Wednesday, December 27, 2017

The Feast of St. John the Evangelist

Poor St. John gets even shorter shrift than St. Stephen. This was not always the case. According to the Hymns and Carols of Christmas website, there are a number of songs in his honour, at least well known enough to have been collected, once upon a time. But can we find a recording of any of those songs.... not on your life.

So you get something a bit odd, with disclaimers attached. To begin with, I cannot find out anything about it. I am fairly sure it is an Orthodox, rather than an Eastern Rite hymn. It was recorded by a group called the Psalmopevtsy Ensemble (about whom, apparently, nothing is known), on a CD called The Alphabet: Psalms by Archimandrite German. An archimandrite is apparently the head of a monastery, or of several monasteries, at least, according to the Catholic Encyclopedia. I cannot find a thing about Achimandrite German, though the cover of their CD states that he died in 1682. I am guessing it is Russian Orthodox, rather than Greek, as it was recorded in the Refectory Chambers of the Resurrection Monastery of New Jerusalem, Istra, Moscow Region. Some of the sites which sell this CD give it a more complete title of  "The Orthodox Tradition Of Singing The Alphabet" which simply adds to the mystery of the whole production. Nor, for that matter, in spite of the fact that the title of this pieces is given in English: Accept Our Hymn, St. John the Theologian, can I find the words-- certainly not in English, and I don't seem to be getting anything in Russian or Greek either, though, given that both those languages are entirely outside my area of knowledge, I might have found them and not realised it.... 

Still, it is mighty beautiful, and I liked it, so you get to hear it too:




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