Programmes for Easter

New Zealand Listener, Volume 32, Issue 818, 1 April 1955, Page 5

Programmes for Easter

N Good Friday 98 years ago -it was April 10 that year -Richard Wagner sat down and thought out and hastily sketched on paper "an entire drama in three acts." This was Parsifal, a story about the Holy Grail, which this year will be the first of a series of Easter week programmes to be broadcast from NZBS stations. Parsifal was performed for the first time in 1882 at Bayreuth, and if Wagner had had his way it would never have been seen anywhere else. This wish was disobeyed, but for all that Parsifal still belongs to Bayreuth, and it’s a Bayreuth production, recorded at the famous festival there in 1951, that New Zealand listenergs are to hear. The first act will be heard from all YC stations at 7,0 p.m. this Sunday (April 3) and Acts 2 and 3 from the same stations at 8.0 p.m. on Tuesday, April 5. Listeners who tune to 1YC for the second part of Parsifal on Tuesday night will find an Easter programme of special interest at 7.14 p.m.-a talk on the "Nazareth Decree,’ by Professor E. M. Blaiklock, of Auckland University College. The Nazareth Decree-illus-trated on this page-is a stone tablet, found. at Nazareth, bearing an Imperial Roman decree prescribing the death penalty’ for those’ found guilty of ' disturbing the contents of graves or tombs. With this tablet as a starting point, Professor Blaiklock builds up a case for believing that Christian preaching began in Rome (and led to Imperial action against the church) much earlier than was supposed; and that in Rome-as in Jerusalem-the stark fact of the empty tomb was accepted by the foes of Christ

The Nazareth Decree will be heard also from 2YC at 7.0 p.m. on Good Friday. The second major musical broadcest for the week will be the Grande Messe des Morts, by Berlioz, usually referred to as the Berlioz Requiem. This is to be heard from 1YC, 2YC and 4YC at 7.30 p.m. on Wednesday, April. 6, The performance is by the BBC Symphony Orchestra, with William Herbert (tenor), and the BBC Choral Society, conducted by Sir Malcolm Cargent. While the other YC stations are broadcasting the Berlioz work, 3YC will be on the air-from 8.0 p.m.-with a relay from the Civic Theatre, Christchurch, of a performance of Bach’s Passion According to St. Matthew, by the Royal Christchurch Musical Society with the 3YA Orchestra. The conductor will be E. R. Field-Dodgson. The, St. Matthew Passion will be heard also from 1YC, in a recorded version by the Bach Choir and the Jacques Orchestra, conducted by Dr. Reginald Jacques, at 7.0 p.m..on Good Friday. Man of Sorrows is the title of a midweek programme to be heard from 2XA on Wednesday, at 9.30 p.m. Relayed from St. Paul’s Presbyterian Church, Wanganui, whose choir ‘will sing the hymns under the organist and choir"master, Peter Warwick, the programme will tell the Easter story through hymns, readings and narration. Music from Handédel’s Pastoral Symphony will begin and end With Heart and Voice, the. most widely broadcast programme to be heard from NZBS

stations on Good Friday. It will be on the air from*2YA at 11.0 a.m. and from 1YA and South Island YA and YZ stations at 3.0 p.m. With Heart and Voice will include orchestral, choral and solo works and, produced by the NZBS

in Dunedin, will be presented by Mauritz Engelen (tenor), George Wilkinson (organ), the King Edward Technical College Girls’ Choir, the Dunedin Choral Society and a string orchestra. W. H. Walden-Mills will be musical director, and Norman Griffiths narrator, A second programme to be heard on a nation-wide link-this time from YC stations at 9.0 p.m.-is The Dying of the Lord Jesus, a Good Friday meditation with music. The title is from St. Paul’s second Epistle to the Corinthians: "Troubled on every side, yet not distressed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; cast down, but not destroyed; always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus." This programme was produced by the NZBS in Christchurch with the Durham Street Methodist Church Choir and Gordon Mathieson (organist). Melville Lawry is musical director, and the spoken parts are.taken by Davina Whitehouse, Roy Leywood, Peter Varley and William Austin.

Stainer’s The Crucifixion, in a new BBC transcription recorded last Easter when it was broadcast from All Souls’ Church, London, will also be heard from a group of stations on Good Friday. This broadcast will be at 7.0 p.m. from 1YA and South Island YA and YZ stations. Lenten Carols anf Customs, arranged and presented by Myra Thomson, a programme heard from several stations last year, will be broadcast on Good Friday this year from 1YZ and 3YZ. Other Good Friday broadcasts to be heard from single stations include a delayed broadcast from the Nelson Cathedral of Pergolesi’s Stabat Mater (2XN); a broadcast from St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church of a group of Franz von Biber’s Mystery sonatas-others will be heard the previous evening and on Easter Day (1XH); a recording of the Bach cantata "Through Bitter Tribulation" (3XC); a programme prepared by Dr. Gerda Eichbaum-Bell about some outstanding’ religious paintings (2¥YC); a reading for Good Friday by Philip Smithells (4YA); a group of Dvorak’s Biblical songs, sung by Alice Graham (3YC); the ‘story of: Eastertide, by Anthony Scott-Beach (1YA): and the story of Tesus narrated by Claude Rains (3YZ), The ZB stations will broadcast evisodes of Prince of Peace relating to Easter on Good Friday and again on Easter Day. _ Combined services will be relayed on Good Friday morning by 1YA from the Pitt Street Methodist Church, Auckland, by 3YA from the Oxford Terrace Baptist Church, Christchurch, and by 2YZ from St. Paul’s Presbyterian Church, Napier, and in the evening by 2YA from St. Andrew’s Church, Wellington. The Devotions for the Three Hours will also be heard from 1YA, relayed from St. Mary’s Cathedral, Auckland, and Stations of the Cross will be relayed by 2YA from St. Gerard’s Redemptorist Church, Wellington. The main Easter Day programmes will be broadcast in the Main National programme. At 9.4 p.m. (replacing the Hymn Session) The Third Day will be heard. This is an NZBS programme of readings hy May MacDonald and William Austin, with carols by the Wellington Baroque Chorus conducted by Stanley Oliver. Easter music from Handel’s Messiah will be broadcast in the same link at 1.45 p.m. Easter programmes to be heard from single stations on Saturday and Sunday will include from 2XP on Saturday a programme for Holy Saturday from St. Mary's Chutch, New Plymouth, and from 2¥Z on Sunday an NZBS feature by Oliver A,’ Gillespie showing how great’ men have" ‘been insvire?d by Easter, yale "*"

Letters from Listeners will be found this week on pages 20-21