HOLY SATURDAY/EASTER SUNDAY
The final movement of the Symphonie-Passion op.23 by Marcel Dupré. A gently flowing opening using motifs based on the hymn ‘Adoro te’ is placed over long pedal notes of the chant which then develop a canonic setting. The movement intensifies and after a repeat of opening material, builds to a French toccata style accompanying fleeting snippets of the chant. Before a re-establishment of the toccata figuration with the chant boldly played with full pedal reeds, there is a section that Graham Steed describes as referencing the ‘harrowing of hell’ when Christ descends into Hades to redeem the dead. The final section uses a sequence of fortissimo chords, hammering out the message that Christ is Risen!
The Harrowing of Hell
I stretched out my hands and offered myself to the lord.
The stretching out of my hands is the sign of my offering,
The stretching out on the wood
Where the Just One was hanged, there by the roadside.
Hell saw me and was vanquished.
Death let me depart, and many with me.
I was gall and vinegar to it.
I descended with it to the depths of hell.
Death could not bear my face.
I made the dead an assembly of the living.
I spoke to them with living lips
So that my word should not be in vain.
They ran towards me, the dead.
They cried out, ‘Take pity on us, O Son of God!
Deliver us out of the darkness that fetters us.
Open the gate for us that we may go out with you.
We see that death has no hold on you.
Deliver us also, for you are our Saviour!’
And I heard their voices and I traced my name on their heads.
So they are free and they belong to me. Alleluia!
Ode 42 from The Odes and Psalms of Solomon, a collection of anonymous hymns from the 1st to 3rd centuries.
Original texts in Syriac/Aramaic.
A choral setting of this text is available at:
https://chichestermusicpress.co.uk/theharrowingofhell
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