Humanity Divine

for medium voice and piano

Duration - approx. 20 min.

Program Notes:

I initially wrote Humanity Divine in the spring of 2005. The original text consisted of passages of Nikos Kazanztakis’ The Last Temptation of Christ. However, acquiring the rights became a quixotic dream, so in the fall of 2007 I rewrote the text myself, using the themes of the original text as inspiration. Not wanting to take the brunt of writing such a loaded text myself, I decided to use passages from a variety of sources, including The Bible, The Qur’an, Dante’s Inferno, Milton’s Paradise Lost, and a fragment from the original text. The result is a much more subdued and rhapsodic text, with many allusions and ambiguity. I’m not expecting it to have the same power as the original text, but I hope that it can be something else, something new and unusual and powerful and haunted.

The story remains the same. Jesus learns of his divinity and intended fate. Since he is mortal he has doubt about his divinity. This leads him to the desert where he fasts for forty days and nights, all the while tempted by Satan. After this he heads toward Jerusalem. He is betrayed by Judas (a somewhat sympathetic character in this telling) and crucified. But, before he dies he is given one final temptation, that of a normal, mortal life. It is Judas who finally arrives and helps Jesus understand what is occurring. Rid of the final temptation, Jesus dies and the rest, they say, is history.

Although not intended as blasphemous, lots of the material is counter to what conservative churches like to portray as being “Christ-like”. But is it too hard to imagine a man who doesn’t understand what he is? A man that is conflicted between the human feelings that he sees as being natural, and the Godly feelings that are forced upon him? And this man who is or maybe isn’t the last possible hope for mankind must be tempted to simply be a man and not a God, for to think one is God would be vanity and therefore a sin? This theological quagmire leads Christ to his last temptation, to forsake his death for a good, mortal life with a wife, kids, and happiness. But to deny this temptation, to choose suffering and death is what I find fascinating and truly God-like.

 

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This piece has not been performed.

Fall, 2012: Joseph Abad will premiere a new Saxophone Sonata.

Fall, 2012: Jordan Jacobson will perform fragments and memories in CT.

Spring-Summer, 2012: Jeux pour Jumeaux will be performed in San Francisco, CA.

Spring, 2012: Bobby Watson and the UMKC Big Band will premiere Rhapsody for Dean Moriarty in Kansas City, MO.

Spring, 2012: Ashly Evans will premiere Birdsongs in Houston, TX.

Spring, 2012: BA(da)SS will be performed by Ryan Ford in West Hartford, CT.

Spring, 2012: Jordan Jacobson will perform fragments and memories in CT.

Spring, 2012: Not Death, but Love will be premiered by Ineo Saxophone Quartet.

Spring, 2012: David Tayloe will perform A Page Out of Zen in CT.

May, 2012: The Invisible, Magic, Soccer Phone will be premiered in Middlefield, CT.

April, 2012: The UMKC Opera Dept. will perform portions of Songs from Behind the Curtain.

April, 2012: David Tayloe will premiere A Page Out of Zen in NY.

Feb. 17th, 2012: The 016 Ensemble will be perform Romanza for Alto Saxophone and Violin in Manchester, CT.

Dec. 3rd, 2011: Ryan defends his dessertation, Songs from Behind the Curtain at UMKC.

July 17th, 21st, 24th, 2011: Music Faculty from the Sebago-Long Lake Music Festival will perform ...and those seven dwarfs in a series of concerts in Western Maine.

June 16th, 17th, 23rd, 24th, 2011:Orphée Redux will be performed by Rhymes With Opera on their East Coast Tour (NYC, Baltimore, Hartford, Boston).

June 12th, 2011:Selection from Songs from Behind the Curtain will be performed at the John Duffy Composers Institute in Norfolk, VA.

May 13th, 2011: The Ineo Quartet will perform the 1st movement of Not Death, but Love on their Fischoff Competition program in South Bend, Indiana.

March 19th, 2011: The Ineo Saxophone Quartet will perform ...and love is fire... from Not Death, but Love at the NASA conference in West Point, NY.

Feb. 25th, 2011: I. Jest will be premiered by Robert Olson and the UMKC Orchestra in Kansas City, MO.

Feb. 14th, 2011: Hebdomas Squatinae will be performed at the Nebraska at Kearney New Music Festival.

EVENT HISTORY