This is a day in which I am having my cake (albeit wedding cake) and eating it, too. Ruthie and I were married on Friday, December 27, 1974, 45 years ago. We chose this day for a couple of reasons. It allowed for about a week between my college graduation and our wedding, and, we would have a church adorned in Christmas decorations. One other factor is that many would be on Christmas vacation which allowed more people to be at our wedding.
Over the years, I have composed 6 musical compositions in honor of Ruthie, five piano compositions and 1 choral composition. One of those songs was composed as a Christmas present for her. I will lead with that song.
The song I composed for Ruthie was a musical portrait of the Presentation of Jesus in the Temple (also known as Candlemas). Here is the story from Luke’s Gospel.
“When the time came for their purification according to the law of Moses, they brought him up to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord (as it is written in the law of the Lord, “Every firstborn male shall be designated as holy to the Lord”), and they offered a sacrifice according to what is stated in the law of the Lord, “a pair of turtledoves or two young pigeons.” … Guided by the Spirit, Simeon came into the temple; and when the parents brought in the child Jesus, to do for him what was customary under the law, Simeon took him in his arms and praised God, saying, “Master, now you are dismissing your servant in peace, according to your word; for my eyes have seen your salvation, which you have prepared in the presence of all peoples, a light for revelation to the Gentiles and for glory to your people Israel.” And the child’s father and mother were amazed at what was being said about him.” (Luke 2:22-24, 27-33. NRSV)
As the Lucan account of the story tells us, while there, the family encounters Simeon, who gives praise to God for having lived to see the birth of the Messiah, as he expresses in his great Canticle “Nunc Dimittis”. The Holy Family also encounters the prophetess, Anna.
Melody A, introduces the Holy Family arriving at the Temple. Melody B is Simeon and Anna viewing Jesus and talking with Mary. Melody A returns to conclude the music, as the Holy Family leaves the Temple and ponders what was told to them by Simeon.
This love song to Ruthie was composed in 1990. I tried to place in the song the mysterious qualities she possesses, the beauty of her soul, her physical beauty expressed in these simple notes, melody, and rhythm. There is none that can compare to my Ruth. She embodies for me all that is good and is the living expression of God to me. In other words, what Simeon saw in the infant Jesus, I have seen in my wife, Ruth.
THE REST OF THE SONGS FOR RUTHIE …
This song, the first one dedicated to Ruth, I composed as a piano etude for my college music theory/composition class. An etude is simply a finger exercise piece teaching certain skills for performance, e.g. scales, arpeggios and so on. Some, like the Czerny Etudes are pretty utilitarian, and others, like Chopin’s Etudes are musical compositions in their own right.
This song literally came to me in a dream. I woke up, drew a staff on a blank piece of paper and quickly noted down on the paper what I heard in my dream. Several years later, I added the middle section of the music to the song. I always intended the song for Ruth, and gave it to her in 1974. Fast forward 44 years later, I played it for Ruth. She thought it was a brand new composition. She had forgotten that it was composed for her back in 1974. So for her it was a brand new piece in her honor.
This song was composed for Ruthie on our 10th wedding anniversary. Our daughter, Beth, had been born 11 months earlier on January 11th. I had been binge listening to Aaron Copland compositions, particularly his ballet, Appalachian Spring (a ballet about an Appalachian wedding). I decided to compose a fugue (a la Johann Sebastian Bach) in the manner of Aaron Copland. I used all the compositional techniques in composing a fugue, subject, retrograde, bridges, augmentation, etc in this music. While Ruthie was not necessarily impressed by the compositional finesse placed into the song, she enjoyed it. The music expresses the great joy and celebration I felt in being married to this most remarkable woman.
This song was composed for Ruth in 2016. On my birthday that year, I presented Ruthie, our children Andy, Luke, Meg, Beth, and my daughter-in-law, Olivia, songs I composed for them as a present. They gift me every day with their presence, and I felt compelled to thank them for sharing their lives with me.
I composed a special song for our wedding Mass in 1974, sung at our wedding by a good friend and voice major from the College of St Catherine, Diane Strafelda. The melody was inspired by an aria entitled, “Dido’s Lament”, from the Baroque opera Dido and Aeneas, written by the English composer, Henry Purcell. I was tremendously moved when I heard that aria for the first time. As a young man, deeply in love and filled with grand illusions of our romantic relationship taking on the mythic qualities of that of “Dido and Aeneas” and “Tristan and Isolde”, I sought out to compose a melody as deeply moving as Purcell’s aria. I set the melody to a familiar text from the Book of Ruth in the Bible, “Set me as a seal on your heart” (Ironically, it was spoken by Ruth not to her husband, who had died, but by Ruth to her mother-in-law, Naomi, who was also a widow).
Over time, the score for my wedding song to Ruthie got lost. However, I did not forget the melody. So in 2016, I set out to recreate from memory, the song I composed so many years before for our wedding. In reimaging the song for piano, I added a middle section. This is what a wrote about the song at that time in 2016.
“Overall, it expresses in music my relationship with Ruth over the past 45 years [note: we started dating in 1969]. The primary melody retains the great passion I feel toward Ruth. It starts simply in the lower register like one lover expressing his love to his intended. It is restated in the higher register, his lover reciprocating his affection than moves to a middle section where the couples love for each grows until the primary melody returns in chordal octaves, a passionate expression of love consummated, then peace as the lovers begin life together.
“The middle section is the dance of the couple as they work, have children, raise their children, and the demands of life attempts to pull them in all directions. However, in the midst of the hustle and bustle of that dance, the love and the passion the couple have for one another does not fade as the primary melody is joined into the dance.
“The song concludes to a simple restatement of the love that began many years before, intact, and filled with nothing but gratitude of a life together.”
The fifth and final song of this post was composed in 2018 for Ruthie. I consider it as one of my finest piano songs.
Ever since the time I first heard the Dave Brubeck Quartet’s jazz hit “Take Five”, I have considered 5/4 meter my favorite meter signature. Now I am sure that everyone has a favorite meter signature. They just don’t know it nor think it important. Most of our songs are composed in 3/4 time (think a waltz), or in 2/4 or 4/4 time (think marches, blues, polkas, most rock songs, love songs etc). We are used to hearing songs that a feeling of 3 beats, 2 beats, or 4 beats to a measure in most of the music we love to hear.
5/4 time is much different. When you have 5 beats to a measure, the accents can fall unpredictably on any of the 5 beats in that measure. I try to tell people that it is like dancing with a third leg. It just feels different, exotic, special. I only compose the most special melodies for special people in 5/4 time.
Now that you are totally bored by this musical dissertation, Here is the song I consider the best of all the music I have composed for Ruthie over our 45 years of marriage together. She is the most special person in my life and she deserved the most special song with the most special meter. When I gave it to her in 2018, she loved it. Will there be any more songs for her? I have plans on setting my favorite psalm (Psalm 84 “how lovely is your dwelling place”) as a 9 or 10 song piano cycle for Ruth this year.
Here is Ruthie’s song, Psalm Offering 9 Opus 9.
If ever you wish to download or stream my music, you can find and hear it on Spotify, Pandora, YouTube, or purchase it on Amazon, iTunes, and a CD Baby.
