The University of Redlands Choir - “Tenebrae Factae Sunt“ Marcoantonio Ingegneri

In 1968, a year before his retirement, J. William Jones, made another of the many off campus appearances of the University Choir during his tenure. This service was for the dedication of a new organ at the San Diego First Methodist Church. He was not in the best of health having suffered recent minor strokes, and at one point during the service had to pause when he developed numbness in his hands. The wonderful thing is you can’t tell it by this beautiful anthem sung in the J. William Jones style. The Latin text means, “Darkness fell“ which of course was what occurred during Jesus’s crucifixion. The anthem expresses this with a dramatic harshness in the tone and dynamics initially, but then there are shifting diminuendos and crescendos that go with the following text until the soft ending that illustrates, “And he bowed his head and gave up the ghost.“