"Christian Zeal and Activity" is the middle movement

Movement (music)

A movement is a self-contained part of a musical composition or musical form. While individual or selected movements from a composition are sometimes performed separately, a performance of the complete work requires all the movements to be performed in succession...

 of American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 composer John Adams' 3-part ensemble

Musical ensemble

A musical ensemble is a group of people who perform instrumental or vocal music. In classical music, trios or quartets either blend the sounds of musical instrument families or group together instruments from the same instrument family, such as string ensembles or wind ensembles...

 work American Standard

American Standard (John Adams)

American Standard is an early ensemble work by noted American composer John Adams. It consists of three movements: a march, a hymn, and a jazz standard...

. The piece has achieved individual notability and is often performed and recorded without the other movements.

Adams states that the title of the movement was "stolen out of old Methodist

Methodism

Methodism is a movement of Protestant Christianity represented by a number of denominations and organizations, claiming a total of approximately seventy million adherents worldwide. The movement traces its roots to John Wesley's evangelistic revival movement within Anglicanism. His younger brother...

 gospel or hymn

Hymn

A hymn is a type of song, usually religious, specifically written for the purpose of praise, adoration or prayer, and typically addressed to a deity or deities, or to a prominent figure or personification...

 tune book" and is an arrangement of "Onward, Christian Soldiers

Onward, Christian Soldiers

"Onward, Christian Soldiers" is a 19th century English hymn. The words were written by Sabine Baring-Gould in 1865, and the music was composed by Arthur Sullivan in 1871. Sullivan named the tune "St. Gertrude," after the wife of his friend Ernest Clay Ker Seymer, at whose country home he composed...

", a popular hymn tune (written as "St. Gertrude") by Arthur Sullivan

Arthur Sullivan

Sir Arthur Seymour Sullivan MVO was an English composer of Irish and Italian ancestry. He is best known for his series of 14 operatic collaborations with the dramatist W. S. Gilbert, including such enduring works as H.M.S. Pinafore, The Pirates of Penzance and The Mikado...

.

Musically, Adams seeks to "displace the voice leading

Voice leading

In musical composition, voice leading is the term used to refer to a decision-making consideration when arranging voices , namely, how each voice should move in advancing from each chord to the next.- Details :...

" and sound like Mahler

Gustav Mahler

Gustav Mahler was a late-Romantic Austrian composer and one of the leading conductors of his generation. He was born in the village of Kalischt, Bohemia, in what was then Austria-Hungary, now Kaliště in the Czech Republic...

. One reviewer says that the movement, "with an almost Wagner

Richard Wagner

Wilhelm Richard Wagner was a German composer, conductor, theatre director, philosopher, music theorist, poet, essayist and writer primarily known for his operas...

ian overtone to the slow unfolding of melodic strand, continues the American tradition of using hymn tunes, and place[s] Adams firmly in the neo-Romantic

Neoromanticism (music)

Neoromanticism in music is a return to the emotional expression associated with nineteenth-century Romanticism. Since the mid-1970s the term has come to be identified with neoconservative postmodernism, especially in Germany, Austria, and the United States, with composers such as Wolfgang Rihm and...

 movement".

An additional aspect of the piece is that the conductor is instructed to place "sonic found objects" into the composition. Adams original recording from 1973 included a recording from a "late-night AM radio talk show in which an abusive host argued about God with a patient man who eventually identified himself as a preacher". This recording extends beyond the conclusion of the musical portion of the movement.

Edo de Waart's 1986 recording of the piece with the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra (appearing on the 1987 album The Chairman Dances) replaced this interview with a looped

Music loop

In electroacoustic music, a loop is a repeating section of sound material. Short sections of material can be repeated to create ostinato patterns...

, fragmented, non-chronological recording of a Christian sermon on a miracle of Jesus

Miracles of Jesus

The miracles of Jesus are the supernatural deeds of Jesus, as recorded in Gospels, in the course of his ministry. According to the Gospel of John, only some of these were recorded. states that "Jesus did many other things as well...

, the healing the man with a withered hand

Healing the man with a withered hand

Healing the man with a withered hand is one of the miracles of Jesus in the Gospels, namely in Mark 3:1-6, Luke 6:6-11 and Matthew 12:9-13.On a Sabbath when Jesus went into the synagogue, the Pharisees and the teachers of the law were looking for a reason to accuse him, so they watched him closely...

, centered on the words "Why would Jesus have been drawn to a withered hand?" This recording was used on the soundtrack of the 2010 movie Shutter Island.

External links

• John Adams on KPFA's Ode To Gravity Series. Audio interview and musical recordings from 18 April 1973. Includes a recording of "Christian Zeal and Activity" at 04:40 of OTGJohnAdamsR2 and Adams discussing the piece at 51:12 of OTGJohnAdamsR1
• Recording of "Christian Zeal and Activity" by the Wordless Music Orchestra at NPR.org