John Adams: preference

Transcript context

…Why would Jesus have been drawn to a withered hand? You’ve asked that question. What’s the answer? [laughs] You’re mentioning a very early piece of mine called Christian Zeal and Activity, which dates way back into the 1970s. That was a period of avant-garde, experimental music. I found an old hymn book. I think it was a Salvation Army hymn book, and I found it in a used bookstore. The hymns were all classified: Easter, “Christ Is Risen,” Advent, et cetera. Then there was a section called “Christian Zeal and Activity,” which I thought was a wonderful phrase. I composed the piece, and basically what I did was to take the very popular old hymn, “Onward Christian Soldiers,” and I slowed it up to almost unrecognizable slowness, just like an iceberg slowly melting. Then I made a recording of a Sunday morning revivalist preacher talking about Jesus and the man with the withered hand. There was something very musical about the way he kept repeating the term withered hand. It was a very American-sounding little clip — I guess you could call it a found object — and I mixed that in with the slowed-down hymn. You’ve also done an oratorio, El Niño. What do you see as the overall role of Christianity in your body of work?…

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