Dómine, memorábor justítiæ tuæ solíus: Deus, docuísti me a juventúte mea, et usque in senéctam et sénium, Deus, ne derelínquas me.
O Lord, I have remembered Your singular justice. O God, You have taught me from my youth, even now in my old age and weakness. O God, do not abandon me.
Psalm 70: 16-18
GT: 332
GN: 320
The last line of the psalms eloquently speaks to one of the primordial fears we have: being forgotten, left behind, cast away. Abandonment is traumatic, and there’s perhaps nothing worse than feeling as if even God Himself no longer cares. Attachment theory states that in order to feel secure, we must first be safe, seen, and soothed; this is implied by the psalmist’s trust in the Lord from his youth to his old age. Is there perhaps doubt that God still sees the psalmist as his death approaches? By recalling God’s providence, is the psalmist attempting to conjure those deeply-embedded neural pathways? The more I sit with this psalm, I begin to wonder if my initial interpretation, that of a vocative demand after a posture of trust, is naive.
I retained the melody as found in the Graduale Romanum.
Besides the ambiguous textual interpretation, the other interesting feature of this chant lies in its modality. Initially cast in mode VIII (plagal tetradus maneria), the cadential pattern on mea whisks us to modes V and VI (tritus maneria) before returning to mode VIII on the words derelínquas me. More specifically, the torculus on juventúte acts as the pivot point between the two maneria, since this intervallic pattern is common to both. DO-RE-DO in tetradus becomes FA-SOL-FA in tritus. This is made further evident by the shift from TI to TE. TI naturally ascends to DO, while TE inherently descends to LA. The introduction of the Bb on the word mea immediately follows the interplay between TI and DO (the dominant of mode VIII) on the syllables juventúte. The modal contrast is thus made evident. The ultimate descent on mea to FA ultimately establishes the tritus maneria. Perhaps the transition between maneriae reflects the textual change from youth to old age.
Mode VIII returns on the pre-tonic syllable derelínquas on the porrectus flexus with TI rather than TE. This is the same motif found on solíus, as well as the transposed figure on justítiæ and sénium. Its usage throughout the chant – four times, in fact – is made all the more extraordinary by the relative brevity of the chant and its unusual graphic, which indicates that all the notes ought to be sung as a complete gesture.
I found the double salicus on ne derelínquas fascinating. Still set in tritus mode, what we consider bright major triads underscore a heavy word. This gesture evokes a ball rebounding from the ground, since the slight emphasis always falls on the last note. In this case, the slight emphasis on DO at the top of each salicus prepares for the re-introduction of TI on the next syllable. The repeated gesture could serve as another extra-musical plea from the psalmist for the Lord to remember him.
Both settings of Deus are particularly expressive. The first Deus, sung on DO, the dominant of mode VIII, sounds almost like a pleading echo with the tristopha over Deus. Sung from an aged perspective, there could quite literally be an echo from the past. I hear a definite change in character for the second Deus, something lethargic and ponderous, perhaps even desperate, in the present cry.
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