Here are ten glorious pieces of music for Holy Week that will remind you that there is beauty in this world.
As a lifelong Catholic, I’ve always taken Holy Week seriously in a personal way, and the reading of “The Passion of the Lord” on Palm Sunday always deeply affects me. You’d think I’d never heard the story before— of Jesus’ triumphant arrival into Jerusalem, his Last Supper, praying in the garden of Gethsemane, his betrayal by one of his own, being tried like a criminal and dying on the cross. I’m just an emotional puddle by the end of the Mass.
As part of this year’s Lenten observation, along with giving up chocolate and wine (and yes I’m counting the days to Easter), I’ve immersed myself in spiritual, religious reading. In addition to a subscription to the publication, Give Us This Day, an enjoyable monthly paperback offering readings, daily Mass and related essays, I’m reading Anam Ċara – A Book of Celtic Wisdom, by John O’Donohue; The Places That Scare You, by Pema Chödrön; Seeing With the Heart – A Guide to Navigating Life’s Adventures, by Kevin O’Brien, SJ.
Yesterday afternoon when I took a hike, I felt a great spirituality arise in me. As I reached the crest of the biggest hill and looked down and around, it was nothing short of a holy moment. You add up my intensive researching of holy music for this essay, tied in with my Lenten reading, an endorphin rush from having just ascended a steep trail for twenty-five minutes, and wow, yeah, I felt utterly transported. It was a spirituality grounded both in the present and the past, in nature and in history. I wanted to cry and sing out at the same time. I wanted to surround myself in music.
And so, without further ado…
- St. Matthew Passion, Johann Sebastian Bach
- “Lascia ch’io pianga,” from Rinaldo, George Frideric Handel
- Mass in C minor, “Kyrie,” Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
- “Fratres for String and Percussion,” Arvo Pärt
- Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis, Ralph Vaughan Williams
- “Nine Psalm Tunes,” Thomas Tallis
- Stabat Mater, Giovanni Battista Pergolesi
- “Adagietto” from Symphony No. 5, Gustav Mahler
- Enigma Variations, “Nimrod,” Edward Elgar
- Messiah, George Frideric Handel
1) St. Matthew Passion, Johann Sebastian Bach
I’ve known a part of Bach’s masterpiece since my childhood, even though I never made the connection until I listened to the St. Matthew Passion in its entirety as an adult. Many a Catholic surely will recognize the melody of “O Sacred Head, Surrounded” (also referred to as “O Sacred Head Now Wounded”) multiple times in the oratorio. Hearing it brought me right back to singing it in Mass on Good Friday. Another deeply memorable part of the St. Matthew Passion for me is “Erbarme Dich, Mein Gott” (“Have mercy, my God”), a gorgeous aria in the oratorio’s second part. It features an alto soloist with an ineffably sweet violin accompaniment, and portrays a grieving Peter, having denied Jesus three times. It’s beautiful and poignant and worth seeking out.
2) “Lascia ch’io pianga,” from Handel’s opera, Rinaldo
“Leave me to cry.” I believe that’s the full translation. That, for me, means Palm Sunday, post-Mass. I’m always profoundly stirred, weepy, even, and just want to get myself a coffee, hide in a private corner, and process it all. Doesn’t matter that I’ve been attending this service for more than half a century. I still go in deep.
3) Mass in C minor, “Kyrie,” Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
You might know Mozart’s Mass in C minor, the “Kyrie” from the 1984 film, Amadeus. That’s where I first heard it and fell in love with it. It’s the epitome of solemn, although in the movie, it played as Mozart and Constanze were getting married, so it wasn’t sad, by any means. Instead it’s profound and soul-stirring. A comment on YouTube about the [at the 7-minute and 14-second mark] piece reads, “When the doctor has said you have 7 minutes and 14 seconds to live.” Witty and a great description of its solemn power.
4) “Fratres for String and Percussion,” Arvo Pärt
This is another piece one you’ll want to make space for. It’s very subtle, very post-Palm Sunday and pre-Holy Thursday. I call it my “Monday of Holy Week” piece. So wait till your world is quiet, meditative. Close that door, crank up the sound—for entirely different reasons than for “The Feeling Begins”—and revel in its ever-increasing, unearthly power.
In his early career, Estonian composer Arvo Pärt’s (b. 1935) was associated with modernist, avant-garde, and twelve-tone compositions. At the end of the ‘60s, he abruptly paused his compositional work in order to study medieval and Renaissance music. Early chants and Renaissance polyphony fascinated him. Around this same time, he also converted to the Russian Orthodox faith. When he returned to composing, in 1976, he was a different composer entirely. The end result is powerful in so many ways. I wrote about him and music HERE.
5) & 6) Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis, Ralph Vaughan Williams
Ralph Vaughan Williams was born to an illustrious family and had a genteel upbringing that included studies at London’s Royal College of Music and Trinity College, Cambridge. He found much inspiration for composing in going out in the fields with friend and fellow student Gustav Holst, to research and retain the traditional English folk music they both admired. In his later work of editing The English Hymnal, he came upon a gem from 16th-century composer Thomas Tallis. The third psalm of his “Nine Psalm Tunes for Archbishop Parker’s Psalter” inspired the beautiful Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis. (You can give those Nine Psalms a listen HERE and read my essay on this composition HERE.)
7) Stabat Mater, Giovanni Battista Pergolesi
I landed first on the Pergolesi last year in my attempt to incorporate a Stabat Mater into my Holy Week listening, and I just haven’t gone elsewhere. But there are a plethora of Stabat Mater compositions. Over at The Ultimate Stabat Mater Website, they’ve logged 600 versions, 300 of which are recorded and archived there. Most people think first of renditions by Vivaldi, Rossini, Dvořák, Pergolesi, Poulenc, Arvo Part—and someone on Reddit gave an enthusiastic vote for Szymanowski, so we’ll include him here too.
8) Gustav Mahler’s “Adagietto” from his Symphony No. 5
Nowhere else will you find more perfect music for the evening of Good Friday, after all the drama has played out. This is one of two works I consider to be post-Good Friday and pre-Easter Sunday. This work makes it to all my serious-music lists, like “Music for Grace, a Top 10 Playlist for Dying.” Warning: have Kleenex handy.
9) Enigma Variations, “Nimrod,” Edward Elgar
This piece of music has got Holy Saturday written all over it. We’re emotionally depleted from the pathos of Good Friday, the intensity of Holy Week, not to mention all of Lent, and this encompasses a post-grief kind of vibe. I wrote more about Elgar (who, by the way, was a devout Catholic) and the story behind his Enigma Variations HERE.
10) Messiah, George Frideric Handel
Another great one for Holy Saturday and letting it segue into Easter Sunday (perfection is hearing the glorious “Hallelujah Chorus” first thing in the morning. Want to know some fun facts about Handel’s iconic oratorio? I wrote about it several years back and you can read it HERE.
Wishing all of you a happy spring (or fall in the Southern Hemisphere) and an early Happy Easter from my home and my beautiful local Quail Hollow Ranch walk. May spirituality flow forth from you however you worship the divine act of creation at play throughout nature and the world. Beauty is there. I promise. Just kinda… hidden these days sometimes. Which is why you need to unplug from the world right now and listen to these glorious pieces a second, and third, and fourth time.
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The featured image is “Jesus Meets His Mother” (between 1886 and 1887), by Theophile Lybaert, and is in the public domain, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
