Danish Hymnia is the contemporary classical a cappela choir par excellence. They work with contemporary international composers, go to international festivals and harvest international prizes. If you have not heard them you should invite them to your country. Hymnia is a choir that seems to have an intimate knowledge of the mysteries of breathing. There is an atmosphere of freedom and experimentation that is absolutely unique in the world of choir music. One feels that Hymnia really loves to be in this modern world of ours and that it can’t wait to try out compositions of contemporary composers and endow them with its own remarkable warmth. It is this combination of warmth and an understanding of how music can actually breathe that enables Hymnia to perform the most modern music in such a way that it actually…touches you. The music seems then to have been transported from the merely cerebral to the human heart. Recently Hymnia celebrated its existence of twenty-five years by singing Kodaly, Holmboe, Messiaen and Schnittke, among others. We bring here a composition of the Danish composer Morten Poulsen over the poem Havsbön (Prayer of the Sea) by Swedens great poet Karin Boye, who died in sadness in 1941. Notice how this choir…breathes.
Havsbön listen here
this contribution is from Hymnia’s CD entitled WATERWORKS (Classico).
Karin Boye (October 26, 1900 – April 24, 1941)
Havsbön
Havssvall, kom sköljande,
ge mig den salta och runda klangen att smaka,
den som gavs mig
till ett urnamn åldrar och åldrar tillbaka!
Ord, som inga dödliga
läppar kan uttala,
ligger gömda
inne i svallen svala.
Länge, för länge
svalt jag på lättuttalade människoord.
Jag vill uppstå,
jag vill mätta min mun vid moderns bord.
Som ett förvillat barn
i ledans ånger
vänder jag hungrig om
till hemmets sånger.
Låt mig dricka
språkens språk ur eviga dova brus.
Låt mig klarna
till ditt vilande djup av skapelseljus.
Innanför själ och ande
hör jag dig sjunga.
Stig i mitt blod, och blomma
i min tunga!
Prayer of the Sea
by Karin Boye
Come cool sea, washing
give me the taste of salt and curving sound,
dub me a name
most ancient, ages down.
Words no mortal lips can tell
lie within the coolest chill.
Long, too long, I was famished
by easy words of men.
I will rise,
I will fill my mouth at my mother’s board.
As a child blundering into a languorous brume
I return as a starvling to the lays of my home.
Let me drink the language of speech
out of your thudding might.
Let me open the quiet deep
of creation’s light.
In spirit and soul, the songs you have sung
Rise in my blood to blossom my tongue.
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