 30-31 ... age 36 ... age 41, taking until this spring to be done ... every natural alignment that I thought I could have, and even some that I did have ... and yet my grand old soldier literally walked with me through those years, and there were quiet fellowships over those decades that were longer and sustaining in the way of my calling... so, really, I just didn't know what was happening, but it was always happening.
Now I know. So much loss ... so inevitable ... to get here. It is staggering to consider. I am glad that I have had additional bass midnights to try to cope with it ... the first night of the full moon had fog flowing over its face in wild beauty ...
... and, obviously, I was still up to see it ...
... but before me remained the same choice as outlined in Strauss's 'Das Tal' and 'Der Einsame' -- one takes the joy with the grief, and either is grateful for the good and lives in gratitude and joy and peace, or looks back to light already gone and falls into despair. There is light even in the night ... but what you see depends on what you are looking at. I could have photographed darkness anywhere away from that great moon ... but instead I captured all the light I could, including what told me the time.
And speaking of the time: one may as well be grateful, for whatever one enjoys, it, and one's self, will only be here so long to do any of that... I thought that Kurt Möll could not rival himself on getting that point across in Brahms "Four Serious Songs" ... but as usual, I continue to be surprised ... there is nothing like that big bass voice describing everything there is under the sun, down to every thought and feeling of mankind, perishing from the point of view of a character who has already decomposed into the earth. It is a basso profondo's type of job, obviously, but there is no accounting for Herr Möll's approach to it ... with all the time in eternity, and an immortally beautiful voice, tenderly uttering the sobering truth and expounding on it: "Everything ends that begins ... everything."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GfsWturFi-I
Add to this the reality that Hugo Wolf knew he was dying when he penned this song. In essence, it is him singing backwards from the future he knew he was facing. Although the poems of this last little set were all by Michelangelo -- yes, that Michelangelo -- one can hear in the music of "Alles endet, was entstehet" that Wolf feels deeply the idea of losing expression and emotion that is imminent for him before he dies. He and Schubert share a similar, common cause of death so young ... so young to confront everything in their world ending!
Herr Möll, by that time middle-aged, sings Wolf's last songs with deep, warm feeling, and sings "Alles endet, was entstehet" with deep compassion, faithfully bearing witness to a scene of sorrow he cannot change. Had he chosen medicine, his bedside manner would have been elite: had he been a pastor, his graveside manner would have been equally elite. He would not have glossed over the reality of grief and loss, but his deep gentleness would have made it possible to bear the nearly unbearable ... and that is precisely what he does as a singer.
The greatest living operatic bass I know has also recorded this: Mr. Kevin Maynor's interpretation with just the piano is stark and haunting, but still gentle ... no effort is being made here either to frighten or be "spooky," but to convey the reality of the impermanence of life. I happen to have gotten to know Mr. Maynor a little more: he is a deacon who loves his community and is living a life of service in music that is at a much larger scale but motivated much as mine is. So, I know he is giving the reminder as well: "We only have so much time ... everything ends that begins ... let us be about our Father's business."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vXYafZhlx48
Mr. Maynor also is the living bass with the finest recording of "Das Tal," in that same collection ... it touches my heart as deeply in its noble joy as Herr Moll's recording ...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=035vi68PFZU
... and as I returned to that reality, it occurred to me:
-
Jerome Hines, Martti Talvela, Kurt Möll, in order of discovery: roughly the same type of voice, same type of man in life (and Mr. Talvela in the middle makes sense because the other two knew and loved him).
-
Eric Hollaway, Morris Robinson, Kevin Maynor -- and my grand old soldier, still alive with the rest and apparently recovering although the doctors are not entirely sure how: roughly the same type of voice, same type of man in life.
-
Kathleen Ferrier, Marian Anderson, and way, way down the line in importance, me: same type of voice -- contralto -- same type of person in life.
So if in the past and present I am always listening and hearing the same music -- both of voice and more importantly of heart -- as I step into the same type of life although on a smaller scale, that suggests that in the future, there are voices and hearts that I will yet hear in the mortal plane, and I will be consoled in this earth with the company among humans that I naturally, humanly long for ... it will be temporary as all things are ... for example most of my living favorite basses will join my favorites of the ages long before me in the natural course of time if I am permitted that natural course ... but I understand now.
It is one thing to be separated by the fact that everything that has a beginning must have an ending. It is another thing to have to be separated because of somebody choosing foolishness. The only choice I have is not to choose foolishness, and be content to walk and work alone, by faith that as surely as I hear, others do too, and in due time those of us meant to walk together for a season of blessing will be thus be drawn together. I may even now be upon the threshold of that, or not -- it is not for me to know now, but to be wise, and keep walking.
The night and the mornings after the full moon were much foggier, and I rose to one that reminded me of my own thoughts... on foggy days on the hill, and sometimes even as the fog comes back in to the ground, one cannot see more than a step ahead, but the path reveals itself as one is going ... which reminds me of a section from one of my favorite hymns, "His Eye is On the Sparrow."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sr1OTWIk4eA
"Though by the path He leads me/not one step I may see/His eye is on the sparrow/And I know He watches me" -- this is not always sung, but it is the portion that has kept me walking, and walking with increasing joy.
"I sing because I'm happy/I sing because I'm free!/His eye is on the sparrow/And I know He watches me!"
One still has to get walking, of course ... I remembered on this day a song I heard on a morning in October 2023, pushed to the breaking point by grief ... that day would see me top Buena Vista Hill, fleeing to the highest point within walking distance from the pit of despair ... I had gotten a reminder that no, I was not meant for death and despair... the journey to Hades, in which one could mourn the loss of all things of life and question when the torments ahead will end for all eternity, was not the way that I was called to go ... that same powerfully compassionate voice described the scene and put forth the warning...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YqjhagGZqmE
Between that and him singing 'Der Einsame,' I was gone climbing ... gone even physically for my life ... I did not need the push from behind on this day, but it popped up anyhow on YouTube, just in case.
The matter was not as urgent on this day; I had set myself to this walk without duress, and waited until the fog lifted a little bit ... by the time I began walking toward Alamo Square, the fog was clearing over the hill ... again, in going and climbing, the light is found in the way ...
Behind me to the southwest, the fog was beginning to lift over Buena Vista Hill...
... and by the time I got up to the top of Alamo Square, one could see the lift almost complete, for over Alamo Square there was already sunlight...
There were plenty of people on Alamo Square this lovely morning ... they and their beautiful dogs ...
... but I was seeking a path away from the crowd, and it opened to me in beauty.
That log was a bit low, but the path split there...
... and I found what I sought there ... a tree stump sufficed me ...
... for a solitary seat in this lovely place...
... and the crowds flowed around me and I thought of my life as it is, so perfectly illustrated ... and remembered one of my favorite Irving Berlin songs as the sun and fresh breeze caressed me and I remembered the moonlight nights ... "I Got the Sun in the Morning, and the Moon at Night"...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8g9FV7vPwno
That and the certainty of the love of the One Who has called me away from the life of the crowd and those who want it ... I felt that it was enough, across the threshold into this new kind of life.
But, I did observe that the tree stump was larger than I thought... it could fit two who did not mind sharing ... so that was the moment for the Ghost of Musical Greatness Past to come up over the southern side of the hill, from behind me because quietly coming down through the fog into view, and sit down beside me -- although granted, some of the most audacious men I have ever met like that park ... but they do not generally come humming in basso profondo to announce their presence...
"You know, when I heard you singing 'Alles endet,'" I said as he approached, "I realized you had been preparing for the role of a ghost for a long, long time."
"Just for that, Frau Mathews, I am going to stay invisible to you another few moments and haunt you ... Mwahahahahahahaha!"
But that gave way to his gentle, merry laughter ... when he came from behind me he was smiling and softly radiant in a summer suit colored with the gray of the pure sea fog, appearing to be about fifty -- elder brother style as he sat down.
"Well, Commendatore is a ghost in stone," he said, "a ghost in stone giving a warning from beyond the grave. The character in 'Alles endet' is essentially walking the same ground in Ecclesiastes that Brahms covers in the first of his Four Serious Songs -- so my approach to all three is not dissimilar."
"Firm, serious, and so compassionate," I said. "My life to age 16 flashed before my eyes in all its terrible separations, but your 'Alles endet' held me and helped me understand, and then Kevin Maynor's equally noble take helped me even more. "
"You know that I stand ready at any time to yield the spot of your favorite bass to Mr. Maynor or Mr. Hollaway ... they must increase, and I must decrease -- and I am doing so, because you are musically going so much further afield," he said.
"No," I said. "I know Mr. Maynor, and Hugo Wolf, because of you -- your voice was the one chosen to call me back to make all this discovery, and the voice chosen to keep my heart from just stopping from grief before I could even think to branch out. No."
"As you wish, meine liebe Dame," he purred. "Nonetheless, remember: 'Alles endet, was entstehet.' Jerome Hines had his time, and Martti Talvela had his, and I am grateful to have mine, but you will continue to grow, and there will be a day when the pain of 2021 and 2022 is a more distant memory, and you may need to hear a different favorite voice to nourish you then. Kevin Maynor is a bass in the same work that you are, and if he were less busy than he is, there are ways in which he would be an ideal remote mentor because considered for scale, you and he have literally the same background, doing literally the same things in your respective communities, out of the same faith and cultural tradition."
"This is true," I said, "but I have never not needed the German view as well. This is why you may as well stay comfortable where you are among the basses of the ages -- my favorite musician."
"So be it, Frau Mathews ... it is of course entirely your choice," he said, "but if one is hoping to find suitable company, one does have to put time into building the relationships. I just point up Mr. Maynor as I spoke up for Mr. Hollaway, and when you get the nerve up to actually talk with Mr. Robinson, I will speak up for him too, as I would have told any of my students: your favorite old bass is now 87, and has been in permanent retirement eight years, so you had better work with those fit to be worked with. I was already telling people this my retirement from the stage from 2006 onward ... although you have observed that Jerome Hines and I could not say no to our students as long as we had any kind of strength to work with. So, I am not going anywhere, Frau Mathews, as long as you need me."
"I did let Mr. Maynor know what I thought of his 'Alles endet' -- I'm working on that part -- I'm just waiting for the right conversation entry to Mr. Robinson, and Mr. Hollaway and I are at work on a song placement," I said.
"Sehr gut, Frau Mathews. This is what I want to hear. Keep going and keep growing. There is so much room ahead of you to explore and enjoy, alone, and with others!"
We sat and enjoyed the beauties of the day ... far distant, the Outside Lands Music Festival was playing in Golden Gate Park and we could hear the bass of the bands distinctly from 2-3 miles off.
"In my life as K.M. Altesrouge, I am getting the weekend off -- I can compete with all that in immortal voice, but there is no need to compete or compare or even for my fanbase to be as upset as they are, because alles endet, was entstehet, or, as your ancestors put it in the proper context for that, 'This too shall pass.'"
"Or even, 'it came to pass,'" I said. "All things come, to pass -- I see your point. I was comforted by the kindness with which you expressed the reality at hand."
He sighed, and then reached his arm around me.
"I shall make two observations here, Frau Mathews, and the first is simply to reinforce your own: yes, you are hearing low-voiced, loving, community-minded singers everywhere in history and the present because you are hearing ideas to help you be who you are: a low-voiced, loving community-minded singer, composer, pianist, and director. You require so much more than just some little old German bass as a distant ethereal mentor, just because you have developed broader potential into reality. I keep mentioning Kevin Maynor as a model because he also has director fully developed, but I have covered that point already.
"The second observation may upset you more, Frau Mathews, because there is no obvious solution is at hand."
He paused ... indeed a kind man with a gentle soul, finding the gentlest way to say something that could really hurt.
"If I were still of the earth, I remember what question I might have asked you about your latest trip to the studio," he said. "Should I be worried about this young German-American at the studio with his German friends, Frau Mathews -- are you going to be swept off and really be called Frau?"
I rolled laughing.
"Not quite past being a little jealous, are we, Mr. Old Blush?" I said.
"If I were still of the earth, I might be," he purred, "for a man my age looking at a woman your age should naturally expect that at some point, he will be replaced as the nearest mortal echo of the One Who loves her from above, since clearly, she is listening for those echoes everywhere in the past and present."
I was speechless for several moments, and then started laughing.
"I have to hand it to you -- bravo," I said. "You just called me out so smooth and gentle and kindly -- you got the existential crisis of the ages to go down smooth in 'Alles endet' and then pulled that off -- bravo."
He rose and bowed with a twinkle in his eye, and I laughed some more, and then sighed.
"Your observation is fair," I said, "and, it is a paradox: the peace and freedom I have in what I need requires me to do without much of what I want, for now. is worth living without all that I want. I am self-aware in this matter."
"I am glad," he said, keeping his voice gentle. "Being calmly self-aware is important. Knowing that you have a choice is important."
By this time, his face was all deep, Germanic elder brother concern, and he made his deep voice ever more gentle.
"But how do you feel, missing your brother-soul as you do?"
I let the question hang out there for some time before answering it.
"It is especially aggravating right now, since specifically, my grand old soldier is very ill. If he recovers, he shall do so to remain here in a world of suffering. If he does not recover, he shall sing on high with you, and will leave me here. I am grieving either way ... but of course, I understand this is the normal course of life and love and death in the world. The pain is considerable, but not unexpected -- his eternal future and mine are secure, and I take comfort in that.
"Generally, even with the specific case weighing on my heart, I know what song in Brahms you are referring to, and I rejoice to say: no death wishes over here," I said. "I know where you are about to take me in this lesson you corrected that character in 'Todessehnen,' gently by your choice of songs in your collection in Brahms ... he is ready to die because he is so heartbroken for not being able to find his sister-soul, but by the very next song, he has his person to talk with on Earth."
The look of concern on my companion's face turned into a hopeful smile.
"I see you have been paying attention," he said.
"I do actually listen to your singing very carefully. Essentially, since you told August Everding that the German lied is an opera sized for the chamber, I deduced that what you did was present a little four-act opera with that character at the end of your collection in Brahms. You handle 'Todessehnen' with deep emotion and compassion, and even have the character ask the right Person for the answer, so we can all understand how he feels, but he's in Act 2. 'Mit vierzig Jahren' when you tell him what he going to do is Act 1 -- he gets situated in his life's work and with a thoughtful companion in 'In Dem Kirchhofe' and then gets the proper perspective, so that's Act 3, and at last reaches the proper, peaceful, fulfilled end of his day and goes home to the Love Above in "Der Tod, das ist die kühle Nacht," just as it is predicted at the beginning -- and that's Act 4. The answer is there from the first, presented like a loving father would to his son: keep walking, and learning, and working, until the end of the day ... so he does it, and reaches that peaceful end in due time."
By this time, the Ghost of Musical Greatness Past was glowing up exponentially ... first with surprise that I had worked all that out, and then with joy.
"Now, of course, my ancestors are a bit more direct," I said. "Same lesson, though, so I'll just say it this way: 'I believe I'll run on, see what the end is going to be.'"
"Das ist es, mein geliebtes Blumenkind ... das ist die Antwort!"
He had forgotten his English in the sudden extremity of his joy, but then remembered as he embraced me: "That is it, my beloved Flower Child ... that is the answer!"
He was overjoyed, but took several minutes to compose himself ... he had gotten right to the edge of the approximation of his mortal voice, and that was plenty powerful enough -- but he knew he could not let himself slip across into the powers of his immortal voice.
"My heart rejoices for you, Frau Mathews -- mein Herz jubelt für dich," he said at last, his voice soft and shimmering in timbre with his joy. "You have indeed been paying attention, and walking in the truth you know -- now, we may build more upon that!
"I will say this to you for today, Frau Mathews: a paradox is the threshold where two realities thought to be disparate nonetheless are overlapping each other ... so, to be able to walk through a paradox is to be able to explore two worlds at once.
"But if we think a moment, this is nothing new ... for you know of sunset and sunrise and eclipses, all between the stark contrast of day and night ... all temporary, but all glorious in their time. "
"Honorary mention," I said, "for my discovering and loving a bass voice deep and black as the midnight, but spangled with all the Milky Way for light."
"It fits the pattern you are called to," he said, "for how you photographed the night of the full moon shows how you think of such matters ... complete darkness existing merely to showcase light in all its glories. That brings us around to the point; these are not so much paradoxical but liminal spaces ... temporary in their equilibrium, for 'alles endet, was entstehet,' but every inch real and available to be explored and enjoyed in their time."
He kept his voice calm and did not break his rhetorical stride, but he had blushed wildly, and his eyes were on fire ... that honorary mention from me had struck his heart, even though he went right past it for the moment.
"Because of where you live, I also will show this to you another way -- walk with me for a moment ... ."
"From here, although you know, you cannot see how steep the drop, nor do you know the place where the fog stops, and even if you did, that line would have shifted by the time you got where you thought you should be. So it is in life ... all of it is liminal space. You discover all of what you are called to as you walk into it. So, you are a deeply loving woman who right now is solitary in terms of close relationships outside family ones ... it is given to you to walk boldly in the space you are in, and enjoy it.
"But also, remember your view coming up the hill. We are looking west, where all sunsets take place, generally down slope from all mountains, so on earth, one walks down into port, as it is in Brahms. Yet remember what your view was earlier."
"Going east, uphill, toward dawn, into a brightening morning," I said, and smiled. "I see what you mean by this: my way is ever upward, ever into the everlasting light which dawns more and more as I approach it."
"For as it is written: the way of the wise goes upward," he said. "Sehr gut, Frau Mathews -- very good! Indeed you are applying your lessons well!"
He paused, and then he glowed up dramatically in his joy, that earlier blush and his eyes having only been a preview of coming events!
"I kept my voice as best I could for the better part of 40 years. I ignored the advice of people that I should do certain roles in opera in order to be able to sing what I knew I was called to in lieder and in even sacred works in which I might or might not have much to sing. I chose to hold that space for those who would make the climb I did for as long as I could. I lived long enough in this world to know that those who loved me had put my efforts out on this new technology in personal computing called the Internet ... so, the space I made would continue to expand ... and you found it."
"And I love you for doing that," I said. "Your gift of a life of love just keeps blessing and blessing on, and that is the path I desire and am walking too. Thank you -- you see why you are my favorite?"
Some tourists came up over the hill and were dazzled like they met the dawn, the way he looked then in his overwhelming joy -- and then jumped as he looked at me with all that, and staggered me! They did not speak English or German, so the romantic comedy of errors was back on!
"And thus I will gladly remain, Frau Mathews -- so long as I can inspire you and help you to walk upward into the light, leaving a blessing behind you, I will-- oh, and as a practical matter..."
"Oh my," I said. "That's brunch, and dessert, and half of breakfast tomorrow -- you know I haven't had time to get up where the figs are on Buena Vista and that will cover all that!"
"Hör mir zu, Frau Mathews," he purred as he took me into his arms. "You are the kind of woman who, within her finite limits, loves without reservation. You literally keep having me back in Q-Inspired not just to talk over the things you have learned from my singing, but to let it be known how much you appreciate my life's work. Where you minister to family and community, you do so without reservation -- so much so that you have had to be slowed down and made to attend to your own health -- you are pressing your finite limits, actually!"
"You must be loved without reservation, Frau Mathews. This is therefore a paradox: it will often be necessary for such a woman to be personally alone for long periods of time in a world like this because the world and those who love its pursuits and fear its punishments cannot offer that kind of love. Schubert and Brahms all write of these same things for men, and how alienating the world can be ... and both of them point in common grace to what you also know in special grace: the need to be in the world, but not of it, and seek for greater meaning and higher love."
"Yet you are loved without reservation, Frau Mathews, from on high ... you are called ever more to know this. You are finding more and more music that you may learn from all around, because YouTube is overflowing with the decree to bless you -- you are gesegnet, blessed, so you may as well be selig, blessed to rejoicing! You are learning how to operate in being loved, slowly but surely, and so more and more and more love can be shown to you.
"I'm just the echo, Frau Mathews, and I have taken my time with you ... and I am a smooth operator, so just today I have eased into openly feeding you into a whole different day ... ."
I started laughing, and by this time we were drawing a little crowd ... the sun and him both were reflecting off of me, and he was glowing up even more now that he had me laughing!
"Oh, so you thought I was still out there singing in the park several days a week blessing other folks and letting them bless me with money I do not need just because I need something to do?" he purred. "You think I do all that for a single meal from time to time? Let me inform your magnificent intellect, meine liebe Dame, that by no means is that the case! Allow me to mangle a wonderful American English statement with my deep German accent: 'You ain't seen nothin' yet!'"
Oh, he mangled it in high style ... and grinned as he had to pick me up because I was laughing so hard! But I was thinking as he, by then also laughing, carried me down the hill ... life is hard, but loving without reservation is easy in the company of those who know how to do the same. Well might I be alone except in the company of those who understood ... and the Love Above Who called me certainly knew, so I would lack nothing, loving and being loved in return, walking with Him, until He put me into the company of mortals who also understood. In the meantime, I would gratefully explore enjoy the space in life I was in, walking upward into light, ever closer to the everlasting dawn.
