St. Anthony’s Sermon (A Music Analysis)
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For many teachers, teaching is a passion. Many teachers feel a calling, a moral imperative to try to serve their students and encourage them to become the best people they can be. But with the damage done to the entire system of public education personally and nationally in the past few years, I fear any “teaching” I do from here on out may wind up as a twisted, distanced version of St. Anthony’s Sermon to the Fish.
What is that, you ask? A sermon to fish? When I am in my most hopeless moods, I see the cynical interpretation of Saint Anthony’s sermon as the equivalent to all my teaching: a laudable and magnificent effort that results in utter failure. Alternatively, when I am optimistic, St. Anthony’s sermon gives me hope: hope that I can help transform the world and make it a better place for my students, through my students.
Herein lies the ambiguity of St. Anthony of Padua: patron saint of lost things and lost causes. Perhaps I should pray to him now? His mythical sermon to the fish became the source for some of the most dazzling music I have ever heard. Let this be my present to you: I’ll start at the very beginning, the very best place to start.
Theme (The Traditional Tale): Saint Anthony of Padua was originally from Lisbon (Portugal, b. 1195) but eventually moved to Padua (Italy, d. 1231). He gained renown as a preacher and even worked alongside Saint Francis of Assisi. In one of his most famous miracles he went to evangelize in Rimini (Italy) which was full of heretics, but when he got to the church to give his guest sermon, it was empty (the local people had pranked him). Unperturbed, he went to the Adriatic shore and began preaching at the waterside. The townspeople came to the shore to snicker but grew silent as Saint Anthony gave the call — and the miracle began! Great schools of fish started appearing in the water, their heads bobbing up and down, seeming to listen attentively to his sermon. At the end of his preaching, he blessed the fish and turned to the townspeople, reproaching them for being less wise than the fish. (The fish listened even when the townsfolk would not!) Thus chastened, the townspeople turned from their heresies and embraced the true faith. The lost congregation restored, a happy ending assured!
In my more egotistical moments, I imagine myself as this version of St. Anthony, giving my civics and philosophy lessons, teaching critical thinking and fostering community engagement, preaching civil rights concern and environmental awareness. Through my wise and effective words, I bless all oppressed creatures, from servants to serpents. My students, shamed by their former callousness towards the natural world and their fellow man, convert to celebrate their familiar bonds with nature and all humanity. A miraculous ending!
Unfortunately, this is not the way teaching usually works, and I know it. But it’s a nice legend to tell myself now and then in order to keep up my faith in the value of education. Ordem e progresso!
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Variation One (The Poem): In the early 19th century, a collection of German poems and folk songs was published known as Des Knaben Wunderhorn (The Youth’s Magic Horn). One of these was the amusing Des Antonius von Padua Fischpredigt (St. Anthony’s Sermon to the Fish). I reproduce it here, along with an English translation by Richard Stokes. [1]
Antonius zur Predigt/Die Kirche findt ledig.
Er geht zu den Flüssen/und predigt den Fischen;
Sie schlagen mit den Schwänzen,/Im Sonnenschein glänzen.
Anthony finds the church/Empty for his sermon,/He goes to the river/To preach to the fishes;/They all flick their tails/And glint in the sun.
Die Karpfen mit Rogen/Sind all hierher gezogen,
Haben d’Mäuler aufrissen,/Sich Zuhörens beflissen;
Kein Predigt niemalen/Den Karpfen so gfallen.
The carp, fat with roe/Have all come along,/Their mouths open wide,/Attentive and rapt:/No sermon was ever/So pleasing to fish.
Spitzgoschete Hechte,/Die immerzu fechten,
Sind eilend herschwommen,/Zu hören den Frommen;
Sharp-snouted pike,/Perpetually fighting,/Swam swiftly along/To hear this devout.
Auch jene Phantasten,/Die immerzu fasten;
Die Stockfisch ich meine,/Zur Predigt erscheinen;
Kein Predigt niemalen/Den Stockfisch so gfallen.
Those strange creatures even,/Perpetually fasting,/It’s the cod I refer to,/Appear for the sermon./No sermon was ever/So pleasing to fish.
Gut Aale und Hausen,/Die vornehme schmausen,
Die selbst sich bequemen,/Die Predigt vernehmen:
Auch Krebse, Schildkroten,/Sonst langsame Boten,
Steigen eilig vom Grund,/Zu hören diesen Mund:
Kein Predigt niemalen/den Krebsen so gfallen.
Good eels and sturgeon,/Prized by the wealthy,/Even they condescend/To hear the sermon:/Even crabs, even turtles,/Slow-coaches at most times,/Shoot-up from below/To hear the address:/No sermon was ever/So pleasing to fish.
Fisch große, Fisch kleine,/Vornehm und gemeine,
Erheben die Köpfe/Wie verständge Geschöpfe:
Auf Gottes Begehren/Die Predigt anhören.
Large fish, small fish,/High-born and low-born,/They all lift their heads up/Like intelligent creatures:/At God’s behest/They give ear to the sermon.
Die Predigt geendet,/Ein jeder sich wendet,
Die Hechte bleiben Diebe,/Die Aale viel lieben.
Die Predigt hat gfallen./Sie bleiben wie alle.
The sermon concluded,/They all swim away/The pike remain thieves,/The eels remain lechers./The sermon was pleasing/All stay as they were.
Die Krebs gehn zurücke,/Die Stockfisch bleiben dicke,
Die Karpfen viel fressen,/Die Predigt vergessen.
Die Predigt hat gfallen./Sie bleiben wie allen.
The crabs still go backwards,/The cod are still bloated,/The carp are still gorging,/The sermon’s forgotten./The sermon was pleasing/All stay as they were.
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This charming, child-like, poetic version of the sermon mocks the miraculous moral of the original myth. Instead of celebrating the conversion of the heretical townspeople to the true faith, the German rhyme turns the focus to the fish who praise the sermon and then resume their debauched routines, utterly unchanged, unconverted from their iniquitous ways. The list of fishy sins is observant: thieving pikes, gluttonous crabs and carp, lustful eels. They hear the saint, yet none alter their behavior. But oh, did they enjoy a good sermon! By shifting the focus to the fish, the poem satirizes those who proclaim piety yet whose lives remain unchanged by the moral lessons they witness. It’s a cajoling critique of hypocrisy.
I provided a whole list of suggestions to the fishy characters in our school district on what they could do to prepare for the coronavirus. Before the lockdown began, I suggested starting to train teachers in distance learning technologies. At the beginning of this month I proposed we periodically take inventory (a monthly poll) to see which students and parents and teachers will want to continue with distance learning and which ones will want to return to the classroom. I offered models for safe teaching (outdoors in the quad or on the playing fields). I proposed ways to deal with the expense of using massive amounts of chemicals to wipe down desks. (Don’t have desks! Issue every student their own light aluminum chair they carry to school with them which only they touch.) I’ve asked the school board to pressure the city council to propose city-wide internet service (get local merchants to all pitch in since it would improve on-line access to the internet for all). I’ve suggested teaching large lecture classes on-line in the evening supplemented by small, concentrated in-person or distance learning study sections that meet every other day to reinforce the general lecture materials. Like St. Anthony, I’ve been told “Oh, those are great ideas!” and then nothing comes from the fishy administrators. The district administrators appear as if they are listening to the sermon, applaud with their fishy little hands, then swim off to continue to pursue their own careers, padding their own job resumes, and sticking to their same old ruts of faddish innovation.
This is a far more realistic portrait of how Saint Anthony’s sermon applies to my teaching situation. I preach to the district school board and site administrators. At best, they flap their fins in applause, and utterly ignore everything I’ve said. I give the call; nobody answers.
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Variation Two (Baritone and Piano): Austrian composer Gustav Mahler began working on a setting of this comic poem from Des Knaben Wunderhorn in 1892. Several of the Wunderhorn poems were arranged for piano accompaniment including St. Anthony’s Sermon to the Fish. In this arrangement you can hear the keys glisten (“glänzen, glänzen”) wet with the spray from the Adriatic and hear the blurry swimming of the fish in their splashy appreciation of the sermon. Together, baritone Hermann Prey, accompanied by the pianist Michael Krist provide a delightfully watery and humorous interpretation of the text in this 1972 recording (4 minutes long). Try to catch the various comic and bemused vocal inflections Prey gives throughout the performance as he sings the story.
Hermann Prey — Die Antonius von Padua Fischpredigt — Gustav Mahler
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7lmjMpRoZ9Q
This is the happy hour version of the tale I share with my fellow veteran teachers over drinks on a weekday. In it our students are the fish. We all laugh and chuckle at how unerringly errant our students are: the same ones arrive tardy day after day, the same ones forget to bring their books, the same ones forget what groups they were working with. We laugh about these students who get D’s but nonetheless tell us, with apparent sincerity, how much they enjoy the class. They may not learn much, but they will graduate with equanimity. We grin along with Mahler and the baritone and the pianist at the quietly flowing comic twists life brings us, and we keep going. We teachers may not be great saints, but as we down our happy hour adult beverage, we taste neither harm nor hopelessness.
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Mahler wasn’t finished with the charming tale. He orchestrated his piano and voice version, but as he did so, he darkened the mood of the piece, introducing glimpses of sinister denialism (fish) and anguished despair (Anthony).
Variation Three (Soprano and Orchestra): Lucia Popp gives a splashy, entertaining performance with Leonard Bernstein conducting the full Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra in 1989. The orchestra churns restlessly underneath the soprano whose exclamations become increasingly cries of exasperated frustration at the situation of not having gotten the fish to repent of their sinful habits. One can hear the fish plunging deeply back under the waves of the sea as the sermon ends and their appreciations vanish along with their return to their same old wicked, unrepentant and unreformed ways. In the end, the sermon is forgotten, “Vergessen! Vergessen!” There may be momentary ordem but there is no progresso. .
Lucia Popp with Leonard Bernstein in a live recording of Die Antonius von Padua Fischpredigt by Gustav Mahler (4 minutes long)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XqDw1F7RRdk&list=PL7U2IHVKSk4JT6ARenY_2ZsHmXZaG6h0b&index=250
This version of the tale of St. Anthony requires a second margarita at our end-of-the-week faculty “happy” hour before the narration even begins. This kind of telling happens after a particularly tough week in which nothing seemed to go right and entire classes failed to understand anything in our sermons. This is the version that results when I ask my class of 17 and 18 year old seniors, “Who was the U.S. president during the Civil War?” and get a gape-mouthed school of blank stares, culminating in one intrepid soul volunteering, “Washington?” This is the version the saint’s tale we teachers tell when we have to throw down a couple more drinks after the second margarita, and it’s Friday, and we are really, really glad we are not going in to teach the next day — we need a break. This is the telling of the story that is undergirded by fears that the next generation will be too stunted and incompetent to provide for our fat retirement benefits. Sure, it’s a comic tale — the comedy and the miracle being that we teachers somehow survived!
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Variation Four (Full Orchestra): First performed in 1895, Mahler’s Second Symphony was a truly titanic follow-up to his first symphony. Clocking in at about 90 minutes in length, this second symphony is titled “Resurrection”. It opens with a funeral march, and concludes with a glorious chorus (à la Beethoven’s 9th) proclaiming “Rise, rise again! Oh believe, you were not born for nothing!”. It explodes with Big Ideas. Buried at the fulcrum of all those grand concepts of death and resurrection is a viciously bitter central movement which Mahler indicated was a portrayal of the futility and pointlessness of life. Perversely, this middle movement (deuxième symphonie, troisième partie) is based on the charming, cute little Wunderhorn poem of St. Anthony’s sermon to the fish. This time, however, there are no words, no lyrics. The verbal references to the Saint’s miracle have been stripped; all that’s left is the futility of his efforts to try to wordlessly preach something, anything, to someone, anyone… any thing. Mahler uses the orchestra to carry all the narrative exposition, and the orchestra does not speak, it screams; Mahler himself referred to the climax as a “death shriek”.
This third, central movement of the symphony is a “scherzo” which means “a little joke”. But unlike the original, charming children’s poem, there’s scant humor in this jest. The explicit (but sarcastic) title of this movement is In ruhig fließender Bewegung (In restfully flowing movement), but any pretense to it being restful are shattered by the opening, thunderingly dislocating two-note slam on the timpani. The turbulent water then flows in, murky and moody. Rapidly, it bewilderingly shifts into a quaint volkish ländler. We hear the fish plunge into the depths, then the sounds of a shining countryside rise before us with delicacy and beauty, before crumbling into a brief, sassy parody of a klezmer band. Nothing endures for long, nothing persists except an inescapable pessimism and sense of futility. Adding to the disorienting moods of the entire piece, Mahler writes incongruous musical instructions in the score like “play with humor”. At one point a formal fugue begins stirring (3:00+) then is abandoned utterly in a crash of triumphant hunting horns. Harps thrum heavenward, flutes trill with bird-calls, before everything degrades into a smokey, ruptured heap of dissonant violins over grumbling tubas, only to be trampled under the triumphant hooves of the galloping hunting horns once again. The “little joke” becomes clear: the joke is the pursuit of order and progress. Any notion of a “meaning” to life is bitter jest.
At the climax of the scherzo (beginning 7:00+), as the hunting horns give way to the death shriek (leaving a shuddering, dismembered conclusion (9:00+) to drag behind painfully, because once the calamity happens, it lingers…) the only law ordained is that there is no order. Nem ordem nem progresso. This is the mockery of my teaching, of my entire existence. All my efforts at using my travels to inspire my students to find satisfaction and meaning, all my efforts at teaching an appreciation of geography and art history, all my personal pursuits of knowledge from voyaging, all these come to a fragmented, grinding, drowning in murk. All progress is lost. The chariot is overturned. My prayers for understanding fall on God’s deaf ears. Or maybe they are like humanity’s ears, not deaf, but destined never to discern the meaning of my muffled, insignificant screams. Listen!
Gustav Mahler, Symphony #2, (“Resurrection”) 3rd mmt. In ruhig fließender Bewegung Conducted by Gustavo Dudamel conducting the Simón Bolivar Symphony Orchestra of Venezuela who performs magnificently in 2011. (10 minutes and worth every minute.)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KgWjmQs6Umk
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Maybe you can sense my death shriek. Maybe you can feel Mahler’s despair as an artist: he writes a brilliant symphony, the audience raves about how great it is and then…. Nothing. The music becomes meaningless as the audience wanders out of the performance hall, as my students are locked in their quarantine rooms, as the concert-goers say, “Well, it was a fantastic public performance!” and then…. nothing.
That nothingness, too, is my gift to you. Bitter despair is also your inheritance from me. O, taste and see!
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[1] Translation © Richard Stokes, author of The Book of Lieder, published by Faber, provided courtesy of Oxford Lieder (www.oxfordlieder.co.uk) Accessed Sept. 18, 2020.
