'Tse Go La'

"Tse Go La" Andrea Clearfield
Cathedral Choir, Fahad Siadat, conductor
Dr. David Harris, Music Director
Dr. Christoph Bull, Organist-In-Residence
3/31/19

Inside the Music
My parent's 50th wedding anniversary is today. I think about them, barely 20, grasping at life in the eyes of a kindred spirit, and defying the world around them to get in their way. That, out of nowhere, one day, they found in one another the help that they needed to make life meaningful. Andrea Clearfield's beautiful setting of a Buddhist prayer is a vision of help. Through its calm and beauty, the sensual nature of life opens to those who can open themselves enough to hear it's music. I love the image of the "father's" and "mother's" sides that inspire purity, wisdom, and holiness. The nature of Clearfield's setting balances between male voices and female voices, the two dancing around one another, revealing newness in difference. The wedding metaphor is also striking, that good will leads to a wedding poised at the threshold of life. Within the events that led up to the Easter story, confusion is as often present as clarity is. In today's story, a community broke rules, even destroyed property, to see that their loved one had the opportunity to experience that "wedding at the threshold of life". These stories have movement, they look all around and take in what would otherwise be missed. With confidence they say what Gershwin says at the end of the harrowing story of Porgy and Bess, that the only way to go is up! I continue to learn from my parents how to entertain and appreciate the things that matter. Fifty years in, they still ask more of life than they were promised, and hold to the joys of their inner circle for comfort and inspiration. ~Dr. Harris