REBEL, Jean-Féry (1666-1747) [by Lewis Saul]

Les Élémens

1. Le Chaos

listen: Stuttgarter Kammerorchester

Thomas Zehetmair, cond.

Baroque music is pleasing to the ear. Bach was the master of delicious polyphony and beautiful part-writing. Handel, Telemann and Vivaldi are crisp and to the point. Rameau and Scarlatti wrote some of the greatest, technically difficult, and exciting keyboard works of all time.

Then there the lesser known composers — Jean-Féry Rebel being one of them.

The first movement of this work — whose later movements are more traditional, focusing on the elements: air, fire and water, along with some more popular French dances — is called “The Chaos.” In it, he attempts to musically depict that time right before the universe was created.

Genesis 1:2

2Now the earth was astonishingly empty, and darkness was on the face of the deep, and the spirit of God was hovering over the face of the water.

בוְהָאָ֗רֶץ הָֽיְתָ֥ה תֹ֨הוּ֙ וָבֹ֔הוּ וְח֖שֶׁךְ עַל־פְּנֵ֣י תְה֑וֹם וְר֣וּחַ אֱלֹהִ֔ים מְרַחֶ֖פֶת עַל־פְּנֵ֥י הַמָּֽיִם

The important Hebrew words in the text above, are the third and fourth — TOHU (chaos) and VOHU (emptiness).

The Midrash Rabbah states:

“R. Huna said in Bar Chappara’s name: ‘If the matter were not written, it would be impossible to say it, viz., GOD CREATED HEAVEN AND EARTH; out of what? Out of NOW THE EARTH WAS TOHU AND VOHU.'”

But there is a fascinating footnote:

“God first created tohu and vohu, and out of these He created the world. But this is not to be taught publicly.”

But indeed, this cannot avoid being discussed. What came before the nothingness?

Rebel — who served as court composer to Louis XIV — sought to teach us one of the strangest musical moments of the Baroque era:

1. Le Chaos

Here he opens with a tone cluster consisting of five clashing pitches — C-Sharp, D, E, F, and G-Flat::

Out of this chaos emerges some normal tonality, but with quickly ascending 32nd-notes and a repeated riff on one note, which dies down and ends peacefully: