(Picture: November 1965, Major Bruce P. Crandall’s UH-1D helicopter climbs skyward after discharging a load of infantrymen on a search and destroy mission. Photograph in the Public Domain)
NOTES: This Psalm Offering was written in 1971, when the Vietnam War, the war of my generation was still being fought. I was a Music Major in my Sophomore year at the College of St. Thomas at that time this was composed, and eligible for the draft. My draft status was 1-A. While I could have obtained a student deferment delaying my eligibility for the draft, I chose not to do so out of a feeling of solidarity with the men from my age group. As it ended up, Selective Service moved to a lottery system with random numbers assigned to dates of birth. The number for my birth date exceeded the number from which Selective Service drafted that year, moving my draft status from 1-A to 1-H (meaning if there was another World War III, I would be drafted). I never served in the Vietnam War, but knew many and worked with many who did. For those who served in combat, their tour of duty “In Country” was for one year. However, that one year serving in Vietnam continues to haunt and possess their souls, many men never recovering from the experiences of what they did, what they saw, and what happened to the people with whom they served and the people whom they fought. Pope John Paul II in condemning the invasion of Iraq by the United States issued this stern warning to our nation, “War is ALWAYS a defeat for humanity!” No one wins, all who participate in war end up broken. In the three years I ministered at St. Stephen’s in South Minneapolis, many of the homeless we served in the homeless shelter were former Vietnam War veterans, still broken psychologically from what they experienced in combat 40 years earlier. It is to all the men and women broken by that war that this Psalm Offering is dedicated.
THE MUSIC: The Psalm Offering is in three part, ABA, form. Melody A begins with the tempo marking Lento con dolente, which literally mean slowly and mournfully, introducing the musical motif of war. Melody B is a little faster and more animated moving from a minor key area to a major key area. The dance like quality of melody B moving to a minor key as melody A is restated at the faster tempo, expresses the dance of the young going off to war, filled with war’s propagandized glory, unaware of their own mortality. Then mournfully as the tempo slows down to the original speed with melody A in octaves in the higher register and ponderous octaves in the lower register of the piano, the true nature of war, death and destruction, reveals itself and imprints itself on the young souls in combat. The Psalm Offering ends with a mournful sounding chord, tolling like a church bell that gradually chimes softer and softer.
