About Bernstein's Mass

The revival of Bernstein's Mass at a venue where it saw its 1971 world premiere has been touted as a grand event by the Kennedy Center, a cultural monument celebrating half a century of its own existence. The work's description as a "piece for singers, players and dancers" clarifies that it is not a traditional mass, which usually comprises six parts: Kyrie, Gloria, Credo, Sanctus, Benedictus and Agnus Dei. I had not seen or heard Bernstein's piece before its anniversary night on Thursday, and decided to look at it with an open mind, without extensive research ahead of the performance. I expected to be surprised and in some ways I was.

Photo: Scott Suchman

The piece opens with a fairly modern sound as the priest comes on the stage and greets the faithful who are praying quietly in the pews. The audience is looking into a church setting from the view one would get from behind the altar, facing the choir at the far end. As the stage turns dark, the light comes from lamps high above that look like Chinese lanterns, while a percussion instrument makes a tinkling beat that brings to mind sounds from Puccini's Turandot. This brief introduction is followed by a more or less traditional Kyrie Eleison, as in any Catholic mass. Bernstein's Kyrie was particularly beautiful, auguring good things to come. The solo Simple Song switches to a tune more akin to Broadway than church, despite its psalmodic verse. The repetition of "lauda, laude" made me squirm, but Will Liverman's interpretation uplifted the uninspired verse.

The harmonized chorale, reminiscent of the great masses of the past, was sublime as were all the other parts performed by the Heritage Signature Chorale. The dancers swaying back and forth on the stage did not add value to the performance, but were not intrusive either. They seemed rather like spirits swirling around the church, or perhaps in the parishioners' minds?

The first real surprise came with the appearance of the "street chorus," representing ordinary people who express their anger at a God who does not seem to hear their prayers for peace in the chaotic world. They taunt the priest, ridicule his homily and interrupt the mass. Coming in from all sides of the stage as well as the auditorium, they look and act as if they have just walked out of Bernstein's famous West Side Story.  Several stand out with gorgeous solo numbers, a mixture of rock, jazz and blues styles, notably soprano Meroë Khalia Adeeb, performing artist-singer Curtis Bannister, Mexican mezzo-soprano Sishel Claverie and bass Matt Boehler, among others.

Photo: Scott Suchman

The orchestral meditation brought back contemplative calm and a return to the order of the Latin Mass.  Liverman sang Gloria in his best voice of the evening. Mass continued with the remainder of its traditional parts, interspersed with Broadway-style solo and choral numbers, and dancing.  A boy soprano sang a wistful aria, much like a shepherd boy at the opening of the third act of Puccini's Tosca. It was hard to imagine what could have offended so many Catholics, at least until the Mass was performed at the Vatican for Pope John Paul II.

After so much - maybe too much - of a good thing, fatigue kicked in.  By the time Mass arrived at the Lord's Prayer, Liverman sounded course and I don't think it was intentional. 

The ambitious work then takes another new turn, a surprise one could say. As the priest prepares the congregation for the communion he is hit by a personal crisis of faith. He interrupts his prayer and smashes the chalice with wine, which represents Christ's blood, lamenting the wrong color of the blood. He is aware that "half of the world is drowned and the other is swimming in the wrong direction" as he had noted earlier, and he can do nothing about it. So he now mocks his congregants. 

One gets a distinct feeling that Bernstein's inspiration was exhausted by that point. The scene which was supposed to be revolutionary, and that probably angered the faithful at the premiere, turned into a real drag. Instead of inspiring compassion, the quasi-operatic episode did nothing more than cause mild annoyance and urgent desire for a swift conclusion, which comes only after the faith of the congregation is reaffirmed. When the roughly two hours of performance without intermission closed with spoken words "The Mass is ended," without the traditional "go in peace to love and serve the Lord," all everyone wanted to do was rush to the nearest restroom.

Artists who worked with Bernstain cite limited time to complete the piece in time for the opening. The latter part of Mass reflects some of that pressure. The composition which flows with ease in the first half, despite switches between various genres, becomes more and more strained in the second half. The work would have benefited from extra time for revisions. Some of the most popular operas we enjoy today came to us in their second or third version.

Photo: Scott Suchman

Since Bernstein did not set out to compose a liturgical work, but as the subtitle says "a theater piece," was it really necessary to include all the parts of the Latin mass, albeit in an abbreviated form?  Bernstein's work was commissioned by Jacqueline Kennedy, a Catholic, for the opening of the Kennedy Center in 1971, at the  time when the U.S. was mired in the Vietnam War. There was a strong anti-war sentiment in the country and in the world. Many people could not reconcile their faith with the news from the front. Bernstein's Mass addressed some of that confusion, but according to him, the piece is a "celebration of life." 

The question surrounding the revival of a 50-plus old work is: how relevant is it today? The US has just come out of the protracted war in Afghanistan, is still under the shadow of Covid pandemic, climate change is wreaking havoc worldwide, and the  political divisions seem overwhelming. When the priest says "half of the world is drowned and the other half is swimming in the wrong direction," it resonates with the audience who privately thinks the same. And even though the critics have panned some of lyricist Stephen Schwartz's pithy lines, I could not agree more with "half of the people are dead and the other half are not voting."

So yes, Bernstein's Mass is as relevant today as it was half a century ago. It is an impressive piece, worth seeing at least once in a lifetime. With a few revisions, it could have been so much more. As it is, the mix of genres praised by Berstein fans sometimes feels more like a mishmash of material that needs good editing. If you have ever looked at maximalist home decor, you will have seen some rooms packed with eclectic styles working so well together that you would want to be invited to tea there, while others seem as cluttered as a storage room. Bernstein's piece in the end reminded me of some of the less successful attempts at maximalism. If he had had the opportunity to make the work more cohesive with a few strategic cuts, reworking some of the weaker segments, adding gravitas to others,  Mass could have been a real magnum opus. As it is, at least for this reviewer, West Side Story remains Bernstein's most successful work.