While posting titles in this fledgling series, I’ve been pondering the title I gave it, wondering whether “questionable” is really the right word. Yes, I suppose H.P. Lovecraft would make a poor role model in real life, on account of his racism if nothing else. And of course he, Partch, and Webern all were largely unknown in their own lifetimes, and all three fall under the category of “cult favourites,” if we’re being honest.
But here’s where things get a little tricky: some of the people I want to acknowledge in this series actually make great role models. For example, today’s subject, Hildegard von Bingen.
Hildegard was a 12th century nun. The tenth child of a fairly well-to-do family, she was given to the church at a very young age, offered as a tithe. (Christians were expected to give ten percent of all their earthly goods to the church. Whether or not this regularly included children, I’m not sure). As legend has it, at the age of 14 she was walled into a cell along with an older nun, Jutta, who served as her tutor until her (Jutta’s) death. Jutta taught her to read and write, and it was also during this time that Hildegard learned to play and notate music. After Jutta’s death, the sisters of the convent elected Hildegard as their abbes; she went on to found two other monasteries and lived to the ripe old age of 81.
From an early age, Hildegard suffered from severe migraines, accompanied by ecstatic visions. Later in life, she began recording and compiling these visions, even using them as inspiration for musical compositions. One of these works, the Ordo Virtutum, is an early example of a morality play. A young woman is tempted by Satan to renounce her faith, when the virtues personified rush to her aid, offering her words of wisdom and encouragement against the devil.
In addition to sacred songs and recordings of her visions, Hildegard also wrote treatises on natural sciences and medicine. Much of the ideas presented are borrowed from Aristotle, including a whiff of Classical Greek misogyny. But there is still much of interest in her writings, including a novel method of dental hygiene in the pre-flouride era.
Perhaps the most remarkable thing about Hildegard von Bingen was how she bucked the proscribed gender roles of her time. She did not hesitate to write directly to the Pope with questions, requests, and advice, and she was also willing to confront the German Emporer Frederick I. She preached publicly, she enjoyed wide-ranging influence in her own time, and even today everyone from feminists to Popes to new-age hippies looks to her for inspiration.
But of course, I like her music best of all. Her music shares the monophonic, single-line texture of plainchant, but the vocal range is expanded immensely. Her music has a vibrant quality not found in church chant music, or even secular music of the period. Whereas plainchant often sounds like aimless wandering, hovering around a few key notes, Hildegard’s music is much more clearly melodic, with a natural rise and fall of tension and greater sense of direction. Her Ordo Virtutum is an inspired work of genius, with an especially nice dramatic flair in the portrayal of the devil: his part is spoken, for evil is incapable of harmonious tones.
