Music by Beppe Cantarelli
Original Latin lyrics by St. Luke 1 - 46
January 1 of the Year of Christ 1997
I am arriving to Portofino, Italy, with my wife Patrice. It's lunch time. Our plan is to unwind and spend a few days of vacation on the beautiful Ligurian Riviera before our return to Los Angeles. We've just arrived at the restaurant from where you can see the whole stunning and glorious Gulf of the Tigullio: the small piazza and the tiny port in Portofino, Santa Margherita, Rapallo and far away on the right side the familiar town of Chiavari where sometimes I spend some holidays since daddy Arturino still keeps his little boat in that port ready to weigh anchor. As we're ready to sit at our table, my cellular rings and when I pick up I can hear a voice excited and running out of breath: it's a dear friend of my family and mine, and I would like to omit her real name so I will call her Mother Angiolina Sartori; she is the head of the nuns of the Sanctuary of the "Madonna di Monza" in Rome:
"Beppe, but where are you?"
I answer:
"Madre Angiolina, what a pleasant surprise, how are..."
...she interrupts me:
"...but are you in Italy? I just called that saint of a woman of your mother who gave me your cellular number. But are you still in Italy?"
"I just arrived in Portofino and we're ready to sit down for lunch."
"You must come to Rome at once!"
"May I ask you what is this all about?"
"No, it would take too much time to explain...but can't you make it to Rome for dinner? You will be my guests, both you and your wife Patrice, here at our House of The Pilgrim of The Virgin Mary...I will reserve a room upstairs so you can sleep here tonight after dinner and tomorrow you will be able to return. At dinner, tonight when I'll see you, I will explain to you..."
...she doesn't give me a chance to answer and she says good-bye:
"...Have a good trip and Hail Mary!"
...and she hangs up.
And that's how it all started the most beautiful adventure of my life, the one I like to call:
"THE MAGNIFICAT ADVENTURE."
That evening, during dinner at the House of The Pilgrim of The Virgin Mary, the hotel section of the conglomerate of the Sanctuary of the "Madonna di Monza" on the Roman Hills, Mother Angiolina (known also as the "Monaca di Monza"), without even giving me a chance to have my second glass of their Frascati white wine, asks me point blank to compose a new "Magnificat (My Soul Exalts)" for the Pope, since the next year John Paul Second will come to the Sanctuary to open and bless the new Sanctuary, vow by the Romans and Pope Pius XII to the "Madonna di Monza" for saving Rome from complete destruction at the end of World War II. During the celebration of the Holy Mass it will be officially fulfilled the vow, precisely the construction of a new Sanctuary for the Virgin Mary......and maybe, now that I think about it, the fact that I was still pretty much sober when Mother Angiolina hit me, as her usual self when she decides to take on a new project (and she practically asked me to make myself look ridiculous to whomever would've listened to my "probable" new "Magnificat", without taking into account the inevitable complaisant if not "making-fun- comparisons" to all the various "Magnificats" composed by the major composers of the history of music, such as J. S. Bach - father and sons - Vivaldi, Mozart, Beethoven and Strauss, just to name a few!!!)...as I was saying, maybe the fact that I was still pretty sober "saved me", or even better "kept alive" what later on it became my future "Magnificat", because rather than tell her right away and up-front ("in vino veritas..."in the wine the truth") something like:
"Thank you, Mother Angiolina, I appreciate the trust and the honor you are giving me in asking me to compose new music to such beautiful lyrics, and especially after so many versions already available and composed by the most illustrious composers part of the history of the worldwide musical composition, but I don't think I should even dare to think about it, etc..."
...I did end up answering her, becoming an impromptu Oscar winning actor and making her believe that I was perfectly cool and self confident:
"No problem, Mother Angiolina. By the way, when do you need it?"
When she answered me that it would've been for the springtime of the next year, a year and a half away, I relaxed a bit and just to make myself even more believable, I asked her to give me the original Latin lyrics (as a young little nun, her assistant or something, very efficient and extremely fast just gave me the Italian lyrics as soon as I had accepted her proposal and, remembering what happened a couple of years before when I composed a new "Veni Sancte Spiritus / Come Holy Spirit", I wanted to be able to work with ancient Latin, a language that has much more rhythm than the Italian one, and also a language that in a few syllables and/or words can say what in Italian would take many more syllables and/or words).
Several glasses later, actually almost through the second bottle of the same cool and easy to drink Frascati that has also the power to make you forget what kind of a mess I just put myself into just because I didn't want to admit my insecurity, maybe because I did not want to disappoint the "Monaca di Monza" who always had such high expectations of me as a composer, especially after listening to my "Mentre Il Silenzio / While Silence" (composed on some beautiful lyrics by David Maria Turoldo) and my "Veni Sancte Spiritus / Come Holy Spirit", as I was saying, after getting through half of the second bottle of Frascati, while I was with my wife on our way up to the last floor in the geriatric elevator of the House of The Pilgrim (that elevator was veeeeery slow!!!!), I get to read the Latin words of the "Magnificat" and immediately I end up singing...
E------G-G-A--------- right on the word-title "Ma-gni-fi-cat." I still remember my wife Patrice telling me:
"As soon as you make it to our room, you better write down that melody because I know you all too well...you're a little bit drunk now and tomorrow, when you'll wake up, you won't remember it and you'll bug me as you expect me to remember it since you always count on the fact that I used to be a musician and I played trumpet in high school,...and also because I am the one who obviously had less of that Frascati tonight..." Since I do not have any empty music sheets in my bag, I follow the suggestion of my "expert-wife-choreographer-and-musician-and-also-manager-and-perfect-organizer" and I draw a pentagram in the back of the first of the two lyric sheets that the little nun had just given me, and I write down the 4 notes under which I write also the 4 syllables of the MA-GNI-FI-CAT...and as soon as I was done I fell asleep...
January 2 of the Year of Christ 1997
In the train returning from Rome, I remember telling Patrice that I couldn't dare to compose a new "Magnificat" and that the "Monaca di Monza" would've probably ended up forgetting the whole thing anyway (at least that's what I hoped...), also because I was convinced that she asked me to do it as a challenge and a test: yes, she would've presented it, if I did come up with something good, and she wanted to see if I could come up with a new composition on such powerful and beautiful lyrics like I did in the past with "Mentre Il Silenzio / While Silence" and "Veni Sancte Spiritus / Come Holy Spirit", but in the likely event that I failed, it wouldn't have been that big of a deal. In case it's not clearly understood yet, I did not take that proposal all too seriously!!!...also because I was evidently very intimidated and pretty much sure that I wouldn't be able to come up with something that I am not saying I would be proud of, but at least that I wouldn't "betrayed" what I consider and I call the "unwritten-inside-morality", therefore "integrity", of each composition, whether is the "Requiem" by Giuseppe Verdi or Mozart, or whether is "Funiculì, Funiculà."
Holy Easter of the Year of Christ 1997
After several months from the last time I've spoken with the "Monaca di Monza", last January 1st 1997, I receive a phone call from her (in almost 20 years that I've been living in Los Angeles, that's the very first time she calls me in America!!!) and even before wishing me Happy Easter she asks me:
"So, did you finish your new 'Magnificat' for our 'Madonnina di Monza' and for our Holy Father?"
Stuttering like a kid caught with his fingers in the cookie jar and trying to make small talk about the fact that in Los Angeles you can not find that great Frascati that they have on the Roman Hills, where the Sanctuary of the "Madonna di Monza" is so "strategically" well located, and blah, blah, blah..., I also tell her that I am working on it (it's a lie since the only time I did work on it, it was those 30 or 40 seconds in the geriatric elevator at the House of the Pilgrim of The Virgin Mary). And when she hears that, in a perfect "Monaca-di-Monza-style" she gives me a deadline for a couple of weeks later, when she says she will call me again. After she hangs up, it finally sinks in that she's not kidding!!! She means business and she IS waiting for a new "Magnificat" from me; as a matter of fact she has already spent words around and people are waiting for her to present it.
I remember that that same day I did try to work on it for the very first time. I did pull out those lyric sheets that the little nun clipped together and, unmindful of those 4 notes scribbled in the back, I tried over and over several new melodies and harmonic progressions. I also vividly remember my huge apprehension while I was trying to write some music, like if I was "disturbing" someone who was asleep. I didn't even dare to change the melodies and chords progressions I just wrote and that were so very obviously "ultra-telephoned-that-even-my-butcher-down-the-street-could-whistle-before-they-even-start-playing-it-on-the-radio"; melodies and harmonic progressions that I was trying to apply to the lyrics that I was reading in front of me like if I couldn't and wouldn't "dare" too much, like if I could've "offended" the sacred and spirituality so deep and unique, prerogative I believe indelible and quintessential, of those lyrics. And now, in retrospective, I do believe that that was what made me fully understand why not only those lyrics managed to become so famous and popular through the centuries, but also why all the major composers did venture upon such text and in doing so, did leave to posterity the masterworks that we all more or less know about.
When a few weeks later Mother Angiolina punctually called me, I was very honest and I told her that I had composed something but that I was not happy with it. Maybe the tone of my voice gave me away and she felt and understood immediately my discouragement and my fear, so I remember that with her usual "matter-of-fact" attitude typical of he...or better she, who's not afraid to climb Mount Everest at age past seventy (and this I believe has always been her strength that I'm sure it comes from her immense faith that to me too, after almost 40 years that I know her, it is font of constant amazement and inspiration) she told me with a tone of voice reminiscent of my childhood and my "doctor-who-didn't-wanna-hear-objections-about-taking-my-medicines-for-a-simple-and-silly-cold:
"Don't worry, keep writing and you'll see that our 'Madonnina' who loves you so much, will tell you what to write and will guide you. Besides that, you know I always pray for you."
One thing for sure, when I talk to Mother Angiolina I never feel my age!!! She does make me feel like a young kid...maybe because of her way of talking to me...or maybe because her enthusiasm and her faith are so contagious that they always leave me upbeat and optimistic even though my life seems to be in turmoil and everything around me seems to be falling apart...
At the average of at least once a month I did try, ever since Easter of that Year of Christ 1997, to compose a new "Magnificat" for the "Monaca di Monza", but I remember that I always ended up smashing my face against the wall and throwing away everything I wrote. And every time she called me (by then she used to do that every two, maximum three weeks, pounding me and putting pressure on me, and asking me for updates) she managed, don't ask me how, to pump up my morale. Morale that was getting lower by the day, also because I did try so many times that I was obviously lacking that "fresh approach" and that "desire-to-find-a-melody-in-it" that you usually have at the very first, maybe second or third approach at the most...after that it's not "boredom" really but there is an objective lack of "newness" as "discovery"; "discovery" that I think is the spark that generates the enthusiasm and the excitement of when someone composes and/or creates. And especially when someone composes not just music by itself (symphonic and/or instrumental generally, and/or music where there will be lyrics written, but later on and after the fact) but music to lyrics already written, and therefore where such lyrics guide you, give you the leading emotions but where at the same time they could also be limiting a bit since they won't let you branch out in complete freedom and try maybe something else...we are only human and as such, in our imperfection, if we do not redeem ourselves in the "human-holy-moment" that I like to call "intuition", then we go look for "excuses" in order to "evade"; and to "change gears" and "change direction" could be a solution, even though, in doing so, the most that we can accomplish would be to find "another intuition" but really "a different one" from the one that we "needed" originally...and with lyrics like the "Magnificat" ones, you know from the very beginning "what you really need"!!! They tell you as much as they tell you what you do not need and what you should throw away!!! And if you try to compose music to lyrics so beautiful, deep, powerful and at the same time extremely ethereal, sweet and poetic and pure, and you can not find the "intuition" you need directly from those lyrics, unfortunately you can not find it anywhere else!!! It must come from them...and if it does not, it really hurts…it hurts badly.
Holy Christmas Day of the Year of Christ 1997
After almost a year that I am not returning to Italy, I receive a call from my mother to wish me Merry Christmas since I've decided, having only a few days off, to spend the Festivities here in Los Angeles, and before she hangs up she asks me:
"So, what is it that you've promised Mother Angiolina? Is that a new composition she's awaiting from you?"
I explain to her what happened in the last year or so and she tells me that "it would be better if you can write something for Mother Angiolina as well", especially because she did not want her to think that when other people asked me to compose something I did deliver, while for her, who just asked me once...in other words my mother, who is a close friend of the "Monaca di Monza" for over 40 years, started also putting pressure on me in order to finish what I promised, very obviously "sensitized" by Mother Angiolina.
I remember that as soon as I hung up the phone, I went for the nth time to my piano and with all my good will and intentions I did retry in good faith and with all the love for Mother Angiolina, the "Madonna di Monza" and at that point for my mother also whom I could see was being "recruited" already by Mother Angiolina and did join full time the "Crusade"...After an hour or so, it was becoming clear that once again I was going nowhere and that I was going to waste more time into writing something that I knew already I would've tossed away!!!
The frustration and mostly the sadness I felt for not "seeing" the "intuition" that the lyrics obviously suggested (lyrics that did suggest it to all of "them" before...yeah, but "they" were the best in history, weren't they?!?!???) were so overwhelming that I couldn't help but to throw a punch at my music stand in front of me. That sent flying to the floor the two lyrics sheets in Latin and Italian clipped by the little nun. While I bend over to pick them up, I notice, due to the fact that they slightly opened up, a pentagram with some notes scribbled in the back of the first sheet. I read the 4 notes that I completely forgot about (that rickety pentagram and those scribbled notes "were born of Frascati...and of Frascati and God only knows what else they were lost for almost a year!!!"), and after immediately putting some harmonies to them, I continue, following the "incipit" of what is clearly the "hook" and, what a coincidence, the "title" of the composition, and I develop the motif created by those "4-notes-that-I've-heard-on-the-geriatric-elevator" at the House of the Pilgrim of The Virgin Mary in the Sanctuary of the "Madonna di Monza" in Rome and, using the other lyrics that the little nun printed out for me, in less than an hour my "Magnificat" is done.
I know, it sounds like one of those cheap movies or soap-operas, and it's just because of that that I've always been reluctant to write it out. I did tell friends and acquaintances occasionally when they've asked me, but ever since I told Ms. Elena Gavazzi, our "webmistress-production-manager-artwork-director-and-jolly-all-over-the-place", she's been pushing me "Monaca-di-Monza's-style" and, also due to the fact that as cheesy as it sounds it happens to be the truth, I finally gave in and here I am, even if it will cost me the stiff price to be laughed at, not to be believed and to be judged as an egomaniac of some sort.
And since I've broken the ice, I might as well go ahead and tell you the rest of "THE MAGNIFICAT ADVENTURE":
...this time it was me who called the "Monaca di Monza" to wish her Merry Christmas!!! And I bet that through all the years that I've known her, which is basically ever since I was a little child, these must have been the best wishes she's ever got from me!!!
February of the Year of Christ 1998
After recording the new "Magnificat" here in Los Angeles with the Millennium Choir and some of its very first members/aficionados such as Brenda Strong, Beverly Allen, Darryl Phinnessee, and my partners & co-founders Patrice Whited Cantarelli and Susan Youngblood, I sent a CD along with a copy of the manuscript with my original orchestration to our brave and indefatigable "Monaca di Monza" who, as soon as she hears it, calls me and when I hear her voice, I swear that if I didn't know her that well, I'd be ready to bet that she's high on some kind of medication or under the influence of some exciting narcotic!!! Her adrenaline is reaching level 1,000...actually, since that's her usual status, that day it must be 2 or 3,000 or more!!! She proceeds to tell me that she's already taken an appointment with a certain Monsignor Salieri, the Music Director of the religious and liturgical function, including the Holy Mass, next June 20 of that Year of Christ 1998, during the blessing of the new Sanctuary by Pope John Paul II, and she announces me that she will officially present my "Magnificat" as composed specifically for the Sanctuary for that special event.
The following week she calls me to tell me that this Monsignor Salieri, who has composed a new Mass for the Pope (most obviously approved by himself as Music Director of the celebration in question...) and that such Mass will be performed next June 20th at the New Sanctuary of the "Madonna di Monza", after reading my manuscript has turned down my, actually at this point I should say "our", "Magnificat" because, as he puts it, "it is not liturgical." I can hear from her voice that she does not want to be upset but, even though she shows the same energies as she's been "very upset", she speaks "channeling" her energies (energies created by a frustration caused by such an idiotic statement that not even the most unsophisticated native of the Rain Forest or the Amazons would be able to believe) in order to keep going and continue on her mission notwithstanding these "impediments" that were imposed upon her (or I should say, upon "us") in such an unfair manner. As a matter of fact we must consider for a moment, like I did, the poor excuse that was given to her in order to justify a simple "denial of the right to express herself not only artistically but also in a matter of faith", denial so offensive to the intelligence of whatever person in this world of any other religion or of no religion at all...therefore let's try to imagine what it must've done to the simple heart of a woman with a deep Catholic faith like Mother Angiolina!!! I remember trying to "minimize" in order to light up her obvious hurt and disappointment, telling her that after almost 20 years in show business and living on the Hollywood hill, I developed a certain immune system for sharks and stabbing-in-the-back...and I still remember her funny yet profound answer:
"If in Hollywood you have only one hill...my dear Beppe, I would like you to know that here in Rome I have a full set of seven hills to deal with!!!" ...and she also added that my predicaments and adventures, as opposed to hers on her "seven hills" over there, made her feel the same age like Christopher Colombus!!!...just to keep it going with the "Italian-American" comparisons...
A few days later she calls me to tell me that this elusive Monsignor Salieri, taking notice of the persistent "Monaca di Monza's" request to "reconsider" his position with respect to our "Magnificat" for a "liturgical-absolution-that-means-that-even-the-liturgy-forgives", becomes very "creative" and his "diplomatic and political creativity" in his quest for excuses seems, for a moment, to obscure even his artistic creativity as a composer and announces to Mother Angiolina that "unfortunately" there is another problem, a logistic one. In other words his orchestral and choral set-up for his Mass that he would have performed next June 20th would've been of only 60 people between orchestra and choir, while the set-up required by my orchestration of our "Magnificat" accounted for 120 choir members (40 sopranos, 40 contraltos, 20 tenors and 20 basses), 44 strings (24 violins, 8 violas, 8 cellos and 4 double basses) and a piano, for a total of 165 people.
At that point the "Monaca di Monza" asks me point blank:
"But, couldn't we bring your choir, the Millennium Choir...all those wonderful and talented American singers who sang in the CD you sent me?..."
...and my answer:
"Yes, all we need is to find the financing in order to sustain all the expenses for traveling, accommodation and others, so we can bring them all to Rome..."
March of the Year of Christ 1998
A few weeks later I'm in Rome with her, shuffling around left and right and almost a month after the "second excuse" that was given to us by this Monsignor Salieri of which I've never heard...at least not on the one hill of Hollywood over here...we manage to secure a sponsorship by Alitalia Airlines as far as the 120 round trip flying tickets for the choir members from Los Angeles to Rome, while the "Monaca di Monza" did also manage to convince Monsignor Silly, the priest Director & Supervisor of the Sanctuary of the "Madonna di Monza" and "buddy-buddy-of-Monsignor-Salieri" as well as with a "decisional-system-directly-proportional-to-the-geriatric-elevator" where I've composed those 4 notes of my "Magnificat", to keep at the House of the Pilgrim of The Virgin Mary at least 60 choir members while the remaining 60 ones would be accommodated at several Roman hotels. All these other costs, including ground transportation, restaurants and orchestra fees for a reduced line-up of 40 musicians, would be sustained by several other sponsors.
April of the Year of Christ 1998
It seems like everything is ready to go and the excitement seems to reach up to the "seventh heaven"...or should I say, considering the geographical location and the "show-business-and-not-show-business-resumè" of Mother Angiolina, up to the "seventh hill"!!!! Tenor Carlo Bergonzi, considered one of the top 5 tenors of the last century and declared by the critics from all over the world as the best living Verdian tenor, in virtue of our friendship and reciprocal respect and admiration (he is my first and most influential teacher and inspiration for singing) and also in virtue of the fact that after hearing my "Magnificat" he has expressed extremely genuine and positive comments, very generously offers his availability to sing it for the Pope with the Millennium Choir. So I turn around and rush back to the writing desk to orchestrate a second version of my "Magnificat", this time for lead tenor, choir and orchestra, which I proceeded to sing and record myself, as far as the lead tenor parts, so I could present it to Mr. Bergonzi along with the music sheets. When I announce that to Mother Angiolina, the seven hills are not enough anymore in order to contain her state of extreme and dangerous excitement (the poor old lady happens to have heart problems, I have to admit that both myself and my mother were seriously concerned)!!!
June 18 of the Year of Christ 1998
The planned departure date from Los Angeles, the same Friday when the Pope returns to Rome from a trip to his native Poland in order to attend the blessing of the new Sanctuary. He is sick though: the day before his return we find out about his health condition and also about a postponement issued by the Vatican to a future date to decide yet (it will be July 4 of that same Year of Christ 1998, two weeks later). Unfortunately we can not reprogram the whole flying logistic, quite complicated by the fact that Alitalia has only one daily flight from Los Angeles to Rome and if that is not enough of a complication, that same flight is half for passengers and half for "air-cargo" so there's even a more limited availability of seats, and there are no "charter-flights" allowed from Los Angeles to Rome. So all the choir members were basically flying in all different kind of alternative routes and flights, some were going via San Francisco, some via New York, some via Seattle, and so on, and this also made it impossible to regain control of the situation in such a short amount of time.
We have to cancel the whole engagement, with tremendous and heartbreaking grief and sadness of Mother Angiolina and myself, tenor Carlo Bergonzi and 120 choir members of the Millennium Choir from Los Angeles, besides another 70 singers part of the choir of my hometown Busseto, Italy, the Choir of the "Collegiata di San Bartolomeo." It is a real pity, as I wish I could've performed the premiere of our "Magnificat" right in the Sanctuary for which it has been specifically composed...at least, looking at the good side of things, the almost 200 singers and musicians that we were, we did not spoil nor destroy the sophisticated, and I'm sure "very appropriate", liturgy of that event...liturgy composed, orchestrated and directed by the "music-director-who-has-no-faults-nor-evident-conflict-of-interests", a.k.a. "Monsignor-Salieri-from-the-seven-hills", as he was pleasantly renamed by the singers of the Millennium Choir... and for that squalid matter Tarcisio Bolzoni, my first music teacher and my pseudo-priest when I was a kid in my hometown of Busseto, with whom I shared the info I was getting through the "Monaca di Monza" from the historical and glorious "seven hills" on the other side of the world where they seem to prefer Frascati wine to Coca Cola, during one of his visits to my humble residence here in the Hollywood hill did give me an explanation that, as cruel as it seems, at least it shines of a pragmatism that I would dare to define almost perturbing... for sure miles away from a faith example such as the one that a Mother Angiolina would have given me, yet realistic and very illustrative, which was:
"But Beppe, he who has the power, uses it..."
...so much for the motto that I've known all my life from Genova...and that seems to have a good similar one (even though in English it bares no rhyme...) here in Beverly Hills, as well as 5th Avenue and Wall Street in New York and lots of other similar places, which is:
"Capitolo Quinto, chi ha il grano in tasca ha vinto..."
...that translates into something like:
"Chapter Fifth, who's got money in his pocket won..."
...but at least this Genovese motto has nothing to do with faith...does it?!?!???
Holy Christmas Day of the Year of Christ 1999
But Mother Angiolina is a woman of faith, huge faith, and her faith is directly proportional to, and at the same time is the cause of, her even bigger tenacity and perseverance in pursuing difficult and sometimes impossible missions that in her life she has always managed to accomplish with the help, as she likes to put it, of her "Madonnina di Monza" who always gave her a chance to attract generous donations for her numerous charity missions such as hospitals, schools, kindergartens, retirement homes, etc. Even though I am 10,000 miles away, I often hear her prayers…and they are powerful prayers that reach up to heaven...and heaven is goodness, heaven is love...and it's goodness and love that you can see in her face, united to an obvious immense happiness and satisfaction, in some photos taken in the Paul VI Auditorium, known also as "Aula Nervi", in the Vatican, on Christmas Day 1999 after the worldwide premiere during the telecast of "Aprite Le Porte A Cristo / Open The Doors To Christ" of our "ultra-suffered" "Magnificat"(see the photo). Pope John Paul II was opening the Holy Doors of the Church of "San Giovanni in Laterano" to the whole world and 200 singers part of the Millennium Choir, boys and girls, men and women of all different races and religions, who were coming from the United States and from several different Italian cities, including members of the "Pentecoastal Community Choir", a Gospel choir from Los Angeles, singers from the prestigious "Coro Città di Roma", and many "illustrious" as well as "perfectly-and-peacefully-unknown" freelancers singing & recording artists, were singing our "Magnificat" in the Vatican during the celebrations of the Great Jubilee to the New Millennium. The "Monaca di Monza" was in the first row with my mother, Anna, my brother Giancarlino, and many Monsignors and Cardinals. When it was all over and Mother Angiolina and mamma Anna came on stage to take some photos with me, Maestro Flautist Roberto Fabbriciani (who also donated his talent and availability in order to be there and perform a sweet and ethereal flute part that he himself wrote to be added to my original orchestration) and Maestro Renato Serio (who was the Music Director of the event and who, luckily for us, did not have "liturgical impediments" in the matter...and could obviously have invited us to sing in the Vatican just because "the music"...), and I was asked to sign autographs right on the "Magnificat" sheets of all the choir members and some of the 110 musicians from the European Youth Orchestra who had accompanied us, as I was saying, in between a photo and an autograph, mamma Anna and Mother Angiolina told me (actually it was my mother who said it, while Mother Angiolina was giving affirmative signs with her head, as if they've been discussing that before and were already in agreement):
"Beppe, don't get a big head now. It is a very beautiful 'Magnificat' and it seems like everyone likes it…I like it too, and I'm the most difficult customer in the family, but bare in mind that it was not you who wrote it...'someone else' did it for you and then that 'someone' simply used your hand!"
Third Millennium, Year of Christ 2000
From there on "THE ADVENTURE OF THE MAGNIFICAT" has taken off and still continues to fly. The Millennium Choir has become bigger and bigger and as of today we're talking about 1,000 singers and counting both here in the U.S. and in Italy, singers who know our "Magnificat." We have performed in beautiful and sometimes even grandiose concerts where we sang our "Magnificat" in such cathedrals as the "Duomo di Piacenza", "Duomo di Imola", "Duomo di Fidenza", in theatres such as the "Teatro Magnani" in Fidenza, "Ebell Theatre" in Los Angeles and "Palazzo Cittanova" in Cremona, and then in Catholic Churches, Protestant, Baptist, Episcopalian, Methodist, and many others in Los Angeles, in Beverly Hills, Hollywood and Westwood, in Compton, Inglewood, Downtown Los Angeles, Long Beach, and many other locations. We also performed numerous charity & fund-raiser concerts for wonderful causes such as the "Alegria" project, by the Salvation Army in Los Angeles, a shelter for homeless family with AIDS (for a more detailed list of our concerts & performances, please feel free to visit our website at the "Concerts & Events" page). Everywhere I have seen kids singing those 4 notes that "I heard" in the "Monsignor-Silly's-geriatric-elevator", I did see and I did touch true faith. I have seen it and touched it when 300 kids sang our "Magnificat" in Tor Vergata, Rome, (see the photo) on August 19 of the Year of Christ 2000, in front of 2.3 million youth who came from all over the world for the World Youth Day gathering with the Pope: from the colossal stage, one could see an enormous quantity of people who disappeared in the horizon at 180 degrees, it was larger and more alive than the ocean!!! And also the faith, the goodness and the love that I've seen and touched that day were larger than the ocean!!! Even though, myself man of small faith "in primis", we were all terrified that something terrible, such as a riot or a fight would erupt (since that's what we've been accustomed to expect when even only a few hundred kids get together for a music happening, etc.), nothing, absolutely nothing happened!!! Over 2 million kids came and went in peace.
Year of Christ 2004
Today, like several years ago when it all started, "THE MAGNIFICAT ADVENTURE" continues with concerts where with each performance new singers, boys and girls, men and women, join the choir; and the adventure continues also as a recital that I am bringing to churches around the world: "The Magnificat Recital" is an hour of "meditation and prayer with music." A whole recital inspired by our "Magnificat" and that we have brought in so many churches and sanctuaries such as the Sanctuary of Caravaggio, the Sanctuary of Fontanellato, the Sanctuary of the "Madonna del Guadalupe" in Santo Stefano D'Aveto, Italy, the Church of the Monastery of Saint Mary of the Angels in Busseto, Italy (from where comes the recordings and the footage of our upcoming live CD and DVD), the Church of "San Giacomo Maggiore" in Pontedell'Olio of Piacenza, the Church of Christ The King in Hollywood, the Church of "San Giovanni Battista" in Vigolo of Castell'Arquato, the Renaissance Church of "San Pietro al Po" in Cremona (glorious Stradivarius town), and so many others (please, see this website's "Concerts & Events" page for more details) including "most obviously" the Sanctuary of the "Madonna di Monza" in Rome. And when last December 29 of the Year of Christ 2003 we finally performed our "Magnificat Recital" for her "Madonnina", Mother Angiolina hugged me and said:
"This humble and suffered 'Magnificat' of yours that you composed for our 'Madonna di Monza' it has given you and it will continue to give you many wonderful satisfactions."
...and I can't agree with her more!!! If "Se Il Mio Canto Sei Tu / If My Canto Is You" is a composition of mine to which I am particularly affectionate, also because 25 years ago it got my career as a composer-songwriter started in a professional way, almost 20 years later our "Magnificat" has given me and is still giving me a new life. A life that I love more than ever, a life made of the most beautiful people and wonderful friends that I have met and that I keep meeting every day, "satisfactions", as Mother Angiolina calls them, that not even one record nor ten nor twenty nor one hundred on the top of the charts in the whole world could give me...and now that I come to think of it, maybe she's also right when she tells me that in Rome she's got "seven hills" while here in Hollyweird I've got only "one"...is she thinking in terms of Golgota hills here?!?!???...maybe I shouldn't stay so constantly close to this hill anyway, maybe I should get detached from it a little bit more ...in the end, yes, I did finish to compose, and I did record, orchestrate and produce our "Magnificat" here...right on this hill where I live...but when I tried to compose it...or better, to "compose it de novo" as I completely forgot about those two lyric sheets with the scribbled stuff in the back & clipped together by the little nun...in this hill I could not make it...I did try for almost a year but I couldn't make it...even though right on this hill I did compose in the past many songs that sold millions and millions of records in the world...in order to compose our "Magnificat" though I had to go back to the "intuition" in the geriatric elevator over the Roman Hills...what is it, the nostalgia for Italy is mellowing me down and is turning me into an old, disgusting and syrupy fatalist?!?!???? If that's the way you are really perceiving me right now, at least I beg of you to forgive me.
After finally composing, actually "finishing to compose", our "Magnificat" on Christmas Day of the Year of Christ 1997, I did listen in the following months to other "Magnificats" such as the one by Perosi, by J. S. Bach and others, and I also found out (someone told me) that one of the very few major composers from the past who did not venture upon the ultra-famous lyrics by Saint Luke was my illustrious fellow-citizen Giuseppe Verdi. In Busseto, city that in the XV Century was the capital of the marquisate of the Pallavicinos and therefore had under its reign also the major cities of Parma and Piacenza, has remained this kind of "mentality-heritage-of-the-master" that is nothing more than a euphemism in order to cover with diplomacy the fact that the typical Busseto citizen, for the reasons that I have above explained, has very probably a few decibels of "innate arrogance" more than other citizens from other cities. Therefore once more, probably due to this reason, there is a popular motto, that you can hear only in Busseto, and that also says it all about the troubled relationship between Giuseppe Verdi (humble farmer's son) and those pseudo-noble citizens of Busseto:
"The most stupid citizen of Busseto wrote the 'Aida' opera!!!"
...as to say "God only knows what the most intelligent one can do!!!"
So to the "Monaca di Monza", who many years ago lived in Busseto and knows all too well what that "toasty-environment" really is all about, my comment is:
"Since Giuseppe Verdi did not compose a 'Magnificat'...we needed another idiot in Busseto who would compose it...didn't we?!?!?????"
...and her prompt and cutting edge answer:
"I don't think so!!! You did it on the Roman Hills where the Sanctuary of the "Madonna di Monza" is..."
Alleluja!!!...ooops, I mean...Hail Mary!!!
Love & music,
Beppe Cantarelli
September 7 of the Year Of Christ 2004
"Magnificat anima mea Dominum,
et exultavit spiritus meus
in Deo salutari meo. "