Playing Joseph Haydn’s The Seven Last Words of Our Saviour on the Cross is an intense experience for the musicians in a string quartet. The seven slow movements between the introduction and the concluding earthquake – Terremoto – which according to the evangelist Matthew shook the ground when Jesus died, provide an opportunity to meditate on both Haydn’s personal interpretations and on a tortured, dying man’s last words and final hours of life. Also, perhaps, on the fact that for two thousand years, man has continued to inflict the same harm upon his fellow man.

South of Seville, halfway to Gibraltar, lies the Andalusian city of Cádiz. It is Europe’s oldest continuously inhabited city. The light from the beaches dances on the blue Atlantic. The white sandstone walls of the houses shade narrow alleyways and the leaves of orange trees rustle in the breeze on the square. When the Jesuit priest Padre José inherited a fortune in the early 1780s, he decided to build a magnificent oval chapel on top of the simple underground chapel where he served. He then proceeded to commission music from Europe’s most famous composers: Joseph Haydn. The small city of Cádiz would have an Easter service the like of which they had never seen before.

Joseph Haydn had recently renegotiated his contract with Prince Esterházy. He now had an opportunity to publish his music with publishers outside the Hungarian court, even writing music on commission from people other than the prince. The request from Padre José was surprisingly detailed and posed a major challenge, even for a composer with eighty symphonies to his name.

Writing seven slow movements in a row was no easy task. The music would deepen the worshippers’ experience of the words spoken by Christ on the cross, as the priest moved from the pulpit to the altar between readings and meditations. Haydn finally found inspiration in the actual spoken rhythm of the biblical words. He turned them into musical themes in a nine-movement work for chamber orchestra, later rewritten for string quartet by Haydn himself.

Haydn had never actually been to Cádiz but had the Easter tradition of the ancient city described to him. “The walls, windows and pillars of the church were hung with black cloth and only one large lamp hanging from the centre of the roof broke the solemn darkness”, Haydn wrote in the preface to one edition. Haydn let his music create a new dimension to this intense atmosphere of mystery.

In this concert that is structured around words, we come together for a moment of mutual reflection. The Sayings of Jesus on the cross become seven meditations on our future challenges. What are they and how can these words help us progress? We engage with Haydn’s music through philosophy, through faith and through humanism.

Text: Janna Vettergren