Peter Niedmann on Composing: From Text to Anthem

Peter Niedmann on Composing: From Text to Anthem
An interview by Joan Pritchard

Peter Niedmann is an organist, conductor and composer residing in West Hartford, Connecticut. He is a graduate of the University of Connecticut where he studied organ with Christa Rakich and composition with William Penn. He also studied piano with Anne Koscielny at the Hartt School of the University of Hartford. Niedmann is currently Organist and Director of Music at the Church of Christ, Congregational, UCC in Newington, CT. He is on the faculty of the Hartt School, University of Hartford and Dance Connecticut, formerly the Hartford Ballet. The United Church of Christ commissioned Niedmann to compose a hymn setting and several antiphons for The New Century Hymnal. In addition to the anthems described here, Niedmann has written compositions for solo organ and for handbells.

People have commented that the texts in your anthems are beautiful and unusual. Where do you find them?

In hymnals — lots of times it is exciting to find some hymn in a dusty old hymnal that no one sings any more, but the words are great. Anthologies — there are several on Christian verse. There’s one published by Penguin and one by Oxford. General poetry anthologies — if you look hard enough there are some with references to sacred themes. Also, preexisting anthems. There’s nothing wrong with using those. There are a lot of settings of certain texts, such as “My Shepherd will supply my need,” the 23rd Psalm, “Lord, Make me and instrument of thy peace,” which can inspire new ideas to do it your way. Also, I have done a couple of texts written by contemporaries, such as my colleague Jane Penfield’s piece [currently unpublished]. She had written the text and then commissioned me to set the text to music. It is about children and is geared towards children praising God through song. And then there is Sandra Niles [“Advent Carol”]. She sings in the same choir in Westerly, Rhode Island that I grew up in. They always do an Advent lessons and carols every year, and there is a spot where very few anthems tie into that scripture lesson. So she wrote a wonderful poem and commissioned me to compose the carol and then presented it to the director in time to do it that year. So that was exciting. It was neat to have someone happy with the work you’ve done and to share it with the director whom we both admire and had worked under. Basically that’s it.

Do you prefer to have the text first and write the music to it?

Oh yes, I have to. I don’t just sit down and write music and then find words that fit it. It’s the other way around. Because of the meter and the accent, everything is derived from the words.

There are anthems based on just one sentence or a few words. If that were your text, would it be harder to write?

That would be harder, yes. You would have to approach it more instrumentally, as a symphonic piece. There are only so many ways you can declaim that text. Without words, the Thompson “Alleluia” could have been written for a string orchestra. I always get the words first. I’m working on a commission right now for a millennium service sponsored by the Christian Conference of Connecticut, so I’m sifting through all my hymnals and anthologies. Some of it is just luck. But some sources have indexes where you can look up certain subjects such as “eternity” or “God” or “God’s Timelessness.” I have already found a bunch of choices. I’ll meet with the music director of the service and together we’ll pick out a text.

What qualities do you look for in a text?

In this particular case, it has to be something that talks about a new age that is hopeful. There are some texts that refer to a thousand years, and that’s perfect. Plus, it has to be really good poetry. Otherwise, you aren’t building on anything good. It’s the old adage about building your house on rock instead of sand; the better the words, the better the piece is going to be. I found some poems that talk about the new age but they are awful.

Do poor texts affect your music?

Sure! I try to rise to the level of the text.

What happens if you are commissioned to write the music to a text that isn’t so good?

That happened once. I said yes to the commission and then got the words. They didn’t do anything for me but I went ahead and wrote the music anyway. You’re stuck with it. If I were to write a piece myself on speculation, I’d find a text with images and phrases that excite me. If the text is too inscrutable, if it is too hard to sort out what it means when you are reading it, I find that it does not make a good anthem text. Once it is set to music, it is even more inscrutable. There are some great poems that have been set to music that I think are failures as anthems because you don’t know what they are talking about. They use really difficult language that gets lost in the music. Music tends to stretch out the timing of a sentence. So I try to read the text out loud and maybe hum it to a melody that comes to me to see if it makes sense in a musical way. I try to find things that are not too pedestrian. Some things I have written straight out of the Bible, such as “Sing to the Lord a New Song” which is Psalm 98.

Do you illustrate the text images musically?

Sometimes, such as the piece “The Earth Did Tremble.” The text is very dramatic. I think of it as a romantic painting, so the music is more hewn to the words. For example, on Page 5 the notes descend to the word “tomb.” That’s a little bit of word painting. On the last page, on the words “trickling tears,” the sopranos descend with altos entering in canon over them and the basses and tenors doing the same thing. The writing gives a sonic representation of the words. The word “tremble” on the first page has the tenor and basses in an interval of a second with the very low pedal note underneath which gives a trembling quality. Those are examples of word painting in this piece. But the use of word painting has to be subtle and judicious. Too much gets silly and cartoon-like.

What about meter?

“Lift Up Your Heads” is a bouncing 6/8 which is a happier, dancier quality than a slow 4/4. Certainly, when you are thinking about the music you gravitate towards things that have worked for composers for hundreds of years. The meter, the key, the mode.

We tend to think of major keys as happy and minor keys as sad. Do you go beyond that?

I think that is a good general rule of thumb, but sometimes a piece can vacillate. That happens in “Advent Carol.” Advent is an odd season anyway because it is kind of like Lent but happier than that, so it is a dichotomy. This anthem starts minor but wanders around in a nebulous mood. It ends in the major key. I was subconsciously thinking of the meaning of Advent — it is minor to major, without Christ and then with Christ appearing on the earth. I don’t map this out, but if you let your mind ponder all these things it all trickles down and comes out OK.

Would you comment on each of your anthems that are in print?

Sure.

The Earth Did Tremble

SATB with organ

Augsburg 11-10922

This is a Passiontide text, a great text by Frances Quarles (1592-1644) and fairly challenging for a choir. A lot of word painting and poetic images. It takes more than a few rehearsals but is not impossible to do. The text came out of Penguin Book of English Christian Verse. It has an odd word in it — on page 6 is the word “elegious” which is pronounce either el’-i-juhs or eh-lee’-juhs. If you look it up in the dictionary you don’t find it unless you look in a really huge dictionary, one of those Oxford sets. But then you find no pronunciation because nobody knows how it was pronounced. When they cite where the word was used in the history of the English language they always cite this text. The poet may have invented it, based on the word “elegy.” So I had to decide whether to put the accent on the first or second syllable: I opted for the second. I’m very proud of this anthem. It is very moving, kind of like a big Anglican rambling Howells anthem. It has the big, dramatic, stormy beginning and ending like bookends. It is through-composed rather than set to verses, but time wise it is only three or four minutes in length.

Advent Carol

Mixed voices and organ

Thorpe/Theodore Presser 392-03049

Sandra Niles wrote the text for this anthem. It is based on the sixth chapter of Isaiah in which the prophet is commissioned to foretell the coming of Christ. It has a refrain about “how long, how long?” It is a great text in strophic form like a carol. It is very accessible for a choir. It has some unison and the accompaniment is not difficult.

However, organists tend to be more trained than their choirs so I can write interesting accompaniments without slowing down the learning process for the choir.

Lift Up Your Heads

SATB with organ

Augsburg 11-10774

I pulled this text right out of the hymnal. I wanted to write a happy Advent anthem. The words are known to people with the Truro tune. It is very accessible; a lot of full choir in unison and women in unison, very simple four parts. If you didn’t have any tenors, you’d find the notes are doubled by the sopranos. It has simple canons, so if they learn the melody they’re just singing it a couple beats apart. A very simple ending. I think I wrote this with simplicity in mind, a really good carol that could be learned quickly during Advent because that is a busy time. It is appropriate for Ascension and general purposes also.

Bread of Heaven, on Thee We Feed

SATB, Selah 410-417

This texture of this piece was inspired by “If Ye love me” by Thomas Tallis. It starts homophonic, becomes polyphonic and then homophonic again followed by a polyphonic “amen.” It is very calm and very simple, good for communion — maybe two minutes.

In the Ending of the Year

Mixed Voices with Flute, Oboe and Strings, or Organ

Thorpe/Theodore Presser 392-03026

Approximately 4 ½ minutes.

This is a little tougher. It is a Christmas text that talks about Adam, Noah, snakes. The refrain talks about the Virgin Mary and, on the last verse, a choir singing with the Virgin Mary. The text is by John Mason Neale (1818-1866), a translation of a 12th century Latin hymn. It is not too hard but there is one chromatic verse that is a little tough because it is supposed to be done a cappella, but it doesn’t need to be. This has an orchestral arrangement available. The Harvard University Choir directed by Murray Somerville recorded this anthem on their CD “Carols from the Yard” by Gothic Records. This one I’m very proud of, too.

Joy to the World

Mixed Voices and Orchestra or Organ

Thorpe/Theodore Presser 392-03045

This is an arrangement of the tune we all know and love. This also has a full orchestra arrangement, but it started out for organ and choir and that’s what you get when you order the octavo. It’s very easy. I wrote it as an opener for our Christmas concert in Newington. It is very fast and quick with fresh harmonies, counterpoint and canon.

My Shepherd Will Supply My Need

Unison Choir and keyboard with optional descant

Selah 410-822

Another arrangement of the folk tune made famous by Virgil Thomson. This is a unison anthem written for the Nutmeg Children’s Chorus. After it was performed, I added the descant to the last verse at the suggestion of the publisher. It is doable by a children’s choir or an adult choir, although it is a little high for adults. It is simple.

Only for These I Pray and Prayer of Saint Richard of Chichester

Unaccompanied mixed voices

Thorpe/Theodore Presser 392-03046

This contains two pieces under one cover. The first uses a poem is by Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1860-1935) who was born in Hartford, Connecticut and lived in the Norwich area. She was related to Harriet Beecher Stowe and was a kind of proto-feminist, a writer, lecturer and political person. It is a motet, somewhat Copelandesque. The sopranos start with the tune on their own and then the altos come in harmonizing with them. To me, that is like “Appalachian Spring.” The tenors have the melody for the third verse and the women are harmonizing. Then all four parts appear on the last verse. It’s not too hard to do. It is a general prayer about light and strength and is a nice text. Then on the back is the prayer “Day by Day,” a short benediction. That is about one minute long.

Praise the Lord, His Glories Show

Unison and keyboard

GIA Publications G-4743

This is very easy, written for a children’s choir but adaptable for adults. You could have women sing a verse and then men sing a verse, then sing together. There is a little bit of harmonization that is optional. This is nicely represented on the Papal Mass CD that St. Louis Cathedral put out. It was performed by their archdiocesan children’s choir, about 150 kids. They took it really fast, but it is a good representation of the anthem. It is a general praise anthem that works for any time of the year. I wrote this for a recruitment effort in Newington. To get kids to join the choir I wrote this anthem to teach by rote to the whole Sunday school class. At the end of the hour we had the parents come in and we did a little performance. It was written with simplicity, repetition and energy in mind. I wrote part of it for that event and then added the middle section for publication. [The text is based on Psalm 150 and is found in hymn no. 19 of the 1958 Pilgrim Hymnal.]

Sussex Carol

Unison Voices and Piano

GIA Publications G-3912

This was also written for the children’s choir at Newington. I wrote it very quickly. It was the first anthem that got published. It is an arrangement of the famous Sussex Carol tune and can be done by a mixed choir of adults by alternating verses. It’s very simple.

Lullee, Lullay

Mixed Choir and Organ

Thorpe/Theodore Presser 392-03035

Very simple. The music is very calm and peaceful like a lullaby. The text is by Janet Lewis (b. 1899) and is a very beautiful poem — it is not the familiar Coventry Carol text. This anthem was recorded by CONCORA [Connecticut Choral Artists, a professional chorus] on their CD “Christmas in our Time.”

Lord, Make Me an Instrument of Thy Peace

Motet for unaccompanied choir SATB

Thorpe/Theodore Presser 392-03048

This is the prayer of St. Francis, although some think that he didn’t really write the poem. It may have been written in the 19th century, but it sums up things that he said. The music is more difficult, the hardest thing in print that I wrote. It is a cappella and has some thorny dissonance which is word painting again. It may be beyond some choirs but is worth looking at.

Peter Niedmann can be contacted at Church of Christ, Congregational, UCC, 1075 Main Street, Newington, CT. Phone 860-666-4689. More information on his music can be accessed at publishers’ websites, including: www.thorpemusic.com, www.selahpub.com and www.giamusic.com.