Program notes on “Let my prayer arise/Da ispravitsya molitva moya”, Op.

24-6

by Gerald Jiu Yang Kiing

The architect of this masterpiece, Pavel Chesnokov, was an Imperial Russian and Soviet composer,

choral conductor and teacher. He produced over five-hundred choral works, an overwhelming majority of

them being sacred in nature. The texts of this piece are from Psalm 141 (or 140 for the Hebrew and

Protestant numbering):1-4, and are as follows:

Let my prayer arise in thy sight as incense;

and let the lifting up of my hands be an evening sacrifice.

Lord, I call upon thee, hear me;

receive the voice of my prayer, when I call upon thee.

The music’s grave tone accompanies the sorrowful theme of Holy Week well during which the

piece is usually sung (specifically at the Liturgy of the Pre-sanctified Gifts in the Orthodox Church). Holy

Week is the week in Christian tradition in which Jesus was tortured and died. The last two lines (“Lord, I

call upon…when I call upon thee”) portrays the scene of the anxiety-ridden Jesus praying alone in the

Garden of Gethsemane, desperately calling for His Abba Father to “(if you are willing) take this cup of

suffering from me; yet not my will, but yours be done” (Luke 22:42). Additionally, the second line “and

let the lifting up of my hands be an evening sacrifice” eerily conjures up the bloody image of Jesus’ hands

stretched up high to be nailed on the cross so that He became the paschal sacrifice.

Furthermore, I dare to say that this piece was a foreshadowing of the oppression that the incoming

Soviet communist regime would impose on Chesnokov. The regime prohibited the production of sacred

music, and Joseph Stalin ordered the destruction of the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour (for which
Chesnokov was the last choirmaster). “Let my prayer arise” is a cry to God by the author that his voice

may be heard, and I do not think that it is bizarre to assume that he Chesnokov voiced out such cries when

he couldn’t compose sacred music out of fear of persecution. And that he too did the same when he saw

the destruction of his beloved cathedral, a watershed moment that nailed the coffin in his music career.

Tragically, on 14 March 1944, Chesnokov died of a heart attack caused by malnutrition while he

was queuing up in a Moscow bread line.