Hildegard video

[lmpower]

I recently watched a 52 minute videocassette about Hildegard of Bingen. Actors dramatized her life with the inclusion of her writings, music and paintings. I always thought I had a familiarity with old music from Gregorian chant through Palestrina, but I had never heard of Hildegard until a few years ago. I am wondering if she got herself "discovered" by a new publicity agent the way Mahler was "discovered" some years back. Anyway my wife and I both found it enjoyable and interesting. It is available from Vision Video.

[Corlyss_D]

I am wondering if she got herself "discovered" by a new publicity agent the way Mahler was "discovered" some years back.

If memory serves - and Brendan who has studied Hildegard closely would know more - two groups, Sequentia of Cologne (Barbara Thornton and Benjamin Bagby) and Christopher Page's Gothic Voices, discovered her music almost simultaneously and began issuing discs in the early 80s. Sequentia I believe recorded all of her works in a continuing project. I'm not sure about Gothic Voices. There are two one-hour programs here in 2001 and 2003 archives and one interview with Bagby immediately after the 2001 Hildegard program. These programs are practically a college level course in EM in themselves.

[Haydnseek]

I am wondering if she got herself "discovered" by a new publicity agent the way Mahler was "discovered" some years back.

She made quite a comeback:

[Brendan]

Tuning into the music of Hildegard von Bingen, whose Scavias I was already familiar with, was one of my motives for listening to EM in the first place, and her music has been one of the main focuses for EM since the eighties.

I was just looking through the new Hildegard releases on Amazon before surfing over here. Maybe due to her herb-lore she was bound to be popular with the folk/medieval revival set. Whatever, it is a good thing in my view, as I binge on von Bingen when I can.

[lmpower]

Haydnseek, that was the only Hildegarde I knew as a boy. There is as much contrast between the two Hildegards as between the two madonnas. It is wonderful that we have progressed so much since the Middle Ages.

[Cyril Ignatius]

Hildegard Von Bingen was (is) one of the most amazing people ever to have lived; her more recent "rediscovery" is genuine and fully deserved. She not only wrote profound spritual music so many centuries ago from her abbey in what is now Germany, but she was intellectually and spiritually supercharged, for lack of a better word.

Several different vocal ensembles have done excellent recordings of her music. It's also nice to hear her music performed live in a church.

[jbuck919]

Haydnseek, that was the only Hildegarde I knew as a boy. There is as much contrast between the two Hildegards as between the two madonnas. It is wonderful that we have progressed so much since the Middle Ages.

Coincidentally, the convention two years ago of all music teachers in DoDDS Europe (don't laugh, there were at the time dozens of us) met at Bingen, a modest city on the Rhine not far from Frankfurt. Nobody bothered to mention (maybe because nobody but myself knew, much as I hate to say it) that we were in the home of possibly the first composer whose name is known to us and can be attached reliably to specific music.

[PJME]

shortly before her death in 2002

its the name...that brought back memories of a wonderful, very dark and gravelly voice....Something like a German Jeanne Moreau, an actress that could sing.

She was quite famous & glamorous ca 1950-1970.

[Corlyss_D]

I am wondering if she got herself "discovered" by a new publicity agent the way Mahler was "discovered" some years back.

She made quite a comeback:

Hildegard . . . I mean Haydn wins the Post of the Day Award!