19th March, 8:00pm
Pusey House, St Giles, Oxford
Sopranos Lois Heslop & Jessica Edgar will sing Couperin’s setting of the Lamentations of Jeremiah. Tickets £10. Tickets are available through FIXR (see below) and will be available to purchase on the door, too.
Antiquum Documentum presents a concert featuring Couperin’s famous setting of the Lamentations: a text most often associated with the darkest point of the Church year, Holy Week.
Francois Couperin (1668-1733), known as “Couperin le Grand,” was one of the most distinguished musicians in 18th-century France. Organist of the famous Parisian Church of St Gervais, he rose quickly on the Parisian music scene, becoming court composer to Louis XIV at Versailles aged just 25.
The text of the Leçons de Ténèbres is taken from The Book of Lamentations. This book includes some of the most doleful Biblical passages. In it, the Prophet Jeremiah laments the destruction of Jerusalem in a typological reference to the death of Christ.
Scored for two solo sopranos with continuo accompaniment, Couperin’s sparse setting leaves space for moments of intense expression amongst the overwhelming serenity. The contrast between heightened emotion and a pared-back texture reflects the liturgical context from which this piece is abstracted: the service of Tenebrae.
The Tenebrae liturgies of Holy Week take place after Judas betrays Jesus on Spy Wednesday. These services are some of the most moving of the Church year. Tenebrae (lit. ‘darkness’) features a symbolic extinguishing of candles, followed by a Strepitus (a loud noise). The dark church in its Lenten sparseness, accompanied by the extinguishing of candles, is in harmony with themes of Jeremiah’s Lament.
This performance will take place in Pusey House Chapel, a building which unites the restrained vision of Temple Moore (1856–1920) with Sir John Ninian Comper’s (1864–1960) rich and lavish embellishments. The building itself can be seen to reflect the themes of the concert. In a lower light of the East Window stands the Prophet Jeremiah, while above the choir screen hangs Temple Moore’s beautiful Rood (cross), depicting the crucified Christ.
Please join us at 8pm on 19th March to experience the sombre beauty of Couperin’s Leçons de Ténèbres and to anticipate the darkness and stillness of the coming drama of Holy Week.
