On Abiding in the More Excellent Way, as Illustrated by Brahms's Very Last Song (with a Bit of a Harmonization at the End)
Photo by the author, Deeann D. Mathews, March 26, 2024
A woman I know observed in a YouTube video: kindness is a slow path to success.
I put that with knowing for certain: "Love is patient. Love is kind."
I knew that before ever hearing my favorite bass singing it to me in German, in one of his most remarkable recordings: the fourth of Brahms's Vier Ernste Gesänge, or, Four Serious Songs, because the quotation is from 1 Corinthians 13. Brahms just lifted much of the "Love Chapter" wholesale for his text. Because Vier Ernste Gesänge are his last songs, and the fourth is the last of the last, we might take it as the very last thing Brahms wished us to know in song about life itself, as he dealt with the death of his dear friend Clara Schumann and the knowledge that his own death was approaching.
The very last portion of this very last song by Brahms is that last portion of that chapter: all things in the end shall fail but faith, hope, and love, and of those, love is the greatest: "Die Liebe ist die Grösseste unter ihnen." Brahms had it sung it twice at the end just in case his listeners missed it the first time.
That word ernste in German gives us the name Ernest and the word earnest in English ... so yes, serious, but not schwer, or severe, the word that develops out into English there. An earnest in English was also an old term for earnest money, a down payment that someone paid to show they were serious about a purchase. One can then consider each of these four songs as a earnest view of life's most serious matters, and the last as the most serious of all ... for nothing counts for more, in time and eternity, than love.
Notably also, love is not the greatest over all, because the phrase would be uber ihnen. German and its wonderful precision ... love is the greatest under or among the last three. When you think about it, those two translations make sense ... for love justifies faith, and fulfills all of faith's hopes. It is both the foundation and the fulfilling element.
To me, there is a tie on favorite performance of the song because of contralto Kathleen Ferrier, still young when she went to the love above (1912-1941), known in her brief but spectacular career for her radiant joy and faith, both of which shine through in this recording. I always feel like she was given a glimpse of where she was soon to go, and turned around to tell us as much as she could about how wonderful it was before going:
By contrast, Kurt Möll enjoyed a long life and career (1938-2017), but while still in his forties sounded like he was singing from a lifetime of faith and hope and love, a lifetime that gave him such joy that one gets a sense of a life completely transformed already by taking the greatest thing as the greatest. The utter joy of the opening section, contrasted by the sensitive fervency in the middle section, and then that ending that brings both elements together ... the timestamp is 13:15, and you all excuse me while I go compose myself, having listened to Ms. Ferrier and Herr Möll back to back and not having put a box of facial tissues close enough ...
It just so happens that Ms. Ferrier is widely considered the greatest English contralto of the 20th century, and Herr Möll likewise enjoys that same consideration among German basso profundos -- there are other very fine singers, but what seems to get them over the top is how many people remember them as being able to communicate deeply from a place of love. With Ms. Ferrier this is even more marked because it has been more than 70 years since she took her place in the alto section of the heavenly choir -- but then again, what does the song say? In the end, what remains, and what is the greatest?
I am 43, permitted to be in the earth two years longer than Ms. Ferrier, and among her VERY late-coming admirers ... but then, who we see on YouTube is a measure of how much people loved a particular artist and cared enough to make available ... and thus what came through from the artists' artistry and their lives. I know now why those two artists stand out to me like great beacons from the past.
Photo by the author, Deeann D. Mathews, March 26, 2024
I have always found the models I needed both nearby in my own great elders, and far off, all of them pointing me in the path of the greatest of all things, and what it can look like amidst life. Notably, as Herr Möll sang also in Brahms, there is a place in which life and love bear one name, and it does require a leaving of the world in a real sense -- but the specific circumstances of "Todessehnen" might not be quite what everyone needs. It may be a question, for some, of abiding where they are called.
Photo by the author, Deeann D. Mathews, April 1, 2024
I have had to earnestly take serious business decisions in this past week, going against the grain of some very sharp people wise in the art of "getting ahead." But I cannot be other than who I am. My family has been called three generations down in ministry ... we have worked in many fields and in many vocations, but at heart, all that we do is a portion of our ministry.
It falls to me to incorporate the best of the advice I have gotten in business with what I know I am called to do even with my fifth book ... and opportunities falling into my lap that may well allow me to do both, but to those only concerned with profit, this will still seem like madness unless it "works," and yields the monetary and material and status rewards so many live for.
But then again, it takes relatively little money and material and status to be on Buena Vista Hill:
Photo by the author, Deeann D. Mathews, April 1, 2024
... and to walk as I do, in clear conscience, is a blessing indeed. To be absent of scheming from greed and ego ... to be absent of the need to control other people ... to be powerfully present in a loving way where I choose to show up, and be able to give freely of all that has been given to me ... if I were to die relatively young, I would prefer to leave thus ... if I were to die quite old, then I would prefer to leave, thus ... so, all of that is to say the same thing. To abide as I am called, outside of living for the priorities of the ravening world, is to live in accord with what is eternal, whether in the earth, or not.
Photo by the author, Deeann D. Mathews, April 1, 2024
I had been out of step with the world all my life ... from a child I knew I was not put here for all that my peers were being taught was important. Not that in adulthood I had not had all the human longings for friendship and companionship ... but my grand old soldier was my analog, also called early, also largely in solitude after his military service, only "visiting" the world when ministering, long before the advancement of age required that he slow down. He had shown me the possible, and made a bridge of love so I could get there before I even fully understood what he was showing me. Call him the basso profundo voice who foreshadowed the life I have now.
Photo by the author, Deeann D. Mathews, April 1, 2024
Long before knowing my grand old soldier, I knew of the passage: "Come out from among them and be ye separate, and I will receive you, as sons and daughters, saith the Lord." Generally, living for and by anything but "love, joy, peace, gentleness, goodness, patience, meekness, self-control, and faith" is what needs to be abandoned. That was not clear to me in childhood, but it is now. As a human, it is forever going to be a challenge, particularly while living in a decadent society, but it is a challenge worth accepting in full. It also frees one to move powerfully in the world and impact it without concern about maximizing one's own take, provided one believes that the One Who calls will provide. That I do. I have never known Him to fail me.
Photo by the author, Deeann D. Mathews, April 1, 2024
But still ... the question was in my mind ... Ms. Ferrier's earthly lifespan was only 41 years. We would expect she had to have deeply spiritual faith to have met that reality so powerfully. So, just how did the younger German basso profundo manage to be just as profound at that same age, with death almost forty years still down the road for him?
"I was waiting on you to ask the question, Frau Mathews."
The Ghost of Musical Greatness Past materialized with a smile, but older than usual ... about the age he was at Carnegie Hall in 2012, one of his last international public appearances, so, 74, already notably thinned out, but still smiling radiantly as ever. He reminded me, in this form, of my grand old soldier's lean perseverance, for at that age, the dying master singer and teacher was still strong enough for international travel, and willing, on behalf of yet another generation of students.
"And I thought I was piling up those frequent flyer miles back then, Frau Mathews! But it is still known: if you want to see the old bass get around in his retirement, tell him there is a student for him to teach!"
"Well," I said as I embraced him, "I appreciate that you are consistent!"
"The perks are good!" he said. "I love still having VIP access to exclusive places! Carnegie Hall last decade, Hive this decade -- onward and upward!"
Oh, we had a laugh about that!
"This is where, my dear master teacher in the bud, we begin today's lesson, for I wish you to regard the fact illustrated also by your own father, himself a master teacher in his fields, and your grand old soldier also in his fields. A life so spent is never empty, nor its legacy ever finished. Keep this in mind as we walk today. In route to Buena Vista Hill I saw a lovely route above and around Lake Alvord in Golden Gate Park that I thought you might enjoy."
"Oh, let's certainly do that!"
So, down from the hill and onto a path I did not know, but I thought nothing of worry ...
Photo by the author, Deeann D. Mathews, April 1, 2024
... such were the beauties of the path ...
The lake, from distance, was sparkling, its trees just budding because their winter sleep likewise had come so late...
Photo by the author, Deeann D. Mathews, April 1, 2024
... and when for the moment the path took us to a main thoroughfare, that stage timing of his ... when traffic was stopped in both directions, it was a stunner ...
Photo by the author, Deeann D. Mathews, April 1, 2024
So many things in Creation were enjoying their day ... a little dog got his thirst quenched at the lake ...
Photo by the author, Deeann D. Mathews, April 1, 2024
... before at last we made it down to lake level by the long path ...
Photo by the author, Deeann D. Mathews, April 1, 2024
... and, in rounding it, were on the long route to my home, with later hills to be climbed smiling down in the distance...
Photo by the author, Deeann D. Mathews, April 1, 2024
... and we found a place to sit with views of gold, hinting of places to explore in the future, just across the road.
Photo by the author, Deeann D. Mathews, April 1, 2024
Our walk to there had been quiet ... gentle paths, gentle joys. It was only after a long time that my companion spoke.
"What a glorious day," he said gently. "Spring speaks so powerfully, and comes so early here in California!"
"More of it to love," I said.
"Indeed, Frau Mathews, there can be no dispute about that -- and to come to one in peace as you have!"
"And clarity," I said. "I'm sure you know that April Fools Day is some people's national holiday, but, they were not invited!"
He laughed, but then added, "Yet that leads to a question, Frau Mathews, by which I will answer your question of me."
"Ask," I said. "Fragen Sie mich."
"Besser und immer besser, Frau Mathews," he said. "You are thinking in German again. The fall semester is not that far away for you to resume actual lessons."
"Definitely considering that," I said.
"I am not mentioning it just to be mentioning it casually," he said, "for it goes to the purpose of the question I am going to ask you. Do you remember the first time you got far enough out into the park to get lost, and then finding your way back?"
"Yes," I said. "I was about this far out, and I remember I was praying all the while, having never been walking that far from home alone, but because I know how the streets run, I knew when I got to the main street that divides the Panhandle from the rest of Golden Gate Park I could find my way home, just by following the park."
"How did you feel about it, once your safety was no longer in question?"
"I felt good, actually, because from there on, I knew I could manage the entire mile to my west. My walking life began there, although it would be several years before my grand old soldier and I really got after it. But I remember in those early years ... like Beethoven, I would hear such music in the park, and I also remember that I would talk with the Lord as I do now."
"Not much has changed, has it?" he said.
I began to see where he was going then, and considered it before we resumed our walk.
Photo by the author, Deeann D. Mathews, April 1, 2024
"When you are only 43," he said, "and your life has already come full circle, it is worth considering indeed. It just so happened that Beethoven, who walked and wrote in his journals and left grateful expressions toward God as he was going, provided you a model for life your own culture could not at that time, given that a few years earlier it was not safe for you to be in the street alone. But now that which was foreshadowed has come into the light, and perhaps there is no need to be overly concerned with the trappings of the foreshadowing."
Photo by the author, Deeann D. Mathews, April 1, 2024
"You see, while you were still Fräulein Mathews, you discovered something that your culture could not support, and that late 20th-century Germany could not have either: for you, a small ministry circle in which you can work deeply, combined with time outdoors, is a full life, without need of all the things the world says life consists of. At 43, you have reverted to what you already knew at 17.
"Now we will give Germany and Austria both a point as a cultural match for you in terms of reverence for nature. For an American, and even for a modern African American, you are unusual, although you and George Washington Carver would have surely been good friends, for he saw what you see in Creation. I mention Mr. Carver for a reason. He certainly was not German, in the same manner that you are not -- yet location is not as important as abiding as you are called, for you will be who you are everywhere you go.
"I wish for you to understand, Frau Mathews, that all you ever needed was time and space to be who you are called to be. I wish for you to be very clear on the point so that you are not deceived, here or abroad. Now I know full well that if you yet desire to visit Germany, it will take a far more powerful voice than mine to discourage you. I know how intent you are upon whatever you have decided to do, because you made the very hard climb back to a life of peace in these last two years. That was a longer journey than many will ever take -- and you made it, Frau Mathews! I wish you to know that you made it right here in the United States of America, in your home city, having found your peace in abiding as you are called.
"I do see your point, Herr Möll, and, given how much you love your homeland, I especially appreciate you saying it."
He smiled, but there was a touch of sadness in it.
"It is another lesson for another day, Frau Mathews, but there is a love a man has for his homeland, and there is a love a man has for those he considers his children. Those need not be opposed to each other so long as he does not make an idol of one and thus, a sacrifice of the other."
His eye fell upon a gate of sorts ...
Photo by the author, Deeann D. Mathews, April 1, 2024
"Now, that is a pretty passageway, Frau Mathews. There is nothing wrong with you going through it. But, there is something wrong with me going through there."
I looked at the space, and then at him.
"Not even trimmed down to the appearance of your last agility at around 74-75 could you get through there because your shoulders are still 3-5 inches broader than mine. You are both too tall and still too broad."
"So, it is a pretty place to pass under for you, but no matter how I think it looks from here, and no matter what I think it would be like to pass through it, it is not for me. Thus it is in life, as we carefully consider life's many good passageways; one must carefully and wisely measure both the gate, and one's self, before going through."
Photo by the author, Deeann D. Mathews, April 1, 2024
"I say again to you, Frau Mathews: you have found your peace where you are. You did so at age 17, and climbed back at age 43, because location was never the issue. I wish for you to become masterful in measuring by both faith and wisdom, for by doing so, you will find all those passageways that are for you, and avoid being stuck in places that are not. All passageways on the right path are good, but not all are good for you. You are too deep of heart and broad of mind for many."
He paused, and then smiled, shaking off that touch of sadness.
"And now, Frau Mathews, I will answer your question about me: if location does not matter, perhaps age, as you say in the American idiom, is nothing but a number. Now, experience is said to be the best teacher, but whoever said that does not know of wisdom. Many old men and women enjoyed their global holiday on April 1."
"Indeed," I said. "Not everyone is engaged in learning from their experiences."
"This is true, and also, people discount how much their experiences occur because of how much wisdom they have -- or do not have -- in choosing their path of life. But still further, Frau Mathews: life experience provides us the opportunity to examine if what we believe about life is actually sound. Wise people are always looking to sift the true from the false in their own thinking and beliefs, and seeking to, as you learned it in English, 'abhor that which is evil; cling to that which is good.'"
"That is the quotation," I said. "Never thought of it quite that way, but discernment is key. That sifting process is key."
"Allow me therefore to adjust your thinking on 2022 and 2023; is the person who knows that ever going to be at home in the crowd, at any location, at any age?"
"Not at all."
"I press further, Frau Mathews; if what one believes is true, and one walks in it not even fully understanding it, will not the road of experience rise to meet one, as the old Irish blessing has it?"
"I suppose that would cut down on time considerations," I said, "especially on big eternal things like love. There will be some bumps in the road because other people don't get it, but big concepts bear themselves out pretty quickly if one is paying attention, and not fighting against the truth every step of the way."
"And then at some point, experience also teaches you that you can't carry anyone where they are not prepared to go. If you accept that and keep moving onward, you find that the road smooths out considerably, Frau Mathews."
"Indeed, Herr Möll. I cannot gainsay it. When I think of this spring, compared with the previous two ... no, I cannot and will not gainsay it."
"For with you, experience has actually met with the love of truth, and thus, with wisdom," he said. "You did not make an idol of your grief, and thus, did not take a winterreise that will never see the spring -- you are here, in every way. Now, tell me again: where are you still living, and how old are you?"
"I am 43, and still living in San Francisco where I started."
He smiled and let that hang in the air for a long time as a spring breeze murmured a harmony to it through the golden-green eucalyptus flowers in the trees.
Photo by the author, Deeann D. Mathews, April 1, 2024
"Life is full already for you, Frau Mathews, and it is full of purpose and peace based on love. There is no need for you to overextend yourself for any reason. Consider what I am saying in the light of the previous two springs. This is the deep corollary of the last of Brahms's four most earnest songs, and of the Scripture text he used word for word. If whatever is supposedly to be done cannot be done in step with the love to which you are called, what does it matter? Why do it? Can it last? Can it bring you, in the long run, anything but grief?"
My companion again remained silent for a long time as we moved through the beauty of the day ...
... and his face grew more reverent and somber before he spoke again.
"Holy Week was last week, Frau Mathews. Even One Who is Love Himself, in the flesh, suffered much at the hands of two entire cultures of people focused on their own pursuit of godhood, in essence, over the people they felt were their chattel. He endured all that to provide the redemption of all those who believe in Him, and because He is the Redeemer, that was good and right for Him to do. Because He is the One that calls you, and your faith and hope are in Him, and your love comes from Him, there will be times when the great redemption purpose requires that you endure the contradiction of people devoted only to their own aggrandizement. That is what you take on in being a Christian, and that is a settled fact for you."
"Yes, sir, it is."
"I say to you with all gravity, Frau Mathews: that is enough. Dass ist genug. There has been time enough in your past life for your natural compassion to lead you astray. Now, you have done exceedingly well in not seeking money, power, and status in this world as your goals, instead opting for a life of loving, compassionate service. I can say of you what is said of a true saint: though you are not perfect, you are indeed blameless. But like me, you have a big weak side, and like me, you have to shore that up.
"Without telling you what is not your business to know, we shall propose for the sake of discussion that by the time I was 74, there might have been a few people around me who, out of love, might have said to me, "Carnegie Hall is halfway around the world -- now Kurt, think of yourself, and your health.' We shall also propose for the purpose of discussion that I already had considered myself, and my health. Now then, for what did I come to your homeland, in 2012? For what did I invest so much of my remaining time and strength?"
"For that to which you were called," I said. "Out of love, as a master teacher. It is still noted by those who were there how kind you were, even to those students who may or may not have been ready for the privilege."
He chuckled.
"Frau Mathews, with all the great American basses there are, the privilege was all mine, I assure you, for your nation can do better than a dying old German bass."
"Oh, I beg to differ!" I said, and threw my arms around him.
"Oh, I know," he said, "and apparently, there are a great number of people who share your opinion, because I did get that call! Now do you think, at that point, that I would have had the energy left to respond to that call had I been chasing fame and status, or being entangled with foolish people?"
"No," I said. "If you did not marshal your strength carefully, you would have had no chance."
"Here is a great secret, Frau Mathews: if at 74 you get that call -- and remember, Jerome Hines whom we admire got one at 80, just three years before he joined the bass section above -- then it means you marshaled your strength and kept silly people from tying up your phone not in your last decade, but in all your previous decades, so you have energy left all the way to the end."
Photo by the author, Deeann D. Mathews, April 1, 2024
"Most people that you know, Frau Mathews -- how did your grandmother put it -- their lives are living them. Most of them do not know that the world never had the right to choose for them. Most of them do not know that people around them are not in charge of their choices, because they and the crowd reinforce each other in going just as they are going. This is the corollary on last week's lessons from Winterreise. Scale the numbers on the walk up or down as you like, but it all goes one way: the sentence of death gets posted over the path, every time. Like you, I might wish that it were different, but I have seen the truth of the matter far too much to ever gainsay it."
"So have I, Herr Möll. So have I."
We childhood survivors -- him of World War II, me of the crack cocaine flooding of African American neighborhoods in the 1980s -- both shuddered in tandem, but then also in tandem wrapped an arm around the other and squeezed gently, each drawing the other out of the shadows of our darkest memories back to the beautiful place and time we were walking through.
Photo by the author, Deeann D. Mathews, April 2, 2024
"Ich danke dir, Frau Mathews," he said as he smiled down at me.
"Ich danke Sie, Herr Möll," I said as I smiled up at him.
"The importance of keeping good company," he said. "That is how I marshaled my strength, Frau Mathews, so I could attend to my calling to the end. You returned to your ancestral music to both warn and encourage and point your hearers on the deepest level to a more excellent way than the error-going common to the generation before you. I also as a young man returned to the music of my ancestors, seeking to recall my people to that more excellent way than the error-going common to the generation before me. So, we are understanding and supportive company to each other.
"And if we were not, we would not keep company," I said.
"That is the lesson I wish you to apply to the rest of your life on Earth, Frau Mathews. I sang for everyone, but I was particular about my circle. You are tracking me in terms of broadening of international reach, so then, track me in the care I took around my personal circle. Both of us come from communities utterly wrecked by collective error-going, but each was protected to abide as we are called, and thus be a beacon to our own and the generations to come. As for every other pursuit the world tempts us with, and even for the temptations offered to our compassion by people indeed in desperate need but yet refusing to walk that more excellent way from themselves, time has passed for all of that."
"A tempo piu non v'eh," I sang, an octave higher than he sang it as Commendatore in the first recording I noted him in, including his choice of the lower D.
"My word -- a D3, from a woman -- that is the note Mozart actually wrote as low enough for a man!" he said.
"Well, you know I learned from the best, and his booming D2 there," I said. "I suppose we have come full circle in our lessons. As Don Giovanni found out, when time is up for the foolishness, it is up."
"And although April 1 has just passed, that is not our holiday, my dear contralto profundo student," he said.
"It is not, my dear basso profundo teacher. We are abiding in a more excellent way."
Photo by the author, Deeann D. Mathews, April 1, 2024
Into that beautiful moment, as we stepped into the meadow, he sang that last song of Brahms again, and just blessed everyone along the way we were walking, as the afternoon glowed at every turn ...
Photo by the author, Deeann D. Mathews, April 1, 2024
... before settling into a calm blue evening. He -- with his impeccable stage timing -- matched up his last low note with the bells that pealed the hour at nearby University of San Francisco, and those bells pealed more sweetly than perhaps they ever had, their lower harmonics caressed by the ever-so-slight slippage to the immortal voice side he permitted then in his approximation of his mortal voice.
Photo by the author, Deeann D. Mathews, April 1, 2024
Ever thorough, the old master teacher wound up his lesson as we at last reached and climbed my stairs.
"When I am at home, our beloved Ms. Ferrier enjoys harmonizing the last two lines of this last song of Brahms with me."
"Oh, now that must be a glory to hear," I said.
"It is among the greatest honors of my eternity that she asked me, since I grew up hearing her sing it. It would also be among the greatest honors of my eternity if you would harmonize it with me, now, in your lovely contralto."
"Herr Möll ... of course I have done so many times when by myself ... but ... "
His request was a picture in a picture of the message of the song ...
Photo by the author, Deeann D. Mathews, April 2, 2024
... for he had faith that I could do it, and I loved him so much I could not disappoint his hope ... love is the foundation of faith, and fulfills faith's hope ... so I smiled, recalling all the alto-part-picking-out skills I had used in church for 30 years anyhow.
"But ... aber...
Oh, that smile of joy on his face ... for indeed, perfect love casts out fear!
"I will count off three beats, two times, Frau Mathews ... one, two, three, one, two, BREATHE --."
"Aber die Liebe ist die Grösseste unter ihnen. Die Liebe ist die Grösseste unter ihnen!"
The sheet music, so you can get it a bit larger!
We let Brahms and 1 Cor. 13 have the last word between us, for there was nothing else that needed to be uttered after such harmony, from both sides of the sky.
Photo by the author, Deeann D. Mathews, January 8, 2024
