Review Summary: Part II -- Monasteries, clairvoyance, and a shouting Devil
Considered by some to be the first noteworthy composer in Western music history, Hildegard von Bingen (1098 - 17 September 1179) stands apart from her contemporaries in several ways, not the least of which being that she was a female composer at a time when, despite the presence of people like Kassia, women composing music was a rarity. Beyond that, however, her approach to composition differed in vast ways to most other Medieval composers, and her intimate connections with persons in power allowed her works to survive in a way nobody else’s could have. To add icing on the proverbial cake, composition was but a small part of the output that Hildegard released, and indeed it does not appear to have been the primary lens through which she viewed herself.
Born in the summer of 1098, Hildegard grew up in the County Palatine of the Rhine, a small territory of the Holy Roman Empire located in what is now western Germany. From a young age, Hildegard claimed to have possessed a sort of clairvoyant spiritual awareness, recurring visions that she referred to as the
umbra viventis lucis (“the reflection of the living Light”). These visions were characterized by the appearance of a light so powerful that all senses were overwhelmed, as if she was perceiving the world via the sensory faculties of God himself. Such gifts were naturally noticed by her parents, who enclosed her in Disibodenberg, a Benedictine monastery, sometime around 1110. At Disibodenberg, Hildegard is believed to have learned, among numerous other things, the basics of musical composition -- she likely did not receive extensive tutelage, but certainly enough to have some degree of literacy in the practice. Hildegard grew to become the
magistra of the monastery and would likely have remained in obscurity were it not for a particularly potent vision she received around 1141:
“
...as I was gazing with great fear and trembling attention at a heavenly vision, I saw a great splendor in which resounded a voice from Heaven, saying to me, “O fragile human, ashes of ashes, and filth of filth! Say and write what you see and hear.””
Following some correspondence with Church authorities, Hildegard received the blessing of Pope Eugenius III to not only write down her visions, but to share them publicly. Emboldened and wishing to branch out further, Hildegard and several other nuns relocated in 1150 to the Rupertsberg monastery in the town of Bingen am Rhein, where she would live for the remainder of her life. Most of Hildegard’s written work dates from this time at Rupertsberg. Among the output she produced were several theological treatises, numerous observations on herbs and medicines, an invented language called the
Lingua ignota, and a trove of letters. Also written in this time was a series of 69 chants, from which both text and melody survive, and a piece of liturgical drama set to chant melodies,
Ordo Virtutum (“Order of the Virtues”).
Ordo Virtutum was one of the first works that Hildegard composed at Rupertsberg, and of all her musical pieces, its legacy resounds most because it epitomizes Hildegard’s unique style of composition the best. As mentioned above, the piece is a liturgical drama; specifically, a “morality play”, in which a central character interacts with various manifestations of good and evil. In this case, the manifestations are crystal clear: the central character is a human soul, the Virtues represent good, and the Devil represents evil. While previous theatrical works are known to have utilized some sort of melodic chanting/singing (particularly those of ancient Greece),
Ordo Virtutum preserves both text and melody to an extent not seen before. In a sense, it belongs to an extremely old tradition, despite in many ways being a work unlike anything known to have come before it.
And what of the work? More than anything, Hildegard makes the sacredness of chant/song apparent. The Virtues sing melodies that rise and fall elegantly, utilizing a vocal range especially unusual for the time (spanning exactly two octaves; typical chant melodies from the period rarely exceed one). The Devil, by contrast, communicates exclusively by shouting; he either does not possess the capacity for musical expression, or he simply hates it. 82 distinct chant melodies (“songs”, as they are sometimes called) appear throughout the piece’s duration, and many scholars of medieval music have commented on how each melody is remarkably distinct from the others. Hildegard herself attributed the origins of her compositions to her visions, and her lyrics, both in
Ordo Virtutum and in other pieces, place special emphasis on sensory perception. Consider this passage from Scene 3 of the play:
“
You royal Virtues, how graceful,
how flashing-bright you look in the highest Sun,
and how delectable is your home,
and so, what woe is mine that I fled from you!”
Due to the nature of monastic living, Hildegard almost certainly never intended
Ordo Virtutum for public performance. Any performances of the material would have taken place inside the bounds of Rupertsberg itself, with nuns playing the roles of the Virtues and the monastery’s prior playing the role of the Devil. So while the play may be a successor to the Greek dramas of yesteryear on several levels, it is important to situate Hildegard’s work in the context of spiritual vs. secular music. Despite the “dramatist” label, Hildegard was a spiritual composer through and through, and were it not for her relative prominence among her contemporaries and her commitment to rigorous documentation,
Ordo Virtutum and her other chant melodies may well have been lost to obscurity, like so many other chants from the era. To have them so thoroughly intact is a wondrous thing indeed.
Sequentia (1997): https://open.spotify.com/album/1RM2nW2WbT2cNiaawnOTz1?si=-fXQnVIITmm6KW0d1JsrxQ&dl_branch=1
