Minor Key for a Major Season

For me, Easter always conjures up the image of a sanctuary draped with white and gold cloth, filled with fragrant lilies, packed with people wearing their finest pastels, singing out at the top of their lungs the best and most exuberant music the hymnal (or Handel) has to offer.

Now this music I imagine is generally in a major key. After all, a major key is usually associated with happy emotions. This is how many people learn to distinguish a major key from a minor key: Does it sound happy or sad/angry? Though initially a useful pedagogical tool, this distinction does not always reflect musical reality. I think, for example, of music in the Jewish and Irish traditions. Some of the liveliest music from these traditions is rendered in a minor key (think klezmer, or an Irish reel). By the same token, much Irish and Jewish music expresses intensely sorrowful emotions in a major key.

I have listed below four of my favorite “minor” Easter hymns found in The United Methodist Hymnal (1989). I have only heard one of these hymns used with any regularity in United Methodist congregations (“O Sons and Daughters”) – the rest seem to be neglected in favor of bombastic Easter standards. I find, though, that the minor key can heighten a sense of longing for Christ’s return and evoke the intimacy that permeates stories of resurrection appearances. Try them out and see what you think – if not on Easter Sunday, then some other time during the Easter season.

Camina, Pueblo de Dios (Walk On, O People of God), UMH 305
Words: Cesareo Gabaraín, trans. by George Lockwood, 1987
Music: NUEVA CREACIÓN, Cesareo Gabaraín; harm. by Juan Luis García, 1987
Three stanzas in both Spanish and English

On the Day of Resurrection, UMH 309
Words: Michael Peterson, 1984
Music: EMMAUS, Mark Sedio, 1984; harm. by Charles H. Webb, 1987
Text is based on Luke 24:13-35, the walk to Emmaus.

Cristo Vive (Christ is Risen), UMH 313
Words: Nicolás Martínez, 1960; trans. by Fred Kaan, 1972
Music: CENTRAL, Pablo D. Sosa, 1960
Text is based on 1 Corinthians 15, which addresses resurrection
Three stanzas in both Spanish and English
Performance note: I like to take the eighth note C in the bass down an octave (the second eighth note of most measures in the first half of the hymn). It punctuates the offbeat and gives the effect of a large bell tolling.

O Sons and Daughters, Let Us Sing, UMH 317
Words: Jean Tisserand, 15th cent.; trans. by John Mason Neale, 1851, alt.
Music: O FILII ET FILIAE, 15th cent. French carol; harm. by Charles H. Webb, 1987
Stanzas 1-5 suggested for Easter Sunday, stanzas 1, 6-9 suggested for the following Sunday