Easter

Easter is the most important festival in the Christian year, and the Easter story is at the very heart of Christianity. The first mass of Easter, which concludes the Easter Vigil service traditionally held during the evening of Easter Saturday, marks the start of the commemoration of the resurrection of Christ. In the Christian church this event is, in effect, commemorated every Sunday throughout the year. The date of Easter itself varies as it is linked to the lunar calendar. Easter Sunday is calculated as the first Sunday after the Paschal full moon. This is the first full moon after the spring equinox. Paschal means “relating to the Passover”, and this method of choosing the date of Easter was determined by the First Council of Nicea, held in 325. The major Christian seasons following Easter therefore are also affected by this variation in date as they in turn are linked to Easter. The dates of Ascensiontide, Pentecost and Trinity differ each year, therefore, until the equilibrium is restored again on Advent Sunday. Easter is linked to the Jewish Passover and characterised by much symbolism. The Easter egg, a hollow egg, is symbolic of the empty tomb. The Easter Hare is a very popular symbol in the Lutheran church and is a prolific figure in medieval church art. (The Easter bunny is a modern American corruption of this symbol.) The idea that the hare could reproduce without loss of virginity was a view expressed by both Pliny and Plutarch and led to its Christian association with Mary. Biblically the events of Easter Day begin with the visit to the tomb, at daybreak, by Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James and Salome, to anoint the body of Christ. (This Salome is named by Matthew as the mother of Zebedee’s children (Matthew 27:56), and is not the Salome whose dance before Herod resulted in the beheading of John the Baptist.)  

The words of this motet are taken from the Gospel of St Mark, Chapter 16 vv. 1 – 2.  It was used as the Respond for Easter Day.

John Taverner's music spans a fascinating period in English ecclesiastical history. He was born some time around 1490 in Lincolnshire and sang as a young man at the Collegiate Church at Tattershall. In 1525 he was invited to be the first choirmaster of Cardinal Wolsey’s brand new college at Oxford (Cardinal College – now Christ Church College). He left Lincolnshire and recruited 12 lay clerks and 16 choristers for the choir and began directing services there when the college formally opened in October 1526. His career at Oxford was brief as, in 1530, Wolsey fell from grace as Henry VIII’s chief minister and his college at Oxford began to disintegrate. Most of Taverner’s church music appears to date from the late 1520s and was no doubt written for use in the brand new college chapel – the building we now know as Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford. In 1531 Taverner returned to Lincolnshire and became a lay clerk at the church of St Botolph in Boston (known as Boston Stump because of its tall and wide tower). He appears to have been on very good personal terms with Thomas Cromwell and was entrusted by Cromwell to oversee the removal, destruction and burning of the rood screen in St Botoph’s in accordance with the government’s policy at the time towards shrines and objects of superstitious veneration. He died in 1545 and is buried in the churchyard there.

Dum transisset Sabbatum is remarkable in that it was the first piece of music to adopt what was, at the time, a startling format of setting to polyphony that which hitherto had been chanted in plainsong. The liturgical position of Dum transisset Sabbatum was to adorn the Mass on Easter Sunday. Its text narrates the visit of the three women to the now-empty tomb of Jesus, and closes with a jubilant Alleluia, the word of praise that had been absent from the liturgy for the entire period of Lent. It follows a biblical lesson in the service, and adopts a routine liturgical form, the Responsory. In that form a cantor sings an opening phrase, the choir chants the respond text, and the cantor sings a verse, followed by a repeat of part of the respond, and the Gloria Patri. Taverner follows the liturgical form in all propriety, and includes the complete liturgical chant, even in the choral passages, where it is represented in the first bass part. His innovation in Dum transisset Sabbatum is in his scoring of the overall form. English composers prior to Taverner (and Taverner himself in earlier works) would set the shorter solo passages for polyphonic choir, leaving the main burden of the form to be sung to plainchant. However, Taverner reverses the order. The choir sings an elaborate rendition, with the chant present in the bass part and the other parts weaving around and above this in frequently imitative and beautifully arched phrases.