The Creation

Joseph Haydn created a beautiful work when he composed The Creation. From the first two chapters of Genesis, he forms a magnificent relation of its events through the music. The tale is told entirely by the angels Raphael, Uriel, and Gabriel, accompanied at times by the heavenly hosts. As each day unfolds, the angels describe the created things and then rejoice over them ecstatically. When man finally arrives in the midst of creation, they also take part in the great celebration of life given by God. At the end, everything sings praises to God.

Listening to Haydn was a wonderful experience and forced me to listen to everything that was going on in the music. I found that I normally don’t listen to everything that’s going on in the music I listen to unless I am actively trying. Often, I’ll focus on the main melody exclusively because that is the easiest to find. However, Haydn provided so many lovely melodies to follow not only in the vocals but also in the orchestration. Each and every part supports and enhances the other parts of the music. Accident? I think not.

One thing that caught my eye was the vocal assignments to the various “characters” of the Creation, specifically having a soprano as Gabriel and a bass as Adam. Normally in musical pieces, the bass is the villain of the story and tenor is the hero. This is not to say that Adam is the villain; there is no villain the Creation. Raphael is also a bass, for that matter. Yet, it still seems odd that the leading man, quite literally, is a bass and not a tenor as that goes against usually prescribed vocal distinction. In the case of Gabriel, everywhere Gabriel appears in the Bible, the angel is identified as male. Yet, a soprano is a high female vocal part. So, I wonder, why cast a woman as Gabriel, the most famous of the three angels given in the Creation, rather than another tenor? Does this reflect any belief that Haydn may have had of the nature of angels? Or is it merely for musical diversity purposes? I don’t know.