On Saturday, April 8th, I attended the Passion Play, “Behold Your Savior”, at Lutheran High School, Indianapolis. The play emphasized the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod’s 2017 theme of “It’s Still All About Jesus”. The play was 12 scenes long, beginning with Jesus’s miracle of Feeding the 5000, and ending with the Ascension. I found the play very well done, considering the actors are volunteer members of the Indianapolis Lutheran community. There was emotion, and added context which helped provide analysis of the text found in the Bible.
While the story was obviously Biblical, there was limited music because the focus was put on the dialogue. The music was instead used for transitions, and added emotion. The songs were sung from backstage during transitions, which were used as a summary of the scene prior. I thought that this artistic choice of singing live while backstage was really interesting, as it added mystery as well as acting as a collective mood. There was one recording, which was played during the Crucifixion scene, I think merely because of how emotional the death of Jesus is, as well as how many events contribute to his death.
Overall, I think that because the production focused on the life and dialogue surrounding Jesus, music was added when it was felt it was necessary for the audience to understand what just happened, as well as adding emotion to the story. This is what I think we’ve been talking about all semester; the power of music to unify the listeners in emotion and understanding.
2 responses so far ↓
Anonymous // Apr 9th 2017 at 8:12 pm
That sound so interesting. I would have been very intrigued if I would have watched that. Do you think that the addition of music would have made the performance better?
Allie Parker // Apr 9th 2017 at 10:00 pm
While the music was limited, I think that it did make the performance better. I think that with the added emotion, it pushed the actors to match the song’s level of emotional investment which was then conveyed to the audience.
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