Motet notes - Harbison

"Charity Never Faileth" is the first section of But Mary Stood, composed for the Cantata Singers in 2005.  The complete piece consists of two motets and a short cantata, the latter centering on the role of Mary Magdalene after the burial of Christ.  This role seems to be part of the significant emergence of women in the latter part of the Book of John.  The two motets in the larger sequence serve as commentary on the Magdalene narrative.  Charity embodies the favorite Biblical text of Alice Pedersen, my mother in law, who was over one hundred years old when the piece was composed.  Craig Smith, who knew Alice Pedersen well, offered to do a recorded reading in an Emmanuel Choir rehearsal, so that she could hear the piece.  This transpired, an unnecessary strategy when she lived to 104. Thus today's performance is the first at Emmanuel, but not the first time heard within its walls.  The piece uses triads, perfect chords, as symbols of Charity's persistence.