ABSTRACT

The 14-year gap between West Side Story and Mass is the longest period between two Leonard Bernstein musical theatre works, and this suggests a definite change of direction in Bernstein's career during 1957. This gap coincided with his appointment as Music Director of the New York Philharmonic Orchestra, a post that he held from 1958 to 1969. The commission for Mass came in 1966, when Bernstein was asked to compose a dramatic piece to inaugurate the National Arts Center in Washington DC, which was now to be called the Kennedy Center. Mass follows the structure of a Roman Catholic communion service, from the Kyrie Eleison and opening prayers through to the communion itself and the final dismissal. The rite of the early church that recalled the Last Supper developed over the centuries into the service of communion, or mass.