CD: David Lang, 'poor hymnal'

Artists: David Lang, composer / the crossing / Donald nally, conductor

Released on Cantaloupe Records, 2024

David Lang’s poor hymnal tries to get to the core of what a religious experience can be. “What I love about hymnals,” the composer writes in his liner notes to the CD, “is that they’re a catalog of things a community of worshippers can agree on — a catalog that can be sung. And what the worshippers are singing about matters.”

Lang constructed the text for poor hymnal by stitching together lines, phrases and poignant utterances from sources as varied as the Old Testament, Mahatma Gandhi and Tolstoy — “This piece is trying to say: The reason we are coming together is to remember how important we are to each other, and to remember how important it is that we take care of each other.”

David had imagined a hymn book for the album cover. In creating this, it was important to me to make it humble and show the signs of many loving hands having held the book over many years. Inside the wallet, we see the imagined pages of the book, showing the actual track listing and some of the hymn texts.