On the whole I found boarding school a period of uninterrupted boredom, though took some relief each morning in compulsory attendance at the school chapel. Though I don’t consider myself a believer I’ve always loved churches for the architecture and the music.
Later when I spent a year in Paris, on one of my weekly visits to a favourite bookshop, I discovered Église Saint-Julien-le-Pauvre, built in the 13th century, one of Paris’ oldest religious buildings, a place of worship for Melkite Christians. I was fortunate to hear one of the oldest forms of Christian liturgy: a rite for Easter Saturday.
It seemed an appropriate time to share a favourite piece of music. Sometime after discovering Saint-Julien-le-Pauvre – a venue also for one of the last “Dada excursions” – I found a cassette tape, in a market stall on the banks of the river, of the extraordinary Maria Keyrouz singing at the church. She sings a Byzantine chant for Easter.
It is a very ancient, Middle eastern form of music, a hypnotic and unearthly drone, the sound perhaps that angels would make.
Beautiful! I stumbled into a Melkite church in the Old City of Jerusalem. A chanting priest waved me in and gave me books to follow along and after the Liturgy, as I was talking to him, he said “I decided to let the parish priest say the Liturgy today.” Confusedly I asked, “Let him?” And he said, “Oh, I forgot to tell you: I am the Melkite bishop of Jerusalem.” You never know who you’ll meet!
A wonderful story. Thank you, Maximilian.
Thanks, Anthony. Really beautiful. Music like this restores a little faith in humanity in these troubled times. Makes me think of the spirit of Tarkovsky’s Andrei Rublev.
My pleasure, Des. The music’s Middle Eastern origins also reminds me that Christianity, Judaism and Islam all come from the same place, which somehow offers a glimmer of hope.