Eric Whitacre & Eric Whitacre Singers perform "When David Heard" from the album Water Night with sheet music for the music nerds like me who want to follow along :P !
Quote from Whitacre, 18 years later: "This is a piece that continues to haunt me, all these years later, and still brings a tear to my eye, every time I come across it. Almost to the point that I can no longer listen, as tears begin to stream down my face.
Had the privilege of singing this piece on tour many years ago, the summer after I almost lost my then 7-year-old son in an accident. Never got through it without tears streaming. It was cathartic, almost therapeutic.
Also, I believe Whitacre himself said that he cannot conduct this piece in its entirety without breaking down. You KNOW a composer has written a true masterpiece when he can't hear it without truly feeling the music. Just one of the reasons he's AWESOME. :)
You can fully understand the depth of the piece when you understand the text that is being set. When you look at the Biblical account of Absalom and David, you can tell that David dearly loves his son. Nevertheless, when Absalom rises up against his father, David is forced to go to war with him. David tells his generals not to kill Absalom, but they don't listen. Instead, when they find Absalom hanging by his hair in a tree, they murder him. This text comes from when David learns about Absalom's death. It so perfectly captures the realization, grief, sorry, anger, and other emotions that David surely felt at learning this news. Then, David is forced to set aside his sorrow and lead the people of Israel in a joyous celebration of the defeat of his son. The piece truly highlights this scripture and story.
Bryan McDonald thank you so much for the context of this piece. I’ve always loved it as it so perfectly encapsulates so many emotions but I did not understand the story behind this until now. I’m not very familiar with the Bible so I don’t know the story.
So given the context, it's interesting how the diversity of the voices shows the spurt of contradictory feelings, the female ones tinted with maternal instinct, male ones full of grief, etc This story is really about the contradiction of being a human with a family, blood links, especially those of parenthood, and the duty as a king, a sort of living god, of being a political father to a whole community. The dysfonction in David's story is that the two duties clash in the most horrible way, with the impossibility of a peaceful reunion : the generals kill Absalom despite his orders. It shows the cruel but pragmatic political and religious principle that a chief of the state must always sacrifice his well-being to that of his people in order to justify his status.
@@kaitlynamira3916 This piece actually has a deeper meaning as to why EW also composed this piece. It was a tribute to Dr.Staheli for his son died in a car crash as well. He was 19 when he passed away. classicalexburns.com/2018/06/09/eric-whitacre-when-david-heard-choral-catharsis/ thelspin.blogspot.com/2011/07/when-david-heard.html
"wept" in the beginning when they just found out their son died 0:50 VS "wept" at the end after mourning him 16:18. In fact, that whole section is a complete shift in tone because of the new soprano line, but you can still hear and feel the sorrow below in the rest of the chord; it gives the song a sense of emotional complexity.
I love how he uses the overtones to make it sound like the soprano is belting out a high C, and when it finally happens, wow. Plus, the dissonance wow...I love how Eric Whitacre isn't afraid of half steps. The suspense with the mass choir sections are so powerful and amazing at putting despair and anguish into music. This is a piece that everyone needs to enjoy! There is so much to dig apart!
+Jesse Johnson I know! I'm glad I'm not the only one to notice that. I think the version with the BYU Singers has better overtones, but the Soprano in this version who hits the high notes is much stronger.
And how about the second soprano part with c's against a b flat chord. Unresolved in the first section but then repurposed as suspensions in the second! Amazing! It adds so much movement and beauty to that climactic section.
I know right I also love that when when the tenor sings the high A it encapsulates the agony of the father. This is true text painting. This is a really beautiful piece. Eric Whitacre never ceases to amaze me. I love singing his pieces in choir. It's just amazing
I had the privilege of singing this in college. Once you know your part, it's just a matter of learning the flow (and, of course, watching your director). It's somehow even more beautiful and heartbreaking to be in the middle of the sound. The only reason a good chunk of our choir didn't break down mid-performance was because we'd broken down in rehearsal so many times. Now that some time has passed, though... Thanks for posting this.
I didn't realize that 18 minutes had passed until after I finished listening through the entire work. I was so pulled into the music that time became irrelevant. THAT is good music.
@@DreamlessSleepwalker Obviously you don’t understand how hard it is to compose such emotional and moving music, much less find really meaningful words for the music! Eric Whitacre’s music is poetry in it of itself!
2:50 - O, Absalom... that solo line, floating into the silence, the darkness. You have to be a parent for this piece to pierce you through in its fulness of beauty and grief.
This is a great piece to analyze due to its slow nature. Easy to really witness his brilliance. God those overtones too. Really wish I was in a group singing this piece.
I'm no expert on acoustics, but I do know that overtones can play off each other in really intriguing ways. Whitacre presents a slew of dissonant harmonies that, when sung in tune, can create overtones that change the color and even add new pitches to the crunchy sonorities. This is a staple technique of his and it really works most effectively with choirs, because the human voice is so good at blending its timbre into what is surrounding it. There are certainly many other reasons why it is a solid compositional technique, but as I disclaimed, I am no expert on the mechanics of sound. It's a treat for the ears, and having sung a few Whitacre pieces with some highly skilled choirs, I have to say it's a treat to sing as well.
@@AlbertBalbastreMorte Perhaps someone else has answered already, but begin listening at 11:31 and watch the score in the 2nd and 4th measures of page 20 (I think 141 and 143). The highest note actually being sung is a D in the sopranos. The last time I listened I heard a very clear high C. Then, in measure 145 on page 21, the sopranos do sing the high C. The first two are overtones. Unfortunately, I'm not hearing it today, so I think hearing overtones is all a matter of the brain perceiving them.
@@marykalinosky90 I put it through a spectrogram. There is no "high C overtone" being produced there (in this recording). Why would a sung D create an overtone a seventh above? That really doesn't make sense in the overtone series.
@@DrChrisF I wasn't suggesting the D creates the C overtone. I am hearing a high C in measures 141 and 143, but it's not there in the score, so I'm pretty sure it's an overtone, but it could be my brain creating it. See Jesse Johnson's comment below. He also hears it.
Hearing this song before, it never really resonated with me. However, this time around, the full emotion of the song just slapped me in the face. Something about actually seeing the notes and imagining Eric sitting at his desk working on this piece for hours just made it that more real. I suddenly understand why Eric says this is such a hard piece for him to conduct. The meticulous grace that went into selecting each note is just stunning.
Something I love about Whitacre, is his amazing talent for painting pictures with notes. I love how, in this work, he uses juxtaposition of rhythms to portray the anguish that David feels for his son's death, like shock and confusion. He goes even further by providing some terrace dynamics from pianissimo to forte, just like a parent would suddenly cry out for their child-amazing. He does similar things in Leonardo Dreams, and I am taken aback by it EVERY.SINGLE.TIME.
Well if you've seen his Interview he actually says he can't ever rehearse this song in full cause he actually cries he also stated that he has to really feel the song (or something along those lines) so he goes into the moment and him having a son feels that pain (his son as far as I know is completely fine)
I was one of the only sopranos in my chorus that could consistently hit every note, and I'll be honest thats probably the greatest accomplishment of my life 😩
The notes of this peiece are similar to the ones I had to hit as a SOP 1 in prayer of the children and my loves like a red red rose. Not terrible but definitely challenging. Go you!
I tried to sing along on the baritone 1 line and quickly learned that, in this song, it is incredibly difficult to sing the right notes because of all the cluster chords and different moving parts all at once. However, I don't even care because this song is *so* beautiful!
It takes some time to learn to sing dissonance with confidence. Rehearsing this genre of music daily will help you reach the point where you "feel" the dissonances "click into place" and dissonant melodic intervals will begin to feel as natural to you as the "right" notes in major chords you learned so many years ago.
More than a masterpiece. That moment of trying not to believe it, (it can’t be, it can’t be) and then forced over the event horizon, bursting, flooding…into the painful truth. How is it possible that someone found a way to paint that with tones?.. I can’t believe this piece exists. So far above anything I’ve ever heard. I have not experienced true grief but something like this, makes me feel like I know exactly what to expect.
When the tone clusters are so lit, the rehearsal staves look like someone took a Sharpie and drew some lines. When the tone clusters are so lit, your printer runs out of ink before you can get the whole piece printed.
When the tone clusters are so lit, the midi file consumes too much disc space. When the tone clusters are so lit, you can use your forearm to play them on the piano. When the tone clusters are so lit, the singers go to the optometrist because they think they see double. I guess this is the new generation of "your mom is so fat..." jokes now? :)
One of the coolest moments for me is the crescendo at 124. A little after 10:33, I always thought there was a subtle chord change just from listening. Looking at the sheet music now, I see the chord is the same but with certain voices starting to "peek out" above the others, most notably the F5 above the E5 in soprano 1 and the G3 above the F3 in bass 1. It makes the resolution at 132 all the more intense.
Indeed. I think someone pointed out that it might've been from mixing two separate takes from this together, but that pitch change builds so much tension!
Hey! Ik this is from three years ago, but I wanna tell ya what happened! The E's and G's in the cluster had gone sharper in tuning to clash harsher with F's and A's, giving that anguish feeling we all feel while listening 👂😭👍 Edit: oh yeah, this might've been two takes, but that can be a true technique in choral music!
Hands down Whitacre's strongest piece. Hit has a tonal center that he toys with for such a long time, but doesn't arrive there until the piece allows David to fully weep and break down. He vocalizes the pain and agony of losing a child, and the dissonance finally resolving when David breaks down and screams my son is unrivaled in anything else he's written.
Those soprano notes at 11:57 give me chills every time. The alto part in this song is one of my favorites of all time. Another incredible, emotional masterpiece by Whitacre. 😍❤️
I cry everytime I listen to this. I've been missing something like this from my life. I have been provided something beautiful in this. Sincerely, an atheist brought to tears by the beauty of this ♥️
We sang portions of this piece for state contest in high school. It was one of the most emotional pieces we did and it really connected us to one another. Especially because we were a pretty small group, some of the parts only had a few people on them. I'm a very empathetic person and a Christian, and when I would think about the things we were singing, it really connected me to David, which is a truly incredible thing. A number of times I found tears streaming down my face while we were practicing or performing.
Love the dissonance he uses with the D minor tone clusters, then when he finally goes into straight into that D minor chord at 2:17. Just wow…. The amount of despair yet also anger that is brought up by that chord is incredible.
Anyone else here from Fr. Mike Schmitz's Bible in a Year? I'm a huge choir nerd but never actually heard this piece until he recommended it. Wow, just wow. These 18 minutes were an EXPERIENCE. I hope I get to hear or sing this in person someday.
A friend sent this to me a while back, I love it. I'm actually starting bible in a year this coming January, I had no idea they were linked. Nice to see
When David heard that Absalom was slain he went up into his chamber over the gate and wept, my son, my son, O Absalom my son, would God I had died for thee!
yes. It's quite amazing what you can achieve when you give yourself all the time in the world (tempo-wise) as if time didn't exist at all. But here he gives it value like gold. This is a very cathartic work.
My ...what powerful music ....the emotion of grief unspeakable ...I could feel David's anguish ...I could see the the scene of him breaking down .... a silent scream ....my son....my son. Amazing composition. I was transfixed by this. Talking about bringing a Bible scene to life.
I know that when they rehearse it, Whitacre never does a full run-through of the piece. He only rehearses it in small sections at a time, and doesn't actually conduct it in its entirety until they're on stage and performing it at concert. During that, he has to 'emotionally detach' himself from the music and conduct it with an analytical approach. I watched a recording of him conducting a live performance on TH-cam. You could tell he's doing everything he can to fight back tears...
Pretty good for a piece that doesn't have a single accidental. I was fortunate enough to hear this piece as a student almost 20 years ago, in a small church, conducted by the man himself, in an "all-Whitacre" choral recital. This was before he really "blew up" in the choral world. Gosh, the piece must've been pretty fresh back then, recently written (the score says copyright 2000). After the piece finished, he turned to face the audience & bow, with tears streaming down his cheeks. He legit can't conduct it through without breaking down. Got to meet him afterwards, seems like a super chill dude. It was one of those life/career defining concert-going experience. As a professional musician, composer and now educator of 20+ years, I've been to a lot of concerts. But this one stands out in my memory as a highlight in my life. Great piece.
It took me three tries to be able to listen to this piece in its entirety, because I was already a sobbing wreck by about 2:17. I have NEVER heard such sheer pain and heartbreak come out in music so powerfully, anywhere else. I've heard sadness and sorrow, but this piece just *aches*.
While listening to this master piece and looking through the music as displayed. I don’t think I’ve ever come across music like this. It progressively gets better and better and better. Bar 124 is unbelievable. And then bar 140 again, my goodness and immediately after that a dramatic sequence. Oh how I love this. So much in one master piece. Truly the work of a genius…
Sometimes what David heard was painful. Sometimes what we all hear is painful. But we listen. And that is when we cry. Painful can be beautiful. Like Christ in Gethsemane.
While working on the accompaniment of the Bach Flute Sonata No.1 in b minor, S.1030, in analyzing it, it became apparent to me that Bach was writing the story of Gethsemane. I almost couldn't get through it after that, too emotional.
Wow, my second listen was a LOT more impactful than my first. I'm excited to see how much I end up liking this with repeated listens. I have a feeling it's going to be a lot.
This piece is even more moving knowing the relationship between David and Absalom and the historical background. Truly brought the story to life. The sopranos almost seemed to have mimicked what David's cry could have been like, weeping over his slain son. Breathtaking piece!
Just discovered this listening to BIAY with Father Mike Schmidt. I can see why he recommended listening to this. I'm teaching about the Bible next year to 9th graders, pray for me. I can't wait to have them listen to this powerful piece of music.
This is such an amazing piece to listen to and I'm sure the work put into performing this would be so difficult to not get emotional. Little Fact: My sister was in the BYU Singers choir and they received the last page from Mr. Whitacre the day that they recorded this. He actually attended the recording session as well. Pretty cool for them!
12:31 starts the depth of David’s mourning with it getting lower as he comes to terms with the death of his son. Eric is truly and god sent for this one.
I believe it's the style meant with the strong emotion... what I get a sense of is every time there's little parts adding together and building with dramatic and extremes in range it's giving the effect of the father weeping for his son
Oh, my goodness,! It's beautiful. At"My Son, My Son" repeated, brings tears to my eyes. 😢 You can hear David's pain. Thanks for sending me this piece. Love you.
Eric Whitacre is a complete and utter genius.There is an element to this piece that is so daunting. It is amazing that Eric captures the torment of loss. It is as if David is truly weeping. Only Eric knows how to use dissonance to create harmony, and through this he embodies the languish, torment, anger, and most of all the severe lament over the loss of a loved one. Wow. This song brings tears to my eyes, especially 15:36, the build up and suspense to 16:25 onward, wow!
Absolutely in awe following along with the music. I have known this piece for while and it is one of the pieces that made me decide to start composing. I hope some day I can create something as awe inspiring as this piece. Thanks for sharing this.
God damn, that was incredible! One of the most amazing things I've ever heard! Eric Whitacre is most definitely my favorite composer! And listen to the overtones that he creates creates with all that dissonance! That is skill right there!
Albert Balbastre-Morte look up Tartini tones. When two notes sound together and are perfectly tuned, human brains imagine they hear the sum and difference of those frequencies, which means that we hallucinate notes above and below any given perfectly tuned interval, here Whitacre has included those notes that we hallucinate into his composition.
@@ylonmc2 Engineers call the sum and difference frequencies "heterodynes" not "overtones". In a Fourier analysis of the composite waveform which results, we can deconstruct that (and any) waveform into a series of fundamental and harmonic frequencies, each with it's own amplitude and phase. Lots of math, but 100% accurate every time. Given that the frequency interval between half steps of the modern "equal tempered" diatonic scale is ¹²√2, which is an irrational number (1.059463094...) there is no mathematical ability to synthesize an exact pitch of any given note (except octaves of that note) from the heterodynes of any combination of other notes. Oh, and the sum and difference heterodynes are only created when processed through an non-linear system, and are considered to be "distortion products." The acoustic/mechanical/electro-chemical process of the human ear-brain sense of hearing is very non-linear and can produce a lot of distortion, which we learn to filter out using psycho-acoustic techniques in our perceptive abilities.
Not all recordings of pieces are meant to represent a full performance of the piece in one take. Many ensembles are recorded this way to minimize audible error and maximize the accuracy of the recording to what's on the page. This way, a "perfect" recording can be achieved without having to sing through the almost 18 minute piece several times. Doing so would not only be extremely time consuming, but would also wear out the performers very quickly.
The parts where the whole choir is almost in unison rhythmically except for the parts with the triplet that hangs just slightly over hit so much harder when you think of the context. It represents (at least in my interpretation) the chaos of grief that David is struggling to contain because he has to lead his people in their celebration. The dissonant mass choir parts are great and all, but these little touches are what make Eric Whitacre such a great composer.
Just finished reading and roughly analysing this work and my thoughts of it and oh man it is much moving. I think he dedicated this work to a conductor who had lost his son in an accident (from what I've heard in one of his interviews) and honestly if I were him conducting this I wouldn't be able to hold my emotions.
Lyrics: When David heard that Absalom was slain He went up into his chamber over the gate and wept And thus he said; My son, my son O Absalom my son Would God I had died for thee!
This was the first recording of this piece I ever heard, and therefore, it holds a special sacred place in my heart.. However, I HIGHLY suggest finding Polyphony's Cloudburst album and listening to their rendition of "When David Heard" At first, because I was used to this recording I was taken aback by their slightly faster tempos. I wasn't sure about it. However, over multiple listenings, It has come to be my definitive version of the piece. If this piece means half as much to you as it does to me, PLEASE CHECK IT OUT
as a listener, this is beautiful
as a vocalist, this is terrifying
Being a bass 2, would love to sing it!
exactly....
Me: This is beautiful; I’d love to sing this 🥺
*sees that it splits into maximum 18 parts*
😰😰😰😰😰😰
Yes terrifying to be a soprano @11:56 with the high c...not a lot of choral pieces go above an A but once in awhile sopranos hit a Bb or a B
@@Rednaxela137 that soprano part is exhilarating to sing and perform. High risk. Massive reward.
Quote from Whitacre, 18 years later: "This is a piece that continues to haunt me, all these years later, and still brings a tear to my eye, every time I come across it. Almost to the point that I can no longer listen, as tears begin to stream down my face.
Definitely his strongest piece compositionally I think.
@@myanrueller91 100%
Had the privilege of singing this piece on tour many years ago, the summer after I almost lost my then 7-year-old son in an accident. Never got through it without tears streaming. It was cathartic, almost therapeutic.
Also, I believe Whitacre himself said that he cannot conduct this piece in its entirety without breaking down. You KNOW a composer has written a true masterpiece when he can't hear it without truly feeling the music. Just one of the reasons he's AWESOME. :)
I can feel exactly why , it's so powerful, this was truly and totally divinely inspired, at the very very least
You can fully understand the depth of the piece when you understand the text that is being set. When you look at the Biblical account of Absalom and David, you can tell that David dearly loves his son. Nevertheless, when Absalom rises up against his father, David is forced to go to war with him. David tells his generals not to kill Absalom, but they don't listen. Instead, when they find Absalom hanging by his hair in a tree, they murder him. This text comes from when David learns about Absalom's death. It so perfectly captures the realization, grief, sorry, anger, and other emotions that David surely felt at learning this news. Then, David is forced to set aside his sorrow and lead the people of Israel in a joyous celebration of the defeat of his son. The piece truly highlights this scripture and story.
Bryan McDonald thank you so much for the context of this piece. I’ve always loved it as it so perfectly encapsulates so many emotions but I did not understand the story behind this until now. I’m not very familiar with the Bible so I don’t know the story.
So given the context, it's interesting how the diversity of the voices shows the spurt of contradictory feelings, the female ones tinted with maternal instinct, male ones full of grief, etc
This story is really about the contradiction of being a human with a family, blood links, especially those of parenthood, and the duty as a king, a sort of living god, of being a political father to a whole community. The dysfonction in David's story is that the two duties clash in the most horrible way, with the impossibility of a peaceful reunion : the generals kill Absalom despite his orders. It shows the cruel but pragmatic political and religious principle that a chief of the state must always sacrifice his well-being to that of his people in order to justify his status.
@@kaitlynamira3916
This piece actually has a deeper meaning as to why EW also composed this piece. It was a tribute to Dr.Staheli for his son died in a car crash as well. He was 19 when he passed away.
classicalexburns.com/2018/06/09/eric-whitacre-when-david-heard-choral-catharsis/
thelspin.blogspot.com/2011/07/when-david-heard.html
WOW, thank you for the context, made this piece 10x more powerful
Bible stories tend to be so barbaric...
"would god that I had died for thee"
Chills, every time.
"wept" in the beginning when they just found out their son died 0:50 VS "wept" at the end after mourning him 16:18. In fact, that whole section is a complete shift in tone because of the new soprano line, but you can still hear and feel the sorrow below in the rest of the chord; it gives the song a sense of emotional complexity.
So right, its amazing what a simple melodic change will do
I love how he uses the overtones to make it sound like the soprano is belting out a high C, and when it finally happens, wow. Plus, the dissonance wow...I love how Eric Whitacre isn't afraid of half steps. The suspense with the mass choir sections are so powerful and amazing at putting despair and anguish into music. This is a piece that everyone needs to enjoy! There is so much to dig apart!
+Jesse Johnson I know! I'm glad I'm not the only one to notice that. I think the version with the BYU Singers has better overtones, but the Soprano in this version who hits the high notes is much stronger.
Jesse Johnson YES! The first time I heard I jumped when I realized the third one wasn't only the overtones
And how about the second soprano part with c's against a b flat chord. Unresolved in the first section but then repurposed as suspensions in the second! Amazing! It adds so much movement and beauty to that climactic section.
How do overtones work in this occasion? Thanks
I know right I also love that when when the tenor sings the high A it encapsulates the agony of the father. This is true text painting. This is a really beautiful piece. Eric Whitacre never ceases to amaze me. I love singing his pieces in choir. It's just amazing
I had the privilege of singing this in college. Once you know your part, it's just a matter of learning the flow (and, of course, watching your director). It's somehow even more beautiful and heartbreaking to be in the middle of the sound. The only reason a good chunk of our choir didn't break down mid-performance was because we'd broken down in rehearsal so many times. Now that some time has passed, though...
Thanks for posting this.
Have a good life
I didn't realize that 18 minutes had passed until after I finished listening through the entire work. I was so pulled into the music that time became irrelevant. THAT is good music.
18 minutes is a pretty short time to begin with
It repeats my son over and over and over again. This is because Composers are not poets.
@@DreamlessSleepwalker It doesn't need to be poetry. The intent of the repetition perfectly encapsulates the lament of a grieving father in denial.
@@DreamlessSleepwalker I believe he wrote it for a friend whose son had died.
@@DreamlessSleepwalker Obviously you don’t understand how hard it is to compose such emotional and moving music, much less find really meaningful words for the music! Eric Whitacre’s music is poetry in it of itself!
Maybe the closest a piece has ever come to depicting the sheer horror of grief. Every time I hear this piece, I weep like David for his son.
If you want to test headphones/speakers this is the song to do it with.
Aaron Reynolds read this and just grabbed my new apple earphones out of their box to finally test them out. Thank you
True that ... 🤣
Broke mine
*me, breaking down at the electronics store 😅
Haha
2:50 - O, Absalom... that solo line, floating into the silence, the darkness. You have to be a parent for this piece to pierce you through in its fulness of beauty and grief.
It is one of the most difficult tonal choir pieces ever written in this length, but it sounds beautiful.
This is a great piece to analyze due to its slow nature. Easy to really witness his brilliance. God those overtones too. Really wish I was in a group singing this piece.
Can we develop a little about the overtones?
I'm no expert on acoustics, but I do know that overtones can play off each other in really intriguing ways. Whitacre presents a slew of dissonant harmonies that, when sung in tune, can create overtones that change the color and even add new pitches to the crunchy sonorities. This is a staple technique of his and it really works most effectively with choirs, because the human voice is so good at blending its timbre into what is surrounding it. There are certainly many other reasons why it is a solid compositional technique, but as I disclaimed, I am no expert on the mechanics of sound. It's a treat for the ears, and having sung a few Whitacre pieces with some highly skilled choirs, I have to say it's a treat to sing as well.
@@AlbertBalbastreMorte Perhaps someone else has answered already, but begin listening at 11:31 and watch the score in the 2nd and 4th measures of page 20 (I think 141 and 143). The highest note actually being sung is a D in the sopranos. The last time I listened I heard a very clear high C. Then, in measure 145 on page 21, the sopranos do sing the high C. The first two are overtones. Unfortunately, I'm not hearing it today, so I think hearing overtones is all a matter of the brain perceiving them.
@@marykalinosky90 I put it through a spectrogram. There is no "high C overtone" being produced there (in this recording). Why would a sung D create an overtone a seventh above? That really doesn't make sense in the overtone series.
@@DrChrisF I wasn't suggesting the D creates the C overtone. I am hearing a high C in measures 141 and 143, but it's not there in the score, so I'm pretty sure it's an overtone, but it could be my brain creating it. See Jesse Johnson's comment below. He also hears it.
Hearing this song before, it never really resonated with me. However, this time around, the full emotion of the song just slapped me in the face. Something about actually seeing the notes and imagining Eric sitting at his desk working on this piece for hours just made it that more real. I suddenly understand why Eric says this is such a hard piece for him to conduct. The meticulous grace that went into selecting each note is just stunning.
15 months he worked on it. That's a lot of hours!
Something I love about Whitacre, is his amazing talent for painting pictures with notes. I love how, in this work, he uses juxtaposition of rhythms to portray the anguish that David feels for his son's death, like shock and confusion. He goes even further by providing some terrace dynamics from pianissimo to forte, just like a parent would suddenly cry out for their child-amazing. He does similar things in Leonardo Dreams, and I am taken aback by it EVERY.SINGLE.TIME.
Well if you've seen his Interview he actually says he can't ever rehearse this song in full cause he actually cries he also stated that he has to really feel the song (or something along those lines) so he goes into the moment and him having a son feels that pain (his son as far as I know is completely fine)
I was one of the only sopranos in my chorus that could consistently hit every note, and I'll be honest thats probably the greatest accomplishment of my life 😩
The notes of this peiece are similar to the ones I had to hit as a SOP 1 in prayer of the children and my loves like a red red rose. Not terrible but definitely challenging. Go you!
I tried to sing along on the baritone 1 line and quickly learned that, in this song, it is incredibly difficult to sing the right notes because of all the cluster chords and different moving parts all at once. However, I don't even care because this song is *so* beautiful!
Singing bass 2 makes this a lot easier for me.
It takes some time to learn to sing dissonance with confidence. Rehearsing this genre of music daily will help you reach the point where you "feel" the dissonances "click into place" and dissonant melodic intervals will begin to feel as natural to you as the "right" notes in major chords you learned so many years ago.
@@megaman02468 bass 2 gang
@@croatiancowboybass 2 gang
We performed this song in high-school, it was incredible yet also difficult to master. It takes MANY hours to perfect.
More than a masterpiece. That moment of trying not to believe it, (it can’t be, it can’t be) and then forced over the event horizon, bursting, flooding…into the painful truth. How is it possible that someone found a way to paint that with tones?.. I can’t believe this piece exists. So far above anything I’ve ever heard. I have not experienced true grief but something like this, makes me feel like I know exactly what to expect.
When the tone clusters are so lit, the rehearsal staves look like someone took a Sharpie and drew some lines.
When the tone clusters are so lit, your printer runs out of ink before you can get the whole piece printed.
When the tone clusters are so lit, the midi file consumes too much disc space.
When the tone clusters are so lit, you can use your forearm to play them on the piano.
When the tone clusters are so lit, the singers go to the optometrist because they think they see double.
I guess this is the new generation of "your mom is so fat..." jokes now? :)
One of the coolest moments for me is the crescendo at 124. A little after 10:33, I always thought there was a subtle chord change just from listening. Looking at the sheet music now, I see the chord is the same but with certain voices starting to "peek out" above the others, most notably the F5 above the E5 in soprano 1 and the G3 above the F3 in bass 1. It makes the resolution at 132 all the more intense.
Indeed. I think someone pointed out that it might've been from mixing two separate takes from this together, but that pitch change builds so much tension!
Hey! Ik this is from three years ago, but I wanna tell ya what happened! The E's and G's in the cluster had gone sharper in tuning to clash harsher with F's and A's, giving that anguish feeling we all feel while listening 👂😭👍
Edit: oh yeah, this might've been two takes, but that can be a true technique in choral music!
That high A the tenor line has scared the jeebus out of me at measure 69:O
The sopranos jump up to a High C a couple times as well .-. I could never
6:16
@Kribo Kitchen it'll suck for me I need to sing all of this as a freshmen in highschool
Hands down Whitacre's strongest piece. Hit has a tonal center that he toys with for such a long time, but doesn't arrive there until the piece allows David to fully weep and break down. He vocalizes the pain and agony of losing a child, and the dissonance finally resolving when David breaks down and screams my son is unrivaled in anything else he's written.
Those soprano notes at 11:57 give me chills every time. The alto part in this song is one of my favorites of all time. Another incredible, emotional masterpiece by Whitacre. 😍❤️
This is my favorite work by him. You can't listen without shedding a tear.
I listened and was bored.
Your opinion. Not everyone's. Have a nice day :)
And Sam Meyer, I couldn't agree more :)
I think it's really good but my favorite is definitely Hurt
I cry everytime I listen to this. I've been missing something like this from my life. I have been provided something beautiful in this. Sincerely, an atheist brought to tears by the beauty of this ♥️
We sang portions of this piece for state contest in high school. It was one of the most emotional pieces we did and it really connected us to one another. Especially because we were a pretty small group, some of the parts only had a few people on them. I'm a very empathetic person and a Christian, and when I would think about the things we were singing, it really connected me to David, which is a truly incredible thing. A number of times I found tears streaming down my face while we were practicing or performing.
1:20 to 2:30... dear lord. Never fails to give me waves of chills.
at 9:17 starts the best part in my opinion, all the buildup, all the delivery.
Love the dissonance he uses with the D minor tone clusters, then when he finally goes into straight into that D minor chord at 2:17. Just wow…. The amount of despair yet also anger that is brought up by that chord is incredible.
Anyone else here from Fr. Mike Schmitz's Bible in a Year? I'm a huge choir nerd but never actually heard this piece until he recommended it. Wow, just wow. These 18 minutes were an EXPERIENCE. I hope I get to hear or sing this in person someday.
A friend sent this to me a while back, I love it. I'm actually starting bible in a year this coming January, I had no idea they were linked. Nice to see
My husband and I also found this heartbreaking piece because of Fr. Mike. The emotions are so powerful 😭✝️
When David heard that Absalom was slain he went up into his chamber over the gate and wept, my son, my son, O Absalom my son, would God I had died for thee!
Whitacre's dissonance is truly the most beautiful dissonance ever.
I'm waiting for the Netflix miniseries to come out telling the story of Absalom... with this song in it.
That sounds amazing!
I hope you’re telling the truth with this comment. Cause that would be the most riveting moment in the show.
Holy jeez i'm having chills
12:13 gives me chills every. time. Whitacre is simply genius. You can feel the anguish throughout the piece.
This piece is an absolute beauty, ironically I love the use of silence in this piece.
yes. It's quite amazing what you can achieve when you give yourself all the time in the world (tempo-wise) as if time didn't exist at all. But here he gives it value like gold. This is a very cathartic work.
I completely agree! The pauses are so well conceived and placed. Grief is often just like this--over time, often even years.
6:17 when the tenors sing "O" ff is great
One of my favorite parts of the piece, that's coming from a B2, they are so awesome.
There is no way that any human being could even conceive of this...
Yet here it is
My ...what powerful music ....the emotion of grief unspeakable ...I could feel David's anguish ...I could see the the scene of him breaking down .... a silent scream ....my son....my son. Amazing composition. I was transfixed by this. Talking about bringing a Bible scene to life.
I know that when they rehearse it, Whitacre never does a full run-through of the piece. He only rehearses it in small sections at a time, and doesn't actually conduct it in its entirety until they're on stage and performing it at concert. During that, he has to 'emotionally detach' himself from the music and conduct it with an analytical approach.
I watched a recording of him conducting a live performance on TH-cam. You could tell he's doing everything he can to fight back tears...
Got a link for that video?
@@beckettstevens9529 th-cam.com/video/0JaiSGAZfW4/w-d-xo.html
15:45
@@Maddenhawk Thanks!
The greatest choral composer of the late 20th and early 21st century. The unresolved chord at bar 19 is absolute genius!
I love this song, I just can't stop listening to it. It's one of the view pieces I would call truly haunting
Pretty good for a piece that doesn't have a single accidental.
I was fortunate enough to hear this piece as a student almost 20 years ago, in a small church, conducted by the man himself, in an "all-Whitacre" choral recital. This was before he really "blew up" in the choral world. Gosh, the piece must've been pretty fresh back then, recently written (the score says copyright 2000). After the piece finished, he turned to face the audience & bow, with tears streaming down his cheeks. He legit can't conduct it through without breaking down. Got to meet him afterwards, seems like a super chill dude. It was one of those life/career defining concert-going experience. As a professional musician, composer and now educator of 20+ years, I've been to a lot of concerts. But this one stands out in my memory as a highlight in my life. Great piece.
It took me three tries to be able to listen to this piece in its entirety, because I was already a sobbing wreck by about 2:17. I have NEVER heard such sheer pain and heartbreak come out in music so powerfully, anywhere else. I've heard sadness and sorrow, but this piece just *aches*.
While listening to this master piece and looking through the music as displayed. I don’t think I’ve ever come across music like this. It progressively gets better and better and better. Bar 124 is unbelievable. And then bar 140 again, my goodness and immediately after that a dramatic sequence. Oh how I love this. So much in one master piece. Truly the work of a genius…
Sometimes what David heard was painful. Sometimes what we all hear is painful. But we listen. And that is when we cry. Painful can be beautiful. Like Christ in Gethsemane.
While working on the accompaniment of the Bach Flute Sonata No.1 in b minor, S.1030, in analyzing it, it became apparent to me that Bach was writing the story of Gethsemane. I almost couldn't get through it after that, too emotional.
Wow, my second listen was a LOT more impactful than my first. I'm excited to see how much I end up liking this with repeated listens. I have a feeling it's going to be a lot.
Glad you're enjoying it! :D
This piece is even more moving knowing the relationship between David and Absalom and the historical background. Truly brought the story to life. The sopranos almost seemed to have mimicked what David's cry could have been like, weeping over his slain son. Breathtaking piece!
Eric may turn out to be our modern day Gesualdo. This is powerful stuff.
You can hear the grief in the 17 part chords.... It makes you feel the intensity and confusion of what David might have been feeling.
Just discovered this listening to BIAY with Father Mike Schmidt. I can see why he recommended listening to this. I'm teaching about the Bible next year to 9th graders, pray for me. I can't wait to have them listen to this powerful piece of music.
TEARS ARE STREAMING RN
+Andrew H. i feel you bro
My choir director showed us this song and we all sat alone, i cried. This is just crazy.
This is such an amazing piece to listen to and I'm sure the work put into performing this would be so difficult to not get emotional.
Little Fact:
My sister was in the BYU Singers choir and they received the last page from Mr. Whitacre the day that they recorded this. He actually attended the recording session as well. Pretty cool for them!
After listening to and reading The Bible in a year with Fr. Mike S., he recommended to look this up. I’m glad I did.
The same with me. Fr. Mike is an amazing priest ✝️🙏
12:31 starts the depth of David’s mourning with it getting lower as he comes to terms with the death of his son. Eric is truly and god sent for this one.
I believe it's the style meant with the strong emotion... what I get a sense of is every time there's little parts adding together and building with dramatic and extremes in range it's giving the effect of the father weeping for his son
The epitome of a musical expression of grief for a dearly loved one! Bravo and amen!
Oh, my goodness,! It's beautiful. At"My Son, My Son" repeated, brings tears to my eyes. 😢 You can hear David's pain. Thanks for sending me this piece. Love you.
I wish I could give this more than one like
I still can't listen to this song without shedding a tear or two...
I'm so glad Eric put himself through what he did for all those months to write this ABSOLutely beautiful piece.
Just...gorgeous. Gives me chills. You can feel the sorrow in this piece.
Eric Whitacre is a complete and utter genius.There is an element to this piece that is so daunting. It is amazing that Eric captures the torment of loss. It is as if David is truly weeping. Only Eric knows how to use dissonance to create harmony, and through this he embodies the languish, torment, anger, and most of all the severe lament over the loss of a loved one. Wow. This song brings tears to my eyes, especially 15:36, the build up and suspense to 16:25 onward, wow!
I had the pleasure of doing this in choir and while it nearly ended my life it was the most incredible feeling ever
Simply Beautiful !!!!
Absolutely in awe following along with the music. I have known this piece for while and it is one of the pieces that made me decide to start composing. I hope some day I can create something as awe inspiring as this piece. Thanks for sharing this.
11:06 - 11:30 , that high note ties it all together perfectly
Absolutely. Hauntingly. Beautiful.
God damn, that was incredible! One of the most amazing things I've ever heard! Eric Whitacre is most definitely my favorite composer! And listen to the overtones that he creates creates with all that dissonance! That is skill right there!
Hi there. Can you develop a little about the overtones?
Albert Balbastre-Morte look up Tartini tones. When two notes sound together and are perfectly tuned, human brains imagine they hear the sum and difference of those frequencies, which means that we hallucinate notes above and below any given perfectly tuned interval, here Whitacre has included those notes that we hallucinate into his composition.
@@ylonmc2 Engineers call the sum and difference frequencies "heterodynes" not "overtones". In a Fourier analysis of the composite waveform which results, we can deconstruct that (and any) waveform into a series of fundamental and harmonic frequencies, each with it's own amplitude and phase. Lots of math, but 100% accurate every time.
Given that the frequency interval between half steps of the modern "equal tempered" diatonic scale is ¹²√2, which is an irrational number (1.059463094...) there is no mathematical ability to synthesize an exact pitch of any given note (except octaves of that note) from the heterodynes of any combination of other notes.
Oh, and the sum and difference heterodynes are only created when processed through an non-linear system, and are considered to be "distortion products." The acoustic/mechanical/electro-chemical process of the human ear-brain sense of hearing is very non-linear and can produce a lot of distortion, which we learn to filter out using psycho-acoustic techniques in our perceptive abilities.
Not all recordings of pieces are meant to represent a full performance of the piece in one take. Many ensembles are recorded this way to minimize audible error and maximize the accuracy of the recording to what's on the page. This way, a "perfect" recording can be achieved without having to sing through the almost 18 minute piece several times. Doing so would not only be extremely time consuming, but would also wear out the performers very quickly.
Great fresh music !
The parts where the whole choir is almost in unison rhythmically except for the parts with the triplet that hangs just slightly over hit so much harder when you think of the context. It represents (at least in my interpretation) the chaos of grief that David is struggling to contain because he has to lead his people in their celebration. The dissonant mass choir parts are great and all, but these little touches are what make Eric Whitacre such a great composer.
One of the most Beautiful songs I've ever heard. Simply overwhelming!
Just finished reading and roughly analysing this work and my thoughts of it and oh man it is much moving. I think he dedicated this work to a conductor who had lost his son in an accident (from what I've heard in one of his interviews) and honestly if I were him conducting this I wouldn't be able to hold my emotions.
I feel myself on a huge rollercoaster. Page 16 through 19 climbing and the page 20 is the top of the hill.
I'm happy to sing this! This choir is amazing!
Thank you, Whitacre!
If TH-cam did a wrapped playlist like Spotify does this would be at the top of mine
Absolutely love this. Such divine food for the soul. Thank you sincerely
a masterpiece! had me in tears by the second minute
I am about halfway into this piece, and I am about ready weep any moment now!
STUNNING!!
This is the best recording of this piece I have ever heard. Just profound.
If this doesn't give you goosebumps I don't know what will
This piece of music is so strong, that for years now, anytime I hear the two words "my son" in any context, of have to think of this.
5:15 alto is so amazing, look at those jumps. So difficult
Yes, not easy at all for singers, but the lines are so beautiful!
2019... have heard this when it was 2012... but the wave of emotion when listening to it ... overwhelming ...
Lyrics:
When David heard that Absalom was slain
He went up into his chamber over the gate and wept
And thus he said;
My son, my son
O Absalom my son
Would God I had died for thee!
This is the toughest piece by him for any singer. We are doing it this week!!!!
Wow, I was not planning getting this emotional from this piece
the imagery in this is remarkable.
This was the first recording of this piece I ever heard, and therefore, it holds a special sacred place in my heart..
However, I HIGHLY suggest finding Polyphony's Cloudburst album and listening to their rendition of "When David Heard"
At first, because I was used to this recording I was taken aback by their slightly faster tempos. I wasn't sure about it.
However, over multiple listenings, It has come to be my definitive version of the piece.
If this piece means half as much to you as it does to me, PLEASE CHECK IT OUT
11:42 is the best part
holy crap this is a masterpiece
9:30 youll thank me later. everytime i listen to this i get goosebumps.
Measure 145 - instant tears!
the part where they change tuning is absolutely magical (10:35)
Que pour la beauté écrite de l'émotion, merci.
I would kill to be able to sing this with my highschool choir.
Absolutely in love with the soprano 1 part😍😍 I sing soprano 1😍😍🎶🎼🎶🎼