Copland wrote In the Beginning during February - April of 1947. It was first performed on May 2, 1947, at the Harvard Memorial Church in Cambridge, MA, by the Collegiate Chorale directed by Robert Shaw. It is one of Copland's very few a cappella works for chorus, others being the Four Motets of 1921 and The Lark of 1938.

Copland chose his text from the first and second chapters of the Old Testament book of Genesis, and set the text for solo mezzo-soprano and unaccompanied four-part chorus. Although it appeared after Appalachian Spring, In the Beginning has none of the "folkish" tendencies of the earlier ballet. Open, intervals are an important part of the harmonic language, but they are not used to evoke the same atmosphere in In the Beginning as they are in Appalachian Spring.

The mezzo-soprano soloist opens the work with a recitative-like presentation of the first line, "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth." The chorus remains silent until they slip in, quietly, at, "And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters." During the rest of the piece, the mezzo-soprano acts as narrator and the part is to be sung "in a gentle, narrative manner, like reading a familiar and oft-told story."

Throughout the piece, the mezzo-soprano delivers all but one of the "And God said,..." passages of the text, while the chorus follows each of these with the descriptive lines of text. As in a rondo-form piece, the same music returns in the chorus for each of the seven days of the creation story as the chorus delivers a repeated-note line, reminiscent of Gregorian chant, declaiming rapidly, "And the evening and the morning were the [first, second, etc.] day." After most of these refrains, the chorus sustains its final note, supporting the following entrance of the mezzo-soprano, who usually sings alone.

Copland indulges in some text painting at several points in the piece. The first of these occurs at "And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament." Here, staggered, imitative entries "divide" the chorus into sections. Later in the piece, during the second, much older, creation story, the text describes a barren, dry earth on which nothing will grow. Water, however wells up from the ground: "But there went up a mist from the earth, and watered the whole face of the ground." As the chorus delivers this line, both pitch and dynamic gradually rise.

In general, the music of In the Beginning is in a hymn-like, chordal style that follows the inflections of the words. Despite moments of simple bitonality, the piece is diatonic. The few canonic passages do not detract from the otherwise clear text setting, which is syllabic almost throughout. Occasionally, the soloist and the chorus are in different keys, and when notes that are flat in one part but natural in the other occur simultaneously, we hear a "bluesy" sound.

© All Music Guide

Portions of Content Provided by All Music Guide.
© 2008 All Media Guide, LLC. All Music Guide is a registered trademark of All Media Guide, LLC.