Allan Bevan: “The Eclipse”
The Ecclipse.
Whither, O whither did’st thou fly
When I did grieve thine holy Eye?
When thou did’st mourn to see me lost,
And all thy Care and Councels crost.
O do not grieve where e’er thou art!
Thy grief is an undoing smart.
Which doth not only pain, but break
My heart, and makes me blush to speak.
Thy anger I could kiss, and will:
But (O!) thy grief, thy grief doth kill.
Henry Vaughan (1622-1695)
(Vaughan’s words with original orthography)
I spent considerable time during my doctoral studies in Composition at the University of Calgary reading poetry. My idea was to search for texts not generally set by other composers seeking to find words that would set my mind, heart, and soul aflame, with the ideal of transforming beautiful language into music. I became attracted to a group of seventeenth-century English poets described as the ‘metaphysicals’. The ‘metaphysicals’ include John Donne, Andrew Marvell, George Herbert, Henry Vaughan and others. They were given this name (a century later) by Dr. Johnson, who used the term derisively, in objecting to their dense and sometimes obscure imagery.
Vaughan grew up in Wales and studied law at Oxford until the outbreak of the English Civil War. He returned to Wales at that time and lived out a quiet life as a physician, Greek scholar, and poet. Vaughan was steeped in Anglican theology, and was deeply and daily immersed in the Bible, so it is not surprising that his poetry is replete with biblical and specifically Christian reference. It is this background and these viewpoints that has always made me suspect that ‘The Ecclipse’ (sic) is more than just a regretful poem by a jilted lover.
In this short poem, I hear the poet speaking to Christ directly, taking on personal responsibility for the Crucifixion (even in Vaughan’s time, this was a long tradition in English sacred poetry). There are many striking references implicating guilty mankind in the rejection of Christ and his mission and the physical pains of his Passion: “When I did’st grieve thine holy Eye?” “When thou did’st mourn to see me lost, And all thy Care and Councels crost.” The subject of the poem has flown, we know not where, but is implored by the author ‘not to grieve’. In spite of that, the grief is stark and insurmountable, it breaks our hearts, and makes us ‘blush to speak’.
Allan Bevan was born in Toronto and studied at the School of Music, University of Windsor, Queen’s University, and the Institute of Sonology, Utrecht, the Netherlands. Following his undergraduate study he became the conductor of the Lakehead University Vocal Ensemble, and over a period of ten years, he directed a wide variety of choral/orchestral literature and collaborated in operatic and oratorio productions with the Thunder Bay Symphony Orchestra. Dr. Bevan has had a life-long love of sacred choral music in the Christian tradition and has been organist/choirmaster at churches from Toronto to Calgary. Dr. Bevan is currently Director of Music at Robertson-Wesley United Church in Edmonton.
He is widely recognized for the beauty, intensity, and craftsmanship of his choral music, both sacred, and secular. His compositions have been performed and commissioned by many noteworthy choruses including Pro Coro Canada, the Vancouver Chamber Choir, The Toronto Orpheus Choir, the Richard Eaton Singers, Chorale Saint-Jean, Ariose Women’s Choir, the Calgary Boy’s Choir, Cantare Children’s Choirs, Chorus Niagara, Da Camera Singers, and the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.
He has studied with some of Canada’s finest composers including Istvan Anhalt, Howard Bashaw, Allan Bell, Clifford Crawley, David Eagle, Malcolm Forsyth, Paul McIntyre and William Jordan. He holds graduate degrees in music from the University of Alberta, and the University of Calgary, in Choral Conducting and in Composition respectively, and he is an Associate Composer of the Canadian Music Centre.
Allan Bevan’s music has won numerous awards including the Outstanding Choral Work Award of the Association of Canadian Choral Conductor’s for his Passion Oratorio, Nou Goth Sonne Under Wode, Choirs Ontario’s Ruth Watson Henderson Prize for his motet Peace, multiple awards from Choral Canada for his music for treble voices, and first prize in the Chor Leoni C-4 Composition Competition, 2019. His music has been performed, broadcast, and recorded in Asia, Europe, and across North America and is published by Cypress Choral Music in Vancouver and other North American publishers.
Hear “The Eclipse” at our upcoming concert on April 15, Good Friday with Pro Coro Canada.