Cassius Clement Stearns

Cassius Clement Stearns was an American composer of church music. "Prof. C.C. Stearns was born in Ashburnham, Mass., August 23, 1838, and was the son of Charles and Rebecca Greene (Robbins) Stearns. He went to Worcester to live in 1859, and made that city his home until 1893.  During that time he taught music in Worcester and was organist and director of music in a number of Protestant churches.  He taught instrumental music at the Oread from 1864 to 1868. He was for many years one of the members of the Board of Government of the Worcester Festival.  In 1877 he was one of the Conductors of the Festival, at which time a Mass composed by him was sung.  He has also been Conductor of the Westboro Musical Society and of the North Brookfield Musical Society. He has written many musical criticisms and reviews of musical work, and has also lectured on music.  His musical compositions number many hundreds, his speciality being church music, written for both the Protestant and the Catholic church. Of special excellence among his choir pieces are the following: Praise the Lord Jehovah, Blessed is the Man (Psalm I), Great is the Lord, How Beautiful Upon the Mountains, Sing and Rejoice, Benedictus, God is our Hope and Strength and Glad Tidings of Great Joy all published by the White-Smith Music Publishing Co. Of his compositions of secular music his Scenes from Nature: Six Musical Sketches is worthy of special mention. On October 23, 1872, he was married to Miss Gertrude Bottomly of Leicester, Mass. They have no children. Since Professor Stearns left Worcester in 1893, he has resided in Santa Barbara, Cal. and Asheville, N.C., and is living at present in Sharon, Mass." History of the Oread Collegiate Institute, Worcester, Mass. (1849-1881): With Biographical Sketches, p. 265, Martha Burt Wright and Anne M. Bancroft,  Tuttle, Morehouse & Taylor Company, 1905 He was born on 23 August 1838 in Ashburnham, Massachusetts, the youngest child of Charles Stearns (1796-1874) and Rebecca Green Stearns (née Robbins) (1802–87). He married Gertrude Bottomly (1837-1910) of Leicester, Massachusetts, in Boston on 23 October 1872 (a few days before the Great Fire), the celebrant being the Revd. Phillips Brooks. Stearns died on 7 August 1910 in Sharon, Massachusetts and is buried at Worcester Rural Cemetery, Grove Street, Worcester.

Life


Stearns came from a musical family and showed early promise, playing the bass viol with the choir in the Ashburnham meeting house from childhood. He studied the piano and organ with Professor Benjamin F. Leavens and the cello with Wulf Fries, a member of the Mendelssohn Quintette Club. Starting his musical career in Ashburnham, he moved to Worcester, Massachusetts in 1859, where he was active in the Worcester Music Festival.

Stearns was organist and director in several church choirs. For three or four years from 1867 he was the organist of the Congregational (Unitarian) Church on Court Hill, for whose new pastor he composed an anthem Awake, put on thy strength in 1869. On 4 July 1881 he played the organ at a packed Prayer Meeting at Mechanics Hall following the assassination of the President, James A. Garfield, In 1890 he was the organist and director of music at the Pleasant Street Baptist church. However, he was best known as a teacher and composer, particularly of church music, organ and piano studies and songs. He is described as a music teacher in directories for Worcester between 1860 and 1893 and taught instrumental music at the Oread Institute from 1864 to 1868. Stearns left Worcester in 1893, but after brief spells in Santa Barbara, California and Asheville, North Carolina returned to Massachusetts.

Music


Stearns' numerous compositions included several settings of the Mass and of Vespers including the Magnificat. Other compositions included a Te Deum in G and settings of the Tantum Ergo, O Salutaris Hostia, Regina Coeli and Salve Regina. These were warmly received when first performed, "Mr. C. C. Stearns's concert and the first performance of his new Mass...took place on Thursday evening, filled Washburn Hall to its full extent, and was pronounced one of the best concerts ever given in Worcester. It opened with a Tantum Ergo, composed by Mr. Stearns, and well sung by the club under his leadership, with assistance of an efficient little orchestra of seven pieces. The work was well received, especially the second movement, which was brilliant and telling....The second part of the programme was occupied by Mr. Stearns's original Mass in A, a work noticed at length in our columns last week, and which, on the occasion of its first public performance, revealed new beauties to those who heard it in rehearsal, and won from the large audience only high encomiums of praise. Rarely does it happen that a young composer succeeds so well in bringing out his first work, in summoning such efficient aid — choral and instrumental, and in more than meeting public expectation. A more enthusiastic audience is rarely found in our concert-rooms; and yet it was not demonstrative, did not even demand an encore; but there was that unmistakeable air of cordial appreciation, more valued doubtless by composer and performers than the loudest applause. The choruses were well sung; so, too, the majority of the solos, quartets, &c. The strong points of the work came out with new force, and the unity of the whole was even more apparent than before. The Et Incarnatus the Agnus Dei — with the Miserere breathed out, rather than sung; and the Dona Nobis, were especially admired. The orchestral parts were the subject of general remark for their originality, richness, and the sound musical knowledge shown in their composition. It is the general desire that the performance of the Mass should be repeated. We hope to hear it in Mechanics Hall, with a larger orchestra and an organ. Why not at the dedication of the fine instrument to be held here during the coming fall?" Dwight's Journal of Music: A Paper of Art and Literature, Volumes 23-24, 1863-65, p. 210 including at the Mechanics Hall, "An original Mass by a young native composer was the main attraction of a concert lately, which appears to have excited great interest.... Mechanics Hall has seldom been the scene of a more interesting musical event than on the evening of the 23d inst., the occasion of the second public performance of Mr. Stearns's Mass in A. The composer had spared no pains nor expense to give the work the best possible performance, and a large and appreciative audience, many from adjoining and even distant towns, rewarded his efforts....The chorus singers selected for the Mass had been well chosen. Every voice told, and the parts were well balanced. Moreover, the rehearsals had been frequent and faithful. Very pleasant it was to notice that each singer made the work his own for the time; and all sang as if heart and soul were with the young composer and his music — no small compliment to the innate merit of the work which could voluntarily command such interest.... The Mass bears repetition; indeed it is rich in material for study. Very fine is the working up of some of its choruses; as for instance the "Amen", with its fugue treatment, and the magnificent "Sanctus", which was rendered on Tuesday evening with thrilling effect. The "Et Incarnatus" is finely conceived, as all must have felt who heard the quartet sung the other evening by sympathetic, well-trained voices. Fragments of the "Gloria", the "Agnus Dei", and "Dona Nobis" were hummed and whistled in the streets, and drummed out of pianos for months after the first performance of the Mass, and yet these melodies are as artistic as they are original, and as far as possible removed from the clap-trap which seizes the popular ear for a time, to be soon condemned as worthless." Dwight's Journal of Music: A Paper of Art and Literature, Volumes 25-26, 1865-67, p. 184. See also Mr. C.C. Stearns' concert at Mechanics Hall, January 23, 1866, Worcester, Mass., 1866 and Mechanics Hall, Margaret Erskine, Worcester, Ma. (Worcester Bicentennial Commission), 1977 but were later criticized for their 'operatic' style and included on the 'black list' of disapproved music issued after the Motu proprio of Pope Pius X on Sacred Music. Stearns' settings have accordingly been little used since the early 20th century, but interest in them is now reviving. His church anthems, sacred songs, organ voluntaries and a hymnal that he edited were published by White, Smith & Company. Stearns' song The Parish Sexton was dedicated to the operatic comedian Henry Clay Barnabee, who started his career by singing in Boston churches before founding The Bostonians acting troupe.



Stearns' output was summarized in 1890 as follows: "Model Anthems is the title of a new work for quartets and chorus choirs, by Mr. C. C. Stearns, and although only recently published, it is already meeting with a most substantial recognition by some of the best choirs in this city, as well as those in many of the country towns. Choir masters and singers are much interested in the music, which is adapted to the wants and capacities of the most cultivated choirs, and also to those of average ability. Mr. Stearns has also recently published his Easter cantata for Sunday schools, a worthy companion to his Christmas cantata. His masses in D and F, vespers in B flat and G, two masses for children's voices, entitled, Mass of the Angel Guardian and Children's Festival Mass are standard works in Catholic churches throughout the country, and two choice vocal duets, Is Life Worth Living and Hope Abides Forever for concert or church purposes, together with a trio, Father in Heaven, have met with a cordial reception from singers who are on the lookout for something new and interesting. Mr. Stearns's profession as a teacher of the piano and organ has led him to write some available compositions for these instruments and Glad Hours and Loving Hearts' Gavotte are among the most popular piano pieces. For the organ he has written two excellent books which organ students appreciate, also an illustration for the organ, Contemplation founded on the motto: 'An ever-pervading mystery broods over the universe and the soul of man, at times weird and solemn and again calm and reposeful, full of tender memories like a benediction of peace.' All of Mr. Stearns' compositions are published by the White, Smith Music company, of Boston, and the above named are a few of the most prominent ones."

There is a pastoral quality to Stearns' music, as illustrated by the evocative bird song effects in the organ part of Beatus Vir in his Vespers in G. A contemporary wrote that "Mr. Stearns has given an apt expression of his love for his native town and a sensitive appreciation of its scenic attractions, in several musical compositions, suggested by, and dedicated to the mountains and lakes of the landscape."