Tag: baroque music

Deliciously unfamiliar/eminently listenable music from little-known French composer Michel Corrette

Posted on by Peter Mechen

MICHEL CORRETTE (1707-1795) France
LES DELICES DE LA SOLITUDE – Sonatas Op. 20 Nos.1-6

Michelle Kesler –  ‘Cello I Sonatas 2, 4 & 6  / Cello II
Miranda Wilson – ‘Cello I Sonatas 1, 3 & 5  / Cello II

MSR Classics MS 1832

Recorded November 2024 in the Recital Hall at Brigham Young University, Provo, Utah, USA

“In the spirit of friendship between ‘cellists, we hope listeners will enjoy this lively conversation between instruments” writes ‘cellist Miranda Wilson in her notes accompanying a delightful recording that has come my way, of music by a composer whose name I did not know, one Michel Corrette, born in Rouen, France in 1707. In this case, it’s amusing to associate the ready camaraderie between the two musicians featured on this recording with a work whose six sonatas have the collective subtitle  Les délices de la solitude (The Delights of Solitude) – however, although it would seem that Corrette’s set of six sonatas were originally for solo ‘cello plus basso continuo, they’re here assigned to two ‘cellos, whose demonstrably equal share of the lines makes for great satisfaction, as much obviously in performing as in our listening!

Cellists Michelle Kesler and Miranda Wilson are the players on this recording, made in November 2024 at Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah – at the time both were Professors of ‘Cello at their respective teaching places, Kesler at the aforementioned Brigham Young University, and Wilson in the neighbouring state of Idaho at the eponymously-named State University in Moscow, Idaho. We’re given detailed guidance as to which player is “Cello I” in each of the sonatas, Kesler conveniently taking the “lead” in Sonatas 2, 4, and 6, and Wilson in the other three. The presentation nicely completes the collaborative nature of the whole by presenting the works in numerical order.

My first listening impression (Sonata No. 1 in F Major) was of a slightly more spacious acoustic for the two instruments that I thought I was going to fully enjoy, but, as with any concert or recording one encounters, one’s ears can take a little while to, in Michael Flanders’ immortal words on his and Donald Swann’s “At the Drop of A Hat” live recording, “get the pitch of the hall” – and by the first movement’s end the sounds had found and “inhabited” their places for me with music which had by this time amiably teased, cajoled and enlivened my spirits!

Miranda Wilson entertainingly draws attention to Corrette’s music corresponding with the rise of the ‘cello as a solo instrument at the expense of the viola da gamba in popularity at this time, one taken advantage of by, firstly, the publication of these sonatas at around 1739, and the composer’s 1741 treatise Theoretical and Practical Method for Learning the ‘Cello to Perfection in a Short Time. Something of the ferment of the controversy is excitingly suggested by a pamphlet circulated in 1740 by a French lawyer and amateur viola da gamba player Hubert Le Blanc, one which bore the contentious title Defence of the Bass Viol against the Enterprises of the Violin and the Pretensions of the ‘Cello! – wot larks! Le Blanc’s somewhat intemperate rationale regarding his instrument’s superiority has since seen its consignment to the realm of the specialist, by no means obliterated, but put in its place by history!

Here, we are invited to indulge in the composer’s obvious enthusiasm for the then still new-fangled instrument (Corrette’s aforementioned treatise was the first French publication of “a theoretical and practical method” for aspiring cellists) – and the sonatas as recorded here feature a kind of “coming together” of solitudinous delights, with each ‘cellist by turns blending their instruments’ solo lines with their partners’ roles as contrapuntal voices, the modes somewhat antithetical in these pairings but, in situ, delightful.

Sonata No. 1 straightaway dances into a Fuga, marked Allegro, the counterpoints unselfconsciously switching from first to second voice in non-hierarchical exchange, its composer obviously allowing his originally-wrought basso continuo a satisfyingly comparable response to the soloist here, and also in the Affetuoso Aria that followed – and the Allegro finale makes for as “companionable” a solitude as could be imagined!

The D Minor Sonata No. 2 begins with a more driving Allegro, with lots of “fizz” to some of the exchanges, and the ensuing Affetuoso, with its contrasting Arias I and II underlining a poignant operatic-like interaction, not unexpectedly calling for some resolution – a CPE Bach-like Allegro staccato did the trick, those brusque, attention-grabbing initial notes making for a splendid “what’s all this, then!” kind of denoument!

I loved the easy, loping stride of the C Major No 3’s Allemande – a kind of relaxed “bustle” of an Allegro, and then with both this and the equally bucolic concluding Fuga da capella third movement enclosing an unexpectedly concentrated middle-movement Sarabande. More concentrated intensities came with both players’ deep-diving into the following E-flat Major Fourth Sonata’s opening Adagio, one that conveyed a more-than-usual sense of solitude on the music’s part. This dramatically tipped over and into a Corrente, an exhilarating running-sequence leaving one breathless but energised enough to take on board the music’s almost hymn-like Aria which followed – little did we realise we were being primed for a “call-to-arms” with the succeeding “Brut de chasse” here rousing and enthralling our sensibilities with sounds and sensations of an army on the march!

Further excitement came with the galvanic Presto Prelude to the Fifth Sonata in G Major, in which one imagined our two cellists enjoying an “Anything you can do” exchange, with hair and resin flying! The following Allemande, though more leisurely an Allegro took us on a reasonably aerobic stroll, a mood which was at once echoed and calmed by a graceful Sarabande – here, a winsome and exploratory partnership that brought peace to one’s soul. As well for such respite, with the sharply-etched Presto finale that followed mischievously breaking the mood, snapping playfully at dancers’ heels.

Glorious and celebratory were the Handelian flourishes which opened the final sonata of the set, the 6th in a joyous D Major. Here, strangely, it seems the MSR Classics booklet prints the incorrect names and tempi for the movements – the opening Preludio has a grand, ritualistic character which should be Allegro Moderato, not Presto. And this suits the solemn, ceremonial gait of the second movement Aria, not Allemande – Allegro as listed here. Finally, the players skip merrily into a concluding Gigue (not in the least bit like a Sarabande!). It all made for a bit pf a puzzle on a first listen, but one well worth solving, and which Michel Corrette himself might possibly have regarded with amusement rather than annoyance  – after all, among his prodigious output were no less than twenty-five “Concerti Comiques”, pieces for vocal and instrumental ensembles which were often “fun” settings of popular tunes and well-known opera themes, and written largely to be used as “entractes” during performances of comic theatre.

This was revelatory stuff for me – listening to the disc right through was like being taken on some kind of “tour” of a specific time and place in European musical history – though he lived in the same era as his fellow countrymen Rameau, Leclair, Boismortier and Mondonville, and at the same time as Handel, CPE Bach, Gluck and Pergolesi,  Corrette’s music survives comparison with these more famous figures due to its craftsmanship and its composer’s penchant for capturing elements of different styles and blending them in singular ways. The voices of his influences are in places unmistakable but he manages to make the results of their synthesis his own. The only comment I wanted to make of a questioning nature concerned repeats in the various movements, so many of which seemed to finish before I wanted them to! –  and moments such as those made me wonder what the scores of these works indicated were the options for the players who perform this music. I would be interested to find out more regarding this subject. For the rest, to the composer and performers, simply “Bravo! C’est magnifique!”

Music that unfurls the Colours of Karori’s splendid Futuna Chapel

Posted on by Peter Mechen

“Something old, something new…”  – the Elementi Trio at Futuna Chapel, July 2026

ELEMENTI TRIO –
Monica Verburg – flute, alto flute
Nicholas Hancox – viola
Pepe Becker – soprano, thumb piano (mbira)

Futuna Chapel, Karori, Wellington
Sunday, 5th July 2026

Sitting in Futuna Chapel, in Karori, on a recent Sunday afternoon, listening to a concert of music given by a trio of extremely talented performers (flutist, violist and soprano vocalist), I found myself thinking at various stages of the concert about the sheer beauty of the sounds being brought forth by these musicians. I’m sure that, given the singular beauty of the venue’s overall atmosphere, ambience and amalgam of design and colour, I was allowing those qualities to infuse the music’s impact beyond the realms of a simple auditory response and into a kind of totality of experience that transcended “normal” listening. Be that as it may, the effect of these different factors conspired to produce a level of enjoyment of this concert’s music-making that has stayed with me right up to this moment.

Interestingly, the very first item of the concert seemed to me as much a “test run” by the performers, almost a “getting the pitch of the hall” kind of run-through with an audience present for the musicians to be able to sound out things like the balances between the instruments and the voice, and the degree to which the sounds “come back” from the peopled ambient spaces. I did find this first item (Thomas Morley’s madrigal “Arise, get up, my dear” a trifle chaotic in its full-blooded amalgam of sounds – and yet the music is actually about incidental chaos, being Morley’s musical description of the hustle and bustle of a new bride’s wedding day. More spacious and wide-ranging was Pepe Becker’s singing of Hildegarde of Bingen’s “O Euchari” which followed, the singer enabling her voice to “ring down the ages” from Hildegard’s time, with Nicholas Hancox’s viola steadily recreating the age-old drone accompaniment. A third item completed an opening “triumvirate” of the concert’s range and scope, featuring a home-grown work, Pepe Becker’s own setting of a sixteenth-century poem “T’amo mia vita” (I love you, my life) by Giovanni Battista Guarini, originally arranged by Becker for three voices, but here recast for soprano, viola and “thumb piano”, an African instrument known as the “mbira” and played by Becker herself, its sound creating a kind of timeless, tonally transcendent “voice”. The words of the poem have a universality which here seemed to fit the composer’s revised setting as much as it must have her all-vocal original!

We heard three more of Pepe Becker’s by turns playful, declamatory and darkly visionary pieces placed separately throughout the concert, the delightful “Two Tui” a work for flute premiered by Bridget Douglas in 2010, and essayed here most viscerally by Monica Verburg, the music based on two separate calls associated with different places in Wellington, and brought together as a kind of dialogue, with a petulant dismissive squawk of one bird at the other’s expense at the end! Becker’s more expansive, almost ritualistic piece, “Scorpio II – From the far point of the Rising Sun” featured her soprano voice enacting a kind of ritual exchange with the solo flute. Long, sonorous lines alternating with stately roulade-like flourishes before the dialogues become intricate and earnest (though no words were provided – I presumed the singer’s phrases were in Latin), the lines occasionally mirroring one another before concluding the piece with some brief mirror-image shared phrasings. Most suggestive for me was her darkly resonant tribute to Sagittarius, a setting of William Blake’s “The Tyger” a work Becker dedicated to her father, along with her “many Sagittarius friends” – something of a “Do not go gentle into that good night” work of darkness and angst, the sombre tone set by Nicholas Hancox’s opening viola chord, though the trio fetched up more incisive and trenchant tones for the poem’s “fearful symmetries” (it was a work composed for this concert, in fact!).

Bringing her own creative talents to this cornucopian assemblage was flutist Monica Verburg, who contributed no less than two recently-completed pieces for premiering at this concert, the first one a heartwarming and environmentally topical work titled “To the Hils” (Ki ngā puke), being inspired by a recent campaign of conservation of Otago’s Dunstan Mountains. Verburg drew our attention to the piece’s influences, a certain “Celtic flavour” in accord with early European settlement of this area, and which the trio of musicians made much of in performance throughout the piece’s three sections, The other recent work of Verburg’s was  “In the Slipstream” a delight for the ear in its interplay between two instruments, flute and viola (the flutist often swapping between flute and alto flute in her performances, which variation, to my shame, I seem to have neglected to draw any attention to in my notes – mea culpa!) Here, the two instrumental  lines  imitated, shadowed and mimicked one another constantly, with (I thought) occasionally bluesy inflections spicing the sounds ever so slightly, as the music, by turns teased and blended its two strands before drifting into a pensive ending.

Monica Verburg was as well responsible in full or in part for four other items, two of them original works and two arrangements, the first original work “Turn Your Eyes”, originally composed in 2024 for soprano and alto recorder, and then rewritten for soprano, flute and viola – the words were based on the text from Proverbs 4:25 “Let your eyes look straight ahead….” Though the combination of tones made it impossible for me to decipher any of the actual text, the sounds in tandem, though brief, were themselves glorious! We then heard a song “Ocean Breeze” (aha! – in my notes is a mention of the ALTO flute!) – here, Pepe Becker’s soprano and Monica Verburg’s instrument were wistful companions at the song’s opening, one whose melody readily caught the ear in balladic fashion! The two arrangements made by Verburg were for larger-scale forces as one might have expected in her grand setting of Giovanni Gabrieli’s “Jubilate Deo” with its splendidly ceremonial trappings, not to mention the fulsomeness of the text – “Shout joyfully to God, all of the earth!” – what attention-grabbing gesturings (suggesting, of course, antiphonal voices) and declamatory utterances, complete with brief, wistful occasional minor-key harmonic turns, just for variety! Great stuff!

Before I mention in conclusion the concert’s final item (Verburg’s second “arrangement”) I need to recap with still more “gems” which came up in passing  – one was non-vocal, Jack Body’s “Aeolian Harp”, here most evocatively realised by Nicholas Hancox’s viola, capturing the piece’s extraordinary and irresistible frisson of intensities gleaned from nature’s random impulses. Then there were three medieval “pop” numbers from the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, the earliest of which was Guillaume de Machaut’s “Douce Dame Jolie”  (Sweet. Lovely lady)  – performed here with the viola as the drone instrument and the flute as a companion for the voice – what an uncanny sense of time and place, here, with music making its way to us centuries later! Of the two other later works, one (“Quel fronte signorille” (That noble brow) by Guillaume Dufay) had a similar “courtly love” sentiment no less resonant and focused than de Machaut’s, while the other (a motet “Quam pulchra es” by John Dustable) was by contrast an unashamedly erotic setting of words from the Biblical “Song of Songs”, its performance here suggesting a parallel musical “enchantment by beauty”.

By the time we reached the programme’s final item everything seemed suffused with a spirit of complete capitulation towards the music and its making, one suitably enhanced by Monica Verburg’s inspired arrangement of this concluding music. Flute and viola began the “thistledown on the wind” introduction, the former extempore and the latter holding a firm foundation line. The scene having been set, the voice then entered with the famous melody “Hine e Hine”, one written famously by Princess Te Rangi Pai (the stage-name of Fanny Rose Poata – b.1868 d.1916), composed in or around 1907. It felt like a kind of “homecoming”, one returning to something deeper than the present, and with enveloping tendrils of belonging, easier to “feel” than to explain. But in tandem with the glories of the venue in which we had enjoyed these sounds it “rounded off” for me (and for others I spoke to at the time) a most agreeable afternoon’s music-listening!

Handel’s “Messiah” from the Orpheus in warm-hearted seasonal tradition

Posted on by Peter Mechen

Orpheus Choir and soloists  with Brent Stewart  in Handel’s “Messiah” at the MFC

George Frideric Handel – MESSIAH
Emma Pearson (soprano)
Maaike Christie-Beekman (alto)
LJ Crichton (tenor)
Joel Amosa (bass)
Orpheus Choir of Wellington
Orchestra Wellington
Brent Stewart (conductor)

Michael Fowler Centre, Wellington
Saturday, 13th December, 2025

Walking into a concert hall foyer a good half-hour before the performance’s starting time and encountering a veritable sea of faces and conglomerate of bodies all exuding a kind of excitement and anticipation tells you that you’re somehow onto a good thing for the evening!

Such an osmotic buzz of expectation spreads like a forcefield throughout the shared spaces to the performers, creating a “charged” environment through which the ordinary is metamorphosed into the fabulous even before a note is sounded.

Through some kind of alchemy, Handel’s “Messiah”, no matter how many times it gets performed, never loses its appeal. I’ve practically lost count of the ones I’ve attended, and the details have a habit of running together when I try to fetch up specific memories of a presentation with this conductor and that singer, and especially in tandem with dates – but it has for me developed the aura of a ritual in which I feel something of an unexplained compulsion to repeatedly take part.

Of course a major consideration for many people is that “Messiah” is almost never the same work on each occasion it’s presented – and I don’t mean merely in terms of differences of interpretation of the same score, because there is no single “same score” – no single “definitive” version. A statistic I encountered recently which took my breath away was that Handel had produced forty-three versions of the work’s fifteen solo numbers, the composer making numerous adjustments to suit the needs of the different singers he used at various times. Different versions of the whole work also appeared, beginning with the Dublin version in 1742, then a London version the following year, followed in 1750 at the London Foundling Hospital and a revision in 1754, featuring different music and alternate version of numbers.

This near-profligacy of difference makes each performance of this work something of an adventure for the listener – and it’s definitely a factor in the music’s never-ending joy and fascination. Naturally interpretation plays a part in this on-going process, with different conductors and soloists (and choirs and orchestras, for that matter) bringing to each occasion singular characteristics and qualities. While I can remember with great pleasure certain aspects of past performances involving both individual and concerted efforts, it’s a particular joy to encounter, as here, something of a shared benchmark of achievement on the part of all the performers. In fact I can put my hand on my heart and declare that I thought this a splendid and great-hearted “Messiah” which set out from the very beginning to “engage” with us, drawing us increasingly and unsparingly into the story’s intense wonder, drama and fulfilment regarding Christ’s sojourn on Earth.

Under conductor Brent Stewart’s focused direction, orchestra, soloists and choir were able to touch realms that seemed almost transcendent in places –  of course every listener will cherish certain singular “moments” and mark them out for “legendary” status in times to come (as I’ve done now and then with past hearings of this work,as an essential component of the process). Tonight’s soloists rose to the occasion in various instances  – tenor LJ Chrichton pleased with his attractively airy “Evry Valley” at the work’s beginning, even if his opening phrase of  “Comfort Ye” seemed more like a “test run” than the real thing  – but his subsequent longer-held phrases made sonorous amends! At the other end of the expressive scale was his more-assured Part Two set of recitatives and ariosi, concluding with the vigorous “Thou shalt break them”, which featured some confident ascents to the demanding top notes of “thou shalt dash them in pieces” – sterling, true-toned efforts!

His bass counterpart, Joel Amosa, impressed throughout with his virility and flexibility, pinning our ears back with his “Thus saith the Lord” and rolling his voice up and down his runs on the word “Shake” in fine style. Even more thrilling was his partnership with the orchestra in “Why do the Nations?” , a high-energy combination of rushing orchestral figures and melismatic vocal lines, the singer’s triplet figures riding the orchestra’s impetuous common-time trajectories with breathtaking adroitness! However, it was Amosa’s partnership with trumpeter Lewis Grey in “The Trumpet Shall Sound” which carried the day, the singer’s prescient introductory story-telling tones paving the way for the splendid combination of voice and brilliantly-sounded instrument that we were then treated to.

I’ve always thought the alto in “Messiah” had fewer opportunities to really “shine” in this work compared with the other singers, with the exception of the great aria “He was despised”. Here, Maaike Christie-Beekman movingly took us right into the hollowed-out chamber of sorrow and rejection  suffered by the beleagued Christ, almost as if it were a great and private universal “confession of sorrow”. I’m nearly always disappointed when a performance neglects to include the tempestuous middle section “He gave his back” because of the dramatic contrast it sets up – a real “trial” for everybody concerned, though, when it happens!

Soprano Emma Pearson’s first recitative entry, of course, was preceded by the sublime sweetness of the “Pifa” (the Pastoral Symphony characterising the shepherds), after which she sang the 4/4 version of “Rejoice greatly” (my first hearing of this was Handel’s first gigue-like 12/8 version) – the coloratura passages were terrific, really capturing a “joyous” effect! Pearson’s lovely voice also came into its own in the second half of “He shall feed his flock”, following the alto’s opening verse with another, “Come unto him”. Where Pearson’s singing, however, for me “touched” that transcendence I’ve mentioned beforehand was in “I know that my Redeemer liveth”, her clear-as-a-bell rendering still giving the line affecting nuances while fully proclaiming the emotion of belief and surety – something about the unaffected simplicity of her “And though worms destroy this body” I found ineffably touching without knowing really why, but it was a moment that has stayed with me as one of those memories which will endure – a salutary experience for an unbeliever!

As for the “Mighty Orpheus” (as the choir has been known for decades) the voices were at one with their conductor/director Brent Stewart right from the outset, with a vigorous and stirring response to “And the Glory of the Lord”, with the sopranos particularly radiant in their soaring, largely single-note lines.  I felt at times that the rapid tempi for a couple of the choruses missed a certain “deliciousness of utterance”  (“And He shall purify” was one and “His yoke is easy” was another), but I could register the enjoyment of a compensatory “effervescence” in the overall effect (for example, in “All we like sheep” the voices scintillated like bubbling and cascading springs!).  Though not at all related to THIS performance, I still can’t help repeating  for enjoyment’s sakes a reasonably well-known anecdote attributed to the famous conductor Sir Thomas Beecham, who was heard to remark at one point in a “Messiah” rehearsal.  “Ladies and gentlemen of the chorus, when you sing “All we like sheep have gone astray”, could we please have a little more regret and a little less satisfaction?” ).

At the other end of the expressive scale the chorus work projected tremendous potency – in “Surely He hath borne our griefs”, for example, whose opening word was like a hammer-blow – then, in both “He trusted in God” (the most thrillingly incisive performance I can remember ever hearing of this!) and “Let us break their bonds asunder” with similarly biting lines, allied to fantastic energy, making the words come alive – and  making the most of dramatic contrast in “Since by man came death”, bursting out from its positively sepulchral opening in grandly theatrical style. I especially relished, too, the varied treatment of the final “Amen” Chorus, which featured sequences of solo and paired string-playing alternating with the voices – a scalp-prickling effect, then rounded off with plenty of suitably sonorous orchestral tones in support of the voices – wonderful!

With stirring support from the Orchestra Wellington players (a scaled-down band to more readily reflect a Handelian sound-world) aided by the mellifluous strains of  both Bethany Angus’s harpsichord and Jonathan Berkahn’s chamber organ, Brent Stewart and his performers gave Handel’s work a solidly-based sonority from which the details readily sprang, always interestingly, and often excitingly to the ear. The “buzz” that had begun earlier that evening in the foyer had certainly done its job on this occasion, and  in the best seasonal “Christmas tree” tradition!

BACK TO BACH from Baroque Voices takes the listener on a journey

Posted on by Peter Mechen
Baroque Voices at St.Mary of the Angels – from left: Pepe Becker, Andrea Cochrane, Samuel Berkahn, David Morriss, Imogen Granwal (‘cello), Simon Christie. Jamie Young, Toby Gee, Rowena Simpson

 

JS BACH – The Six Motets (BWV 225-230)
Baroque Voices (directed by Pepe Becker)

Pepe Becker, Rowena Simpson (sopranos)
Andrea Cochrane, Toby Gee (altos)
Samuel Berkahn, Jamie Young (tenors)
David Morriss, Simon Christie (basses)
Imogen Granwal (baroque ‘cello)

St.Mary of the Angels Church, Boulcott St., Wellington
Sunday 30th November, 2025

To my shame, I had never before heard a single one of JS Bach’s Motets before finding out about this concert – I’d “heard of” a couple of the titles of famous ones, such as “Komm, Jesu, komm” and “Jesu, mein Freude”, but had never taken the step of getting to know them, thinking that the “Passions” and the “B Minor Mass” and the “Christmas Oratorio” and the “Magnificat”, plus a clutch of Cantatas sufficiently qualified me as an accredited “Choral Bach listener”. So I was both delighted and intrigued upon being told by Baroque Voices’ director Pepe Becker some time ago that this concert was coming up, and DID managed to track down a couple of recordings and fit in some “listening” beforehand so as to get something of an idea of what I was in for…..

The concert date duly arrived and the presentation took place with the succinct title “Back to Bach” for  the Voices’ heady “whirlwind tour” through all six of the composer’s sacred motets, performed by the Wellington ensemble in the sumptuous (perhaps a tad too much so acoustically!) setting of St.Mary of the Angels church in the heart of the city. The director, Pepe Becker, described these works in her programme notes for the concert as “sublime, complex and deeply moving”, though one could add plenty of further epithets to the description of the afternoon’s performance by the ensemble. We warmed as readily to the exuberance of the writing, its enjoyment generated as much by the music’s own urgencies of feeling as by the voices’ different physicalities, all with their own channelled energies. These things all came together, the pieces amply reflecting their creator’s unquenchable human spirit and belief in a higher divine authority.

Unlike the cantatas, which Bach wrote regularly for every Sunday of the church year, the motets were infrequently produced for special occasions in Leipzig, and some may have even been lost. The six surviving ones were in fact the only choral works of Bach which didn’t disappear entirely from view until the renowned “Bach revival” of the 19th Century. The famous story of Mozart’s joyful response, upon hearing in Leipzig in 1789 a performance of Singet dem Herrn ein neues Lied (Sing to the Lord a new song) bears witness to these works carrying a torch for future generations.

It’s unclear what Bach’s intentions were regarding the instrumental accompaniment of these works – only one of the motets, Der Geist hilft unser Schwachheit auf (BWV 226) has extant orchestra parts, and two other Motets have separate continuo basslines written, Furchte dich (BWV 228), and Lobet den Herrn (BWV 230). So there is no “final word” regarding instrumental accompaniment, according to the composer. The works would probably have been accompanied at least by basso continuo (an organ or a melodic bass instrument) – Baroque Voices use a bass stringed instrument in all but two of the Motets – Komm, Jesu, komm (BWV 229), and Jesu, meine Freude (BWV 227), here a baroque cello, played by Imogen Granwal.

Singet dem Herrn ein neues Lied got the concert away to a stirringly festive beginning, with the wonderful “pinging” calls of the opening Singet, the tones brightly shining, and the lines mellifluously blending, swirling nicely together at Die Gemeine der Heiligen sollen in loben, (Sing His praise in the congregation of saints). As well, the infectious “dancing” tones of Die Kinder Zion sei’n frölich über ihren Könige  (Let the children of Zion be joyful in their King) were delightful, leading to the  splendid all-in tones of the climactic Mit Pauken und Harfen sollen sie im spielen! (Let them sing praises unto Him with the timbrel and harp)! The second-movement Chorale Wie sich ein Vat’r erbarmet (As a father is merciful) had one group singing the chorale, and the other interspersing lines from the aria Gott, nimm dich ferner unser an (O, Lord, continue to care for us) – beautiful, heartfelt exchanges! A suitably zestful Lobet den Herrn in seinen Taten (Praise the Lord for His mighty acts), then moved without a break in momentum to a triple-time Alleluia for a satisfying finish.

Next was the tremulously-expressed Komm Jesu, Komm (Come, Jesu, Come), so very theatrical at the outset, and with the individual voices then conveying the hardship of life’s vicissitudes with Die Kraft verschwindt je mehr und mehr (My strength is fading more and more), and the solace of expectation, freed from “Der saure Weg” (the stony path). The voices put an infectious eagerness into the renewed cries of “Komm, komm”, and a renewed strength of certainty  (with touches of elation!) into the trajectories of Du bist der rechte Weg, die Wahrheit, und das Leben (The Way, the Truth and the Light). The concluding Chorale, Drum schliess ich mich in deine Hande (So I entrust myself into Thy hands) quietly exalted in its certainty here, right to the final long-breathed notes.

Though written for the funeral service in October 1729 of Johann Heinrich Ernesti, longtime rector of the St. Thomas School  in Leipzig, Bach was perhaps inspired by the great man’s positive qualities by writing some attractive and inspirational music for this motet, Der Geist hilft unser Schwachheit auf (The Spirit also helpeth our infirmities). Its cheerful, forward-pressing gait and general overall tone includes some droll references to the “Spirit’s” intercession for our prayers “mit unaussprechlichem Seufzen” (with unutterable groanings)! The music’s lovely 3/8 trajectory at the beginning changes to common-time for both the “groanings” and the references to “Der aber die Herzen forschet” (He that searcheth the Heart). My only other thought was that the Chorale could perhaps have been a little more hushed, and varied in delivery at the outset, as befitted the words “Du Heilige Brunst, süsser Trost” (Heavenly Fire, sweet consolation) – which sounded as if they might have come from Schiller, for goodness sakes!

The interval gave us time to reflect on the magnificence of the music and the manifest qualities of the performances, which were considerable – brightly-shining tones, nimble trajectories, neither rushed nor dragging, distinctive individual voices, and, despite some idiosyncratic vocal “blends” in certain places, still successfully ensuring the voices’ clarity and the words’ flavourings and colourings were imparted. I wondered in places whether the acoustic was actually a bit “too much”, resulting in some of the singers’ tones being amplified more than others, and wondered whether a smaller, sparser acoustic might have integrated the sounds better. However, it was a “sometimes” effect, as more often the ensembled sounds came together most mellifluously.

The lovely opening of Fürchte dich nicht (Fear not) with its euphonious exchanges continued our pleasure, as did, in an entirely different way, the dramatic interpolations of recitative-like utterances of “Ich stärke dich!” from individual singers, and the contrast between the austere chromatic fugal passages and the radiant chorale excepts from the sopranos in the ensuing fugue, a vocal contrast that continued to delight us until the final concerted statement “Furche dich nicht – Du bist mein!” Heartwarming!

The longest and most complex of the motets is Jesu, meine Freude  (“Jesus, my Joy”). Essentially scored for five voices, including a second soprano line (as with Bach’s Magnificat) it alternates a chorale tune by Johann Crüger with settings of texts by Johann Franck and from Paul’s Epistle to the Romans. It’s uncertain just when this motet was composed, or for what particular purpose, with one scholar even advocating the idea of Bach using the work just for educational purposes with his St.Thomas’s Leipzig  choir.

The beautiful opening sang out gloriously, the singers relishing the third of each group of lines of text, arching each towards a moment of intense feeling – a marked contrast with the beginning of the next movement’s Es ist nun nichts Verdamliches (There is therefore now no condemnation) with the word “nichts” separately and pointedly repeated, and the following line “Die nicht nach dem Fleische wandein” (Who walk not after the flesh) which wanders graphically in a kind of wilderness! The wonderful third movement Unter Deinem Schirmen (Protected by Thee) returned to the chorale tune, whose serenity was “roughed up” with references to Kracht und Blitz (“Thunder and Lightning”) and then Sünd und Hölle (“Sin and Hell”) adding to the dramatic effect. The three women’s voices then consoled our fears with the fourth movement’s Denn das Gesetz des Geistes (“For the Law of the Spirit”).

More drama and contrast was depicted by the fifth movement’s  Trotz dem alten Drachen (“Defy the Old Dragon”), the singers hurling the word “Trotz” (Defy!) upwards and outwards, and agitatedly word-crafting a world raging and quaking (Tobe, Welt und Springe – ”Rage, world, and quake!”), before painting a picture of the soul standing and singing  in perfect peace with God (Ich steh’ hier und singe in gar Sicher Ruh). The following movement Ihr aber seid nich Fleischlich (“For ye are not of the flesh”) most winningly here contrasted a quick-moving fugal opening with a sonorous chorale-like conclusion Wer aber Christi Geist nicht hat, der ist nicht sein! – (“Yet one who has not the Spirit of Christ is not His!”).

The vigorous and wonderful Weg mit allen Schätzen(“Away with all earthly treasures!)  that followed featured the soprano with the chorale line set against such deliciously contrasting and detailed figurations from the others – the urgently-delivered opening from the lower voices and with its first word Weg! repeated, was such a delight! And the singers conveyed the “strongly-felt essence” of other utterances such as Elend, Not, Kreuz, Schmach und Tod (“Poverty, distress, Cross, disgrace and death”) so very vividly at the conclusion.

The winsome So aber Christus in euch ist (“And if Christ be in you”) was gentle and dance-like, here, until the words Der Geist aber ist das Leben “But the Spirit is life”, when the figurations quickened, though leaving us with a somewhat unresolved conclusion – this was supplied by the following Gute Nacht, O Wesen (“Goodnight, O earthly Life”) – here, a stunningly beautiful piece whose lines I thought the sopranos  took a little time to settle into at the beginning, but which achieved a magic by the end.

After these heartfelt articulations, So nun der Geist des (“Now that the Spirit of him”) seemed businesslike and anecdotal by comparison, almost a case of the narrator moving the story on to its inevitable conclusion! Bach replicates the manner of the work’s second movement in the use of a repeated word (here, “Geist” is repeated, as was the word “Nichts” in the second movement) and the text has the same instruction-like tone as Es ist nun nichts Verdamliches. The true frisson of feeling came with the final Weicht, ihr Trauergeister (“Disperse, sombre spirits”), with the original opening Chorale melody taking us back to the work’s beginning in the most disarming and direct way – all truly wonderful!

There remained the “orphan” of the bunch to give some attention to – the motet Lobet den Herrn, alle Heiden (“Praise the Lord all ye nations”), the one that there’s “doubt” as to whether or not it’s by Bach at all.  Pepe Becker put it succinctly in her programme note about the piece, saying that “it’s hard to imagine who else could have written such a vital, well-crafted piece”. And who could blame her, with such material to perform? At the beginning a sprightly combination of lines led to a splendidly-voiced fugue at “Und preiset ihn, aller Völker”, after which an appropriately slower section made reference to Seine Gnade und Wahrheit (which will) waltet uber uns in Ewigkeit “His mercy and truth (which will) reign over us for all eternity” – and with everything then enlivened by a sequence of triple-time Alleluias – an appropriately joyful way to end such a concert!

What to say? – except that the experience for me of hearing these works in concert for the first time was life-changing. To Pepe Becker and her Baroque Voices grateful thanks for a truly resounding experience!

 

Amazingly vibrant, energetic and tumultuous “Christmas Oratorio” – the Bach Choir of Wellington, Nota Bene and the Chiesa Ensemble

Posted on by Peter Mechen

The Bach Choir, Nota Bene Choir, The Chiesa Ensemble and soloists, conducted by Shawn Michael Condon  – photo, Colin McDiarmid

JS BACH – Christmas Oratorio
BWV 248 – Parts I, II, III and VI

Georgia Jamieson-Emms (soprano)
Maaike Christie-Beekman (alto)
Iain Tetley (tenor / Evangelist)
Robert Tucker (bass)

Douglas Mews – organ

The Bach Choir of Wellington
Shawn Michael Condon (director)
Nota Bene
Maaike Christie-Beekman (director)
The Chiesa Ensemble
Rebecca Struthers (director) / Anne Loeser  (Concertmaster)

Shawn Michael Condon (conductor)

St.Mary of the Angels Church
Boulcott Street, Wellington

Saturday 15th November, 2025

There’s been a definite kind of newly-furbished “buzz” associated with choral events I’ve attended in Wellington over recent times, particularly associated with a venue, St.Mary of the Angels Church, which by dint of its richly-appointed  ambiences and built-to-standard acoustical properties seems made-to-order for public performances of works of an ecclesiastical nature – two such for me have been, firstly, of Claudio Monteverdi’s 1610 Vespers for the Blessed Virgin ( ) and, more recently, of JS Bach’s Christmas Oratorio. I’m actually anticipating some kind of triumvirate of performance in writing this, as another different vocal ensemble based in the capital, Baroque Voices, is set to perform another work of JS Bach’s, the Six Motets BWV 225-230, later this month, again in St.Mary of the Angels Church  – hopefully the occasion will be as tumultuously supported as were both the Monteverdi and the more recently performed Bach work which I’m here reporting on….

Of course the excitement of a “sold out” concert for both musicians and audiences can’t help but add layers of lustre to any such occasion, and would have certainly “fired up” the musicians involved in this recent presentation. I’m certain there would have been a degree of corresponding “lift-off” to the performance we heard, relating to such overwhelming audience support, and  particularly as the opening chorus of the work “Jauchzet, frohlocket” (Celebrate, rejoice) was sung and played at the liveliest pace I’ve ever heard it performed – in fact, conductor Shawn Michael Condon took it all a tad too vigorously for my liking, though all the musicians, vocalists and instrumentalists, seemed to get their notes in! And I was sitting close enough to register the absolute delight and definite purpose on the faces of those in the choir singing this music, as if the extra notch or three of trajectorial purpose was stirring the blood of all concerned even more!

Conductor Shawn Michael Condon, with soloists Iain Tetley (tenor), Maaike Christie-Beekman (alto), Robert Tucker (bass) and Georgia Jamieson-Emms (soprano) –  photo, Colin McDiarmid

The rest had manifold pleasures and beauties – all of the vocal soloists made ear-catchingly impressive “beginnings” – the first to be heard, tenor Iain Tetley, handled his opening “Es begab sich aber zu der Zeit” (It came to pass at that time) with great aplomb and nicely-varied impulse, continuing to do so right through the evening, though the composer’s near-impossible demands upon the tenor in the final cantata seemed to take something of a toll! Elsewhere, though, his tones and enunciation of the text were a joy to listen to, in Part Two catching the excitement of the heavenly hosts,  and in Part Three conveying plenty of the narrative’s thoughtfulness, particularly  regarding Mary’s pondering of the words spoken about the infant’s wondrous birth…

I enjoyed the dulcet tones of alto Maaike Christie-Beekman, her line steadily and fluently maintained in “Bereite dich, Zion” – and she was especially  moving in Part Two’s lovely “Schlafe, mein Liebster” where her lovely long notes and sensitivity in general made up for a somewhat prosaic “Schaut hin, dort liegt im finstern Stall”  from the choir – a pity, as the soprano choral tones had been so lovely in the previous part’s “Wie soll ich dich empfangen?”

Bass-baritone Robert Tucker’s versatility was in no doubt with his “Grösser Herr”  giving great pleasure and managing to even make something of those lower notes which were more difficult to “centre” than others! I thoroughly enjoyed his brief but vivid cameo of the despicable King Herod in Part VI , while earlier, his “So recht, ihr Engel, jauchzt und singet” joined with the heavenly host’s excitement at “Den Menschen ein Wohlgefallen”!  He also interacted splendidly with soprano Georgia Jamieson-Emms’s Angel in Part Three’s  Duet Aria “Herr, dein Mittleid” , both singers given ample space to float and negotiate their tones  while the oboes (I couldn’t tell from where I was sitting who was playing) were splendidly vital, by turns lyrical and energetic in their support.

Part VI had splendid orchestra playing, with the trumpets and timpani displaying pin-point accuracy and with plenty of “schwung” besides, from both chorus and orchestra. That done, the tenor and bass  vividly paved the way for the Angel’s condemnation of Herod’s treacherous intentions – Georgia Jamieson-Emms certainly gave her recitative plenty of bite, and, aided by great support from strings and oboes tackled the angular lines of her aria with plenty of verve and appropriate resolve.

All four soloists relished their interactive dramatic recitative, preparing us for the work’s final chorus, a tour de force for both instrumental and choral forces, alternating as it did the chorale lines with more vigorous instrumental passages. The instrumental playing from the various Chiesa Ensemble members (strings, flutes, oboes, brass and timpani) throughout couldn’t be faulted (including leader Anne Loeser’s hand-in-glove accompaniment of  Maaike Christie-Beekman’s “Schliesse, mein Herze”), the players  (including the continuo of Douglas Mews’ organ) achieving a standard I’ve not heard bettered in any performance of a baroque work I’ve previously attended.

Members of the Chiesa Ensemble – Kirstin Eade (flute) and Robert Orr (oboe) – photo, Colin McDiarmid

My abiding memory, though is of the chorus throughout, of those faces showing every sign of putting their hearts and minds into every syllable of what they uttered, and filling the building unstintingly with their tones accordingly. Their response to conductor Shawn Michael Condon’s every impulse was direct and giving, demonstrating in the most heartfelt way what their voices were conveying. It all made for a memorable and vibrant experience of a piece with the music we heard and enjoyed.

Late-afternoon Bach and Shostakovich – worlds and times apart sounding together….

Posted on by Peter Mechen

JS BACH – Suite No. 3 in C Major for Solo Violincello BWV 1009
Rolf Gjelsten  (‘cello)
DMITRI SHOSTAKOVICH – String Quartets: No 5  in B-flat (1952) / No. 2  in A Major Op. 68 (1944)
The Chamber Pot-Pourri Ensemble:
Helene Pohl, Simeon Broom (violins), Nicholas Hancox (viola), Rolf Gjelsten (’cello)

The Long Hall, Roseneath, Wellington
Saturday, 18th November, 2025

“Wuthering Heights” might have been an apter name for Roseneath’s “The Long Hall” on Saturday afternoon, when Wellington’s Point Jerningham resoundingly lived up to its reputation as the windiest spot in the capital during a concert given by the Chamber Pot-Pourri Ensemble, one in which the wind played at pedal points, drones, and vigorous ostinati as constant accompaniments to the music-making.  The latter, of course, persisted and eventually triumphed, with the players’ all-pervading focus on the music happily relegating such disruptions, however tumultuous, to an incidental, scarcely noticeable in situ degree.

The Ensemble’s quartet personnel has undergone fascinating and fruitful variation over the year, in particular regarding a second violinist, and featuring luminaries such as Monique Lapins, Anna van der Zee and Peter Gjelsten in the position. For this concert the player was Simeon Broom, currently an NZSO member with a number of years’ valuable experience spent in various orchestras overseas. Each of the quartet performances in this concert demonstrated both the group’s flexibility and individual members’ skills at adaptation to fresh combinations, auguring well for continuance of presentation by the ensemble of one of chamber music’s core repertoire resources.

As well they might for the purposes of such an exploration of what is becoming increasingly apparent to me as one of the great cornerstones of musical expression of its time and its relevance for other times – Dmitri Shostakovich’s fifteen string quartets. Though Beethoven’s acclaimed cycle of quartets would seem like an obvious inspiration to any aspiring composer tackling the same genre of works, Shostakovich’s relationship with the form took a different path over time, with the young composer, mindful of his experience with the 1936 “Lady Macbeth affair”,  all too aware of those repressive conditions foisted upon creative artists within his homeland, and thus taking care with his first string quartet venture (1938) to avoid any undue excess. It was six years before he returned to the medium in 1944, confident then of giving an impression of a loyal Russian’s patriotic response to the war effort via his references in the work to Russian folk music, though the ethnic elements in this second quartet included definite references to Jewish “Klezmer” music, perhaps more for aesthetic reasons than political ones. The Third, Fourth and Fifth Quartets were less fortunate, with the composer’s increasingly dysfunctional relationship with Stalin and his cohorts resulting in his regarding the works as “for the drawer” – the Third Quartet (1946) received one performance before being withdrawn), while the other two (the 1949 Fourth and the 1952 Fifth)  languished unperformed until after Stalin’s death in 1953.

Of longer-term interest is Shostakovich’s love of the music of JS Bach – he headed a Soviet delegation in 1950  to attend in Leipzig events marking the bicentennial commemoration of Bach’s death , where he was quoted as saying “For us Bach’s legacy is an embodiment of flaming emotion, soulful humanity and true humanism, which stands in contrast to the dark world of raw evil and contempt for humanity.” Shostakovich knew the Well-Tempered Clavier intimately (he had been playing it from the age of twelve), when he encountered the 26 year-old Tatiana Nikolaeva playing selections from the work at the International Bach Competition which was one of the Leipzig bicentennial events. Her playing (which won her the competition’s first prize) inspired Shostakovich to compose his own set of 24 Preludes and Fugues, and dedicate the set to Nikolaeva, who premiered them in December of 1952 (she subsequently recorded them no less than three times!).

These Op.87 Preludes and Fugues provide a thoroughly refreshing look at musical examples of the art we readily associate with Bach – counterpoint, fugue and texture, a dynamic collection of captivating opportunities for what one commentator has described as “musical ecstasy and reflection”. And, as ‘cellist Rolf Gjelsten pointed out in his pre-concert talk today prior to playing for us Bach’s heart-warming ‘Cello Suite No.3 in C Major,  the work’s confidence, ebullience and mastery of form is a representation of the effect on Shostakovich’s own use of counterpoint and fugue in certain of his quartets, especially evident in the 1944 Fifth Quartet which we were to hear immediately after this work.

I’d recently been enjoying former Wellingtonian cellist Miranda Wilson’s “The Well-Tempered ‘Cello” (published 2022, Fairhaven Press) , describing her own saga of getting to know, working on, and eventually performing these ‘Cello Suites – so the section of the book devoted to this Third Suite occasioned some required (re)reading and (re)relishing!  She emphasises the work’s in-built resonances, being in the C-major key, and Rolf Gjelsten seemed to confirm this with his verdict regarding the work’s general affability and out-going nature – music with plenty to say and with the resonances created that supported this kind of character.

Right from that opening “downward plunge” into Bach’s flow of notes I felt a wonderful sense of well-being – the journey at first was mostly scalic, but with some wider steps and a couple of quirky jumps, and a voice which grows in variety of expression, passing through single notes, phrases, lines and episodes, and with an engagingly droll drone-sequence around the note of G, before a few moments of recitative bring us to the end.  The Allemande contrasts with the bright-and-bushy-tailed Prelude in being so gorgeously relaxed in its graceful trajectory, the sudden chain of double-stopped notes in the piece’s first half, a brief frisson of tension that resolves with a nudge of extra warmth. Rolf had told us about the Courante with its “crazy dance” aspect (Miranda Wilson refers to the piece’s “frantic-up-and-down arpeggios”!) – and to my untutored ear it seemed to possess and swap between two kinds of rhythmic trajectories at will, with beat-stresses changing as if playing a kind of game with my sensibilities!

The Sarabande, my attendant author’s “powerfully moving” rhythm, is similarly characterised by my in situ player as having “a unique kind of intensity” – I didn’t know before this concert that it’s a dance form that was banned in the 17th Century as eliciting “too erotic” a response from its participants! I’ve now been dangerously over-sensitised to its allure, and will have to watch myself over that second note in each bar, in future!  I catch myself savouring it during the performance, here, and thinking that it must be a case of “once heard, etc….!”

The Bourees plucked me our of any such fantasy world I might have ventured into. They’re wonderful, “two-sides to the coin” dances, suggesting different physical, psychological or emotional views of the same location, feeling, or situation. Here the difference seemed like a masculine/feminine distinction, a somewhat conventional response, I know, but one which a lifetime of observation has ingrained for good or ill! And I loved the Gigue, here, with its almost lazily loping stride, and especially the bariolage sections (one note repeatedly sounded in the midst of a whirl of others) which have always had a pleasantly astringent “ring”, and which were followed with a reassuring “that’s enough of that” rejoiner!

So, onto the first of the Shostakovich offerings of the afternoon we went, with the wind just as fulsomely attendant as ever! The Fifth String Quartet appropriately back-ended the Bach Suite performance, allowing the former’s compositional proximity to the composer’s own 24 Preludes and Fugues to resonate more readily, the earlier Second String Quartet having a rather different, and more removed kind of genesis. I was intrigued by other references I’d found to this later quartet’s influences, among them the music of one Galina Ustvolskaya, a former pupil of the composer’s and one he apparently harboured deeper feelings for, following the death of his first wife – Shostakovich quotes a four-note motif from Ustvolskaya’s B-flat Clarinet Trio, played by the first violin in the quartet’s first movement coda (the composer’s feelings, incidentally, were never returned, adding to the poignancy of the quote).

In his introduction to the work for us Rolf Gjelsten emphasised the composer’s predicament at having to indefinitely defer some of his music’s performances, such as this Quartet (along with his two previous quartets, one of which did get a “premiere” but was then withdrawn!). Stalin’s death in 1953 meant that this Quartet could at last come in from the cold, along with a number of other important works “awaiting their time”. It was the first of the composer’s Quartets which joined the movements together in a single sweep, and it contained a number of unusually “personal” references – elements which would come to increasingly characterise the quartets still to come.

The work’s striking opening contained a “walking” theme whose determined trajectories were set upon by trenchant figures whose intensities assailed the music until the second violin’s introduction of a more lyrical subject tossed about between the players. Gradually the mood intensified further, with both the walking and lyrical themes returning but under siege, the lines buzzing like fierce insects, out for blood, but then gradually receding as, firstly, the lyrical theme made an impassioned return, and then, from nowhere, came the aforementioned Ustvolskaya quote on the first violin, disappearing after a second, higher, more ethereal statement as the instrument took the music via a single note and accompanied by pizzicati, to the next movement.

Here, the lines portrayed a kind of stillness, a post-rampage desolation, in places a kind of austere beauty, with eerie unisons and soulful phrases clasping the ambiences and holding them fast, until the viola, obeying a lonely impulse stepped forwards with an engaging phrase in hand to begin the dance, a tart little waltz whose good-humoured gesturings gradually turned once more into the furies that beset the opening movement. And just as unexpectedly as in the opening movement, the tumult ceased, and first the violin, and then the viola impassionedly sounded the Ustvolskaya theme once again, punctuated by emphatic pizzicati from the others. As with its first appearance the theme gave little solace, more a sense of something out-of-reach, emphasised by the subsequent “walking away” of the music, the jog-trot of the finale’s opening leading to a bleaker, much reiterated theme which then dissolved into silence.

After giving us such a “living and breathing from within” response to this work’s emotionally searching sound-saga, the players allowed us an interval’s space before launching into the  stunningly contrasted physicality of the opening “Overture” to the composer’s Second String Quartet , written in 1944 – music sounding for the moment relatively free from the constraints of politics or dogmas, its folkishness serving both as Shostakovich’s loyal citizen-response to the “Great Patriotic War”, and in particular his fondness for Jewish klezmer-like idioms in the exuberant opening theme, here suggestive of a folk-celebration.

Though this remained an ensemble performance overall, throughout the work’s second movement I couldn’t help but be overwhelmed by the charismatic violin-playing of Helene Pohl in her delivery of the piece’s klezmer-like solo, mournfully expressive soliloquies over drone-like accompaniments, and with the occasional notes ambiently “bent” in what one presumes is an authentic style. At one point the ‘cello sounded a brief solo before the violin began a slow waltz, one into which melody the other instruments gradually climbed, their notes rising to agitatedly “connect” with the violin’s before falling away once more – for most of this movement the violin is played as if it has joined with its player at prayer…..

A nocturnal scherzo/waltz followed, swift, ghostly and chromatic, a real danse macabre, alternating between substance and shadow before taking its “do I wake or sleep?” leave.  In its enigmatic wake was left the finale, an astonishing theme-and-variations movement, recitative-like at the beginning between the instruments , settling down to expound and extract every ounce, strand and tone of the folk-tune introduced by the viola, and then refracted through what seemed like all possible combinations, and every single conceivable characteristic one might ascribe to the composer’s experience. All the players here – violinist Simeon Broom, violist Nicholas Hancox and cellist Rolf Gjelsten – brought into play intensities and virtuosities echoing those of Helene Pohl’s brought over from the previous movement, carrying the music through its tumultuous journey to a monumental conclusion.

I managed a few grateful words of breathless appreciation to Rolf Gjelsten at the end – and then, afterwards, the still-insistent winds were good company as I walked home, drawing out the music’s tumultuous resonances from my memory and setting them dancing in the open air, art and nature joining hands in an unexpected post-concert bonus!

“A feather on the Breath of God” transports us all… Baroque Voices’ 30-year anniversary concert September 2024

Posted on by Peter Mechen

Baroque Voices – From Hildegarde to JS Bach –
Sacred German Music for one to eight voices spanning seven centuries
Music by Hildegarde of Bingen, “The Tannhauser”, Wizlau von Rügen, Caspar Othmayer, Johannes Walther, Johannes Eccard, Heinrich Schütz, Johann Michael Bach, Johann Ludwig Bach, Johann Sebastien Bach, Pepe Becker

Baroque Voices: Pepe Becker (director), Kate Lineham, Jane McKinlay, Andrea Cochrane, Katherine Hodge, Toby Gee, Samuel Berkahn, Simon Christie, David Morriss
Additional BV singers: Jo Hodgson, Milla Dickens, Nigel Collins, Herbert Zielinski, Roger Wilson – Nota Bene Choir: Katie Chalmers, Tina Carter, Vicki Mabin, Lindsay Groves – The Bach Choir: Jonathan Lane

Sacred Heart Cathedral, Hill St., Wellington
Sunday, 1st September 2024

One had only to close one’s eyes at the beginning and one was back in an imagined, but definitely different time – the Middle Ages. Such was the power of evocation generated by singer Pepe Becker with her voice, the musical instrument she was playing while singing, and the actual words and music created nine hundred years before by the renowned composer Hildegarde of Bingen (1098-1179). The sound itself, too, had a transcendental, other-worldly quality, the interior of the newly refurbished Catholic Cathedral of the Sacred Heart in Hill St providing a properly spacious ecclesiastical setting which “gave back” a feeling of a distant source being tapped and revitalised both regarding the performer and all who were present at those unique sounds’ inception.

This conjuration began a presentation by Wellington’s Baroque Voices directed by soprano Pepe Becker, which featured aspects of the previous thirty years’ activity by the group, and included a reappearance (where possible) of past members of the group to present a final item. The range of repertoire included pieces featuring from one to eight voices, and spanning seven centuries, reflecting a number of styles associated with different eras of composition.

A glance at the programme’s history of Baroque Voices’ activities detailed the range and scope of the group’s repertoire in some depth, bringing to mind a number of highlights people would readily remember by dint of the bold adventurousness, committed zeal and remarkable excellence, both technical and musical, of these undertakings. Everybody will have favourite memories of certain occasions, mine being of the Monteverdi projects, the delightful explorations of the Books of Madrigals over the years and the absolutely stunning 2010 (can it be so long ago?) performance of the Monteverdi Vespers of 1610 at St. Mary of the Angels Church whose sound’s burnished splendour still stays in my memory!

Whether one chose to close one’s eyes and experience the intrinsic exquisiteness of the sounds alone, or gaze about the visual splendours of the building to augment the music’s “time-and-place” experience it was a feast from the very first aforementioned moment of presentation, in this case Pepe Becker’s performance of Hildegarde’s O Euchari, complete with the singer’s own shruti box drone accompaniment, not, as one might at first think, a musical glorification of the Eucharist, the celebration of bread and wine becoming the body and blood of Jesus Christ during the Mass, but a tribute to a 3rd-Century missionary Eucharius who became the bishop of the city of Trier. The second of two single-voice pieces was a Spruchdichtung (song/poem) sonorously sung by bass Simon Christie, a moralistic piece emphasising freedom from sin and guilt with God’s help and grace. The contrast between the two solo items nicely encapsulated the intrinsic variety of mood, moralistic tone and spirituality throughout the remainder of the concert, as the presentation moved through a sequence which gradually increased the number of voices, and with one or two exceptions during the first half preserved a chronological composer order.

This had the effect of frequently enticing one’s ear with variation – it was, in fact, a beautifully worked-out programme in all respects, with even the instances of leap-frogging chronologies giving pleasure rather than confusion, as with the later Caspar Othmayer (1515-1553), his 2-part songs rightly taking their place with the other 2-part pieces, ahead of three- and four-part polyphonic hymns of Nikolaus Apel (1475-1537).

Inevitably there were pieces which especially charmed my ear, even though another person’s reaction could well single out different things for different reasons. For instance I particularly relished the somewhat “didactic” atmosphere created by the interval between the two voices (Pepe Becker and Jane McKinlay) in Wizlaw von Rügen’s “Ich warne dich” (I warn you), and also the following “Kyrie magne Deus potentie” (Lord, great God of power) from the two “vocal heavyweights” (Simon Christie and David Morriss). And a little later I found myself particularly drawn to, firstly a two-sectioned hymn (“A solis ortus”) whose first unison part featured five voices, and then a polyphonic reworking of the theme by Nikolaus Apel for three voices (Pepe Becker, Samuel Berkahn and David Morriss) the words beautifully describing something of the visible physical boundaries of creation, with Christ as ruler of all.

The leadup to the interval had something of an irresistible “rolling” quality as well, beginning with the beautiful four-voiced hymn “Nova veniens” describing the city of Jerusalem, from a melody collected by Nikolaus Apel in 1494, and the buoyantly irresistible five-voiced motet by Johannes Walther beseeching the protection of the Holy Ghost “Nu bitten wir”, which I found so invigorating! While it might have seemed strange to then flip-flop back to Hildegarde, Pepe Becker obviously wanted something a bit out of the ordinary for a “first-half closer”, which she was able to organise by pairing the famous Hildegarde solo-voiced “O ignis spiritus” (the sound-world similar to that for “O Euchari” which opened the concert) with a new composition-cum-arrangement by her drawing from the “spiritual fire” of the solo-voiced sequence, and “re-orchestrating” the piece for eight voices and hand-held rock percussion effects – all of which worked sensationally well! (Pepe’s idea was that the theme of “life, light and wonderment” of the original text could be augmented by extra voices and percussion to push the “blissful pleasure” of the text into more extreme realms “verging on pain”) – it all indubitably typefied the questing spirit of its instigator to what seemed to this listener as remarkably appropriate effect!

Baroque Voices 2024
Left to right: Jane McKinlay, Andrea Cochrane, Katherine Hodge, Pepe Becker (director), Toby Gee, Simon Christie, Kate Lineham, Samuel Berkahn, David Morriss

Interval gave us a time of shared discussion and delight before we were returned to what was for the presentation venturing into a new era, the Baroque, beginning with the beautiful motet by Johannes Eccard “Christ ist erstanden” (Christ is risen) for five voices (including soprano Kate Lineham and alto Andrea Cochrane, whose work for Baroque Voices  I’ve not mentioned until now, and whose contributions helped to enhance the work’s delight.) The two Schütz motets which followed gave us by turns beauty (“So fahr ich hin”)  and strength (the more declamatory “Herr, auf dich treue ich”), though I was particularly  “taken” by the six-voice work of the next composer, Johann Michael Bach (whom I’d never really heard of beforehand!), and whose more vigorously homophonic style produced an engaging and decorative “bubbly” effect in places in his motet “Sei Lieber Tag willkommen!”

Two more motets by Heinrich Schütz, both for seven voices, brought more singers into play, alto Katherine Hodge in both and counter-tenor Toby Gee in the second of the two (both had of course previously contributed at various stage of the concert) – in the case of the first motet with the well-known text “Ich Weiss, das mein Erlöser lebt” (I know that my Redeemer liveth), and an Advent text for the second, “Der Engel sprach zu den Hirten”, the first an urgently expressive statement of belief familiar, of course, to Messiah-buffs, using the contrasts between lower and higher voices to both lyrical and dynamic effect. No less celebratory was the second, with (again precursing “Messiah”) all those resonant descriptions of the newborn baby Jesus announced to the shepherds in the fields resoundingly bringing forth “Alleluiahs” at the piece’s end.

Appropriately, the great Johann Sebastien Bach’s music was part of the “closing ceremony” at the concert, being the last item but one, and certainly the most challenging to bring off – this was the eight-voiced double-choir motet “Komm Jesu, komm”, requiring all of the virtues on display throughout the afternoon rolled into one! I found the music intense and “exposed”, the one-to-a part giving each voice nowhere to hide, and making the journey by turns enchanting and tremulous, exhilarating and daunting, and playful and harrowing, all of which characteristics came and went in this incredible performance – there were beautiful, heart-warming and stirring moments, with just the occasional sense of strain, all defining the journey in both individual and collegial ways. The sense of pilgrimage was palpable, and the feeling of arrival at the journey’s conclusion treasurable. Bach had obviously conceived and crafted it as an experience for performers and listeners alike, and here, the achievement of those ends was tangible and well wrought.

Having completed its “Odyssey” the group deemed it time for a celebration, with past BV members still within coo-ee, and ready and able to revisit what director Pepe Becker described in the programme as “the memories of joyous times singing together”. Tributes were also paid to singing colleagues who have since died, and to whom the presentation’s final item, a motet by JS Bach’s uncle, Johann Ludwig Bach’s “Das ist meine Freude” was specifically dedicated. Both the declamatory opening and the swirling, melismatic responses were tossed backwards and forwards with terrific elan, before a “duelling banjos” contrapuntal exchange and a final declamation concluded the joyous work.

Little more need be added to the above, save for expressions of pleasure and gratitude towards Pepe Becker and Baroque Voices for this “coming together” of history with the present in such a richly-wrought and life-enhancing manner for us all to enjoy.

 

 

 

“The Choicest Songs” – an Anniversary concert from Baroque Voices at Futuna Chapel, Karori

Posted on by Peter Mechen

Baroque Voices at Futuna Chapel,  Karori,  Wellington,
June 2024David Morriss (bass), Pepe Becker (director, soprano), Douglas Mews (keyboards), Robert Oliver (bass viol)

                                  Futuna Chapel, Karori

Baroque Voices presents “The Choicest Songs”
A presentation celebrating the 30th anniversary of Baroque Voices
and commemorating various other anniversaries pertaining to Futuna Chapel and its creation

Music by John Dowland and his contemporaries
also Henry Purcell, Monica Verburg and Pepe Becker

Baroque Voices – Pepe Becker (soprano), David Morriss (bass)
Douglas Mews (virginals and recorder), Robert Oliver (bass viol)

Futuna Chapel, Friend St., Karori, Wellington

A review by Peter Mechen (Middle C)

On a still and sunny day, Futuna Chapel (built in 1961) in Karori exudes a unique interior atmosphere wrought by the play of light through angularly-placed stained-glass windows  contrasting  with rather more secluded interior vistas. It’s a singular version of a kind of eternity, one vaster than the actual limited spaces might give one to suggest, but compensating with the mystery wrought by the contrasts. It’s no longer a consecrated chapel, as was the case when I first arrived there as a wide-eyed student from a Palmerston North Catholic school in the 1960s, making one of two separate live-in spiritual retreats here, and relishing  on each occasion what used to be (alas, no longer) a surrounding hinterland of native bush through which one could walk and contemplate what seemed like a natural extension of the intangible mysteries I and my classmates were steeped in at that age.  (I freely admit it wasn’t entirely a haven of concentrated spiritual refurbishment, as we fifteen year-old boys seemed to all too readily find clandestine ways to entertain ourselves in more worldly pastimes thru  games of cards and dice in more secluded parts of that magnificent stand of bush!).

Today, however, was dull and overcast in Karori, as it was elsewhere in Wellington, with the chapel interior having all the more austere and gloomy an atmosphere for our promised concert, organised by the indefatigable Pepe Becker, the “guiding Light” behind the Wellington group “Baroque Voices”, whose 3O-year performing anniversary fell this month. Fortunately the bustle and atmosphere created by an enthusiastic (and practically full-house) audience created an ambience of its own which even the “ticky-tacky suburbia” that has ravaged the once-verdant surroundings couldn’t entirely spoil once we were inside and registering the chapel interior’s still-stunning evocations of its own kind of spirituality.

Pepe Becker’s programme notes reminded us that today’s concert was an occasion of anniversaries, being the 100th birthday of Futuna Chapel’s architect John Scott, who died in 1992 at the age of 68. And, coincidentally, it was the first anniversary of another important creative artist, Jim Allen, four of whose sculptures are embedded in the chapel’s architectural fabric. These anniversaries prompted the Futuna Chapel Trust to commission from Pepe Becker a new work commemorating both architect and artist, one called “concrete, wood and light” and  to be performed at today’s concert.

But there were premieres aplenty today, with two others featuring songs Pepe had written dedicated to two of her performing colleagues, bass David Morriss and the viol player Robert Oliver. First, we heard a song called “Fog”, with words written by the poet Carl Sandburg, and secondly an “Ave Maria” setting , one with an extra dedication to Pepe’s former mother-in-law, Mary Becker, who died in 2022. These songs all included the overall title “Capricorn”, alluding to the star-sign all of the people involved (including the poet!).  Adding further distinction to the concert were two more premieres by a different composer, a pair of songs called “Reflections”, with both words and music written by a flute-player friend of Pepe’s, Monica Verburg, interested in the combination of voice and recorder. Pepe remarked upon the pleasure of performing so many of these songs in close association with the people they were dedicated to.

Besides all of this there were works whose sounds, sentiments and spirit expressed a defining aspect of Baroque Voices’ raison d’etre, songs variously by John Dowland and Henry Purcell rubbing shoulders with a couple of instrumental performances featuring music by lesser-known contemporaries, Tobias Hume (1579-1645) and a name I didn’t know, William Inglot (1553-1621). Though one often encounters the quote “Semper Dowland, semper dolens” from the composer’s own title for one of his consort pieces, not all of his music is steeped in melancholy, as the concert’s opening number demonstrated – Up merry mates, from Dowland’s last book of songs the 1612 A Pilgrimes Solace, was presented here as a lively dialogue song between a ship’s master (Pepe) and his crew (David) on the occasion of rough weather, one which contains a philosophical response to the whims of nature (and some extremely low notes which David Morriss did well to negotiate!). The following heartfelt Toss not my soul was, by comparison, more characteristically sombre, beautifully voiced by the singers and sensitively accompanied.

We then got two delightfully contrasting instrumental solos from Robert Oliver featuring the relatively unknown Tobia Hume’s music – firstly Adieu Sweet Love from the composer’s 1605 book The First Part of Ayres, and then the livelier The spirit of Gambo; then it was back to Dowland again, for an attractive, open-hearted Sleep, wayward thoughts, again expressing a mood somewhat removed from the melancholic character usually accorded his work. I do recall my mother, who was a music teacher, being extremely fond of some of the composer’s Lute Dances which had been transcribed for piano, a number of which were anything but melancholic (the cheerful My Lady Hunsdon’s Puffe being one that particularly sticks in the memory).\

Next were three Purcell songs, each demonstrating the composer’s gift for expressing the actual “energy” of words, the first song Come, let us leave the town from “The Faerie Queen” replete with lively, oft-repeated canonic “comes” and other persuasively impressive urgencies from the two singers, all in stark contrast to the following Lost is my Quiet, a soulful lament for what each singer describes as “life’s happiest part”, though we were given a semblance of contentment by the rather more lively While bolts and bars my days control,  a song describing the mind as unfettered and “freeborn” though the body be held in captivity.

Came the first of the “Capricorn” premieres, with Pepe Becker’s “Fog” leading the way, Sandburg’s text brief and unprepossessing, characterising the fog as a cat-like in its movements and aspect, David Morriss’s voice suitably dark and restrained, and Robert Oliver’s viol-playing spare and stark as befitted the scenario. This was followed by Monica Verburg’s “Two Reflections” for soprano and recorder, written earlier this year, the first “Turn your eyes” imploring the listener with stepwise figurations to “follow a path that’s good and true”, and with the final words “see the beauty all around” reminding one of Mahler’s use of Chinese poetry in part of his “Das Lied Von der Erde”.

The second song “Ocean breeze” had a more meandering kind of opening, one whose phrasings took up a gentle kind of siciliana rhythm, Pepe’s voice and Douglas Mews’ recorder-playing beautifully delineating their own courseways through scenarios lit up by the setting sun and framed by oceanic surgings. I remember at one point the text “ocean breezes come by with the promise of a new day” coincided with a gust of wind outside the chapel which we all heard make its presence felt!

The last of the three Capricorn settings was an “Ave Maria” written by Pepe last year (2023) but only now receiving its premiere performance – set for soprano, bass and bass viol, and dedicated to both David and Robert, the work was written also for Pepe’s “lovely former mother-in-law”, Mary Becker, and was performed today in her memory. The opening of the work had a kind of prayerful, reverential beginning, with a second part that became more interactive between the voices and more imploring via some beautiful ascending phrases, before concluding with repeated “Amens”.

More songs, firstly from Purcell and finally, Dowland – the two Purcell songs brought out some truly satisfying singing from both voices, firstly, we enjoyed Leave these useless arts in loving, the nimbleness of both voices a real delight, and then the absolutely delicious Come let us agree, from the composer’s “Timon of Athens”, the words containing sentiments than no-one present would have dreamed of disputing! – and especially in the wake of this performance!

The return of Dowland for the last three items in the “song” bracket brought a beautiful solemnity to the first of these, Flow my tears, a song that contained the words “Where night’s blackbird her sad infamy sings”, and featured a virginals-only accompaniment (I read somewhere that this became Dowland’s single most famous song, a kind of “signature-tune” – certainly, on the strength of this stirring performance one could understand why!).

At this point we were treated to the second of our instrument-only interludes, this one courtesy of Douglas Mews at the virginals, and featuring a work by another lesser-known composer, one William Inglott (c.1553-1621). Although obscure today, Inglott carved out a sufficient reputation for himself in his lifetime to have a plaque at Norwich Cathedral erected at his death (and after being restored in the 18th Century, one which survives to this present day). Douglas Mews read a poem on which Inglott’s composition, The Leaves Bee Greene, was based – one which I haven’t been able to locate for this review, unfortunately, but was still eminently worth hearing.

Of the two remaining Dowland songs, the first, the renowned Fine knacks for Ladies again most delightfully gave the lie to the idea of the composer being “semper dolens”, the words tripping over the tongues and from the mouths of both singers, and mellifluously accompanied not only by the bass viol, but additionally by Douglas Mews’ recorder in the second and third verses.  After this the last of the songs was always going to sound relatively subdued, but perhaps not inappropriately – words and music of Now, O now I needs must part took on a strong hymn-like character as the singers and instrumentalists (from Verse Three onwards Robert Oliver’s bass viol was joined by Douglas Mews’ recorder once again) gave the sentiments all due sonorous and characterful strength up to the end – very beautiful and heart-warming!

So to the concert’s final item, another premiere, this time a joint commemorative tribute from composer Pepe Becker and poet/writer Gregory O’Brien (whose words had already been written for an earlier publication, and were now set to Pepe’s music for this occasion) to the work of architect John Scott and sculptor Jim Allen. This work, called “Concrete, Wood and Light” was crafted for what the composer called  “an aptly unconventional” Quartet of soprano, recorder, bass and bass viol, with additional wood, stone and body-percussion added to the mix – what Pepe called a “sonic homage” to the building’s many colours and textures.

Begun by vocal humming and various kinds of other vocalisings, singers and instrumentalists began intoning the text, along with ambient irruptions of various percussion sounds, and the recorder joining in with the voices. The work reached a focal point at the words “You are a shelter or clearing in which we find our voices”, continuing towards the text’s final reference  to “the L-shaped silence of your body”. The rest was resonance and presence and awareness, and with a great oneness at the end – all that seemed to matter was the space itself and the renewed and reaffirmed life into which the  artists, performers and audience had poured themselves today.

 

 

 

\

JS Bach’s Goldberg Variations for String Trio – a benefit concert for ‘cellist Jack Moyer

Posted on by Peter Mechen

JS BACH – Goldberg Variations BWV 988  (arranged for String Trio by Dmitri Sitkovetsky)

Monique Lapins (violin)
Alex McFarlane (viola)
Jack Moyer (‘cello)

St.Andrew’s-on-The-Terrace, Wellington

Sunday, 26th May, 2024

Firstly, a bit of history – in 1741 Bach had published a keyboard work with the painstaking title , Aria, with diverse variations for a harpsichord with two manuals. It was the concluding work in the composer’s Clavier-Ubung (Keyboard Practice), a publication Bach intended would show a complete range of possibilities for keyboard players, technical, virtuosic, and interpretative.

The work’s opening Aria came from a copy written out by the composer’s second wife, Anna Magdalena of music Bach had made before, one from which he then devised 30 new variations. The legend largely accompanying these pieces grew up out of an 1802 biography of Bach by one Johann Nikolaus Forkel, that the music was written for use by a Count Kaiserling to counter bouts of insomnia, played by the count’s personal harpsichordist, Johann Gottlieb Goldberg, a pupil of Bach’s son Wilhelm Friedmann. Scholars reckon the story to relate more to the history of the work rather than its origins, as the young Goldberg also took lessons with JS Bach and may have encountered the work as a student.

Estimates regarding the music’s circulation at the time reckon something like 100 printed copies (several of which survive today), but no documented performances were recorded apart from the occasional mention in late nineteenth century recital programmes for the piano. The first name associated with public performance of the work is of the harpsichordist Wanda Landowska, who began her own “Bach revival” in 1903, eventually recording the work on the harpsichord firstly in 1933 and again in 1946, albeit on her inauthentic custom-built instruments.

Though pianist Claudio Arrau had performed the complete keyboard works of Bach in 1935, and made a recording of the Goldbergs in 1942, the latter recording wasn’t released until the 1980s – by then the work had already “come of age” in gramophone terms thanks to the phenomenon that was the young Canadian pianist Glenn Gould, whose renowned 1955 LP recording traversed the globe, bringing the Variations into the mainstream of classical music listening.

Today there are all manner of performances and arrangements of the work, bringing the echt-baroque practice of transcription into our technological age, and taking the work through instruments such as the piano, harp and string ensembles to the world of accordions and marimbas, not to mention saxophone and guitar ensembles and various other jazz trios. One presumes the composer, whose music seemed consigned almost to oblivion for most of the century following his death, would have been gratified at his creation’s remarkable resurgence.

Violinist Dmitry Sitkovetsky’s 1985 transcription of the Variations for string trio in 1985 was the one which today’s ensemble of Monique Lapins (violin), Alex McFarlane (viola) and Jack Moyer (‘cello) brought resplendently to life at St.Andrew’s-on-The-Terrace in Wellington. The occasion was a “benefit concert” for the young ‘cellist in the group, Jack Moyer, due to take up a four-year Honours Bachelor of Music programme at London’s prestigious Guildhall School of Music and Drama, the near-full attendance happily rewarding both the organisers’ and performers’ efforts on behalf of the project.

I had retained a vivid memory of a previous occasion when the New Zealand String Quartet (then with Douglas Bielman as the second violinist, and amazingly, as far back as 2013) performed a quartet arrangement of the work, made by William Cowdery – one of several performances by the quartet at around that time. This later concert was, of course, a different kind of experience in almost every way, apart from my shared feeling here at the work’s end, as in 2013, that “we were able to coexist, for a short time, with a kind of transcendental awareness of things, by way of music whose being somehow seemed to accord with our own existence” – for interest’s sakes, a link to the original review is here provided – https://middle-c.org/2013/05/the-goldbergs-with-strings-attached/

Right from violinist Monique Lapins’ beautifully-nuanced delivery of the theme, with its spacious vistas inviting the most delicate of embellishments when repeated, we were drawn into the Bachian world of infinite possibility! All was stimulated further by the entirely characteristic change of mood with the instantly-engaging dance rhythm of the first variation, both Alex McFarlane’s viola and Jack Moyer’s ‘cello establishing at various times, whether leading or accompanying, a presence of character in their exuberantly-wrought figurations.

Whatever the nature of each variation as regards tone colour or trajectory, the players took to it instantly, giving as much pleasure in the transition from one mood to another as to their sustaining a piece’s character – so the sequence beginning with the chunkily-voiced, down-to-earth Variation 5, followed by the deftly elfin peregrinations of Variation 6, and the diverting contrasts between song-like melody and dance-like rhythm in Variation 7 made for a delightful string of progressions in itself, capped off by the elegant humour of the composer’s more-than-usually graceful “Gigue” in Variation 8, with every move and gesture, nuance and  decisive movement “sounded” here with conviction.

To neglect or pass lightly over any section of the Goldbergs would seem reprehensible, though I’m not able to resist recounting certain moments in the performance which drew me an indefinably extra “way” into the music. I loved, for instance, the “strut” of the players’ rhythms in the Fuguetta of Variation 10, begun irresistibly by Jack Moyer’s ‘cello, and reinforced in every sense of an occasion by each of the others. How appropriate, then that the following Variation, with its cascading ritual-like descending figures would put one in mind of the ringing of bells! And I warmed, in a different way, to the group’s playing of the beautiful Variation 13, with the viola’s and ‘cello’s tenderly-voiced melodic lines freeing the violin’s descant-like decorations with a bird-like overview. No wonder, then, that what Glenn Gould called the “neo-Scarlatti” energies of the following Variation 14 made such an invigorating contrast – and what virtuoso playing there was from all concerned!

I’m obviously not going to be able to “get to” all the performance highlights whose details I scribbled down in my notebook as quickly as I could, trying to keep up with so many rapid-fire fiddlings! I did, I admit, think the St.Andrews’ acoustic at times bright to a fault, in running the tones of the lighter instruments in particular together more than I would have wished for, so that one or two of the more busily-scored sequences in the concert seemed almost as confused-sounding as conversational to my ears – I rather preferred the string-sound we had enjoyed from the NZSQ in the acoustic of St. Mary of the Angels Church, a little more than a week ago! Fortunately most of the players’ efforts here “worked with” the venue’s sound, enabling them to make a grand and satisfying thing of the work’s halfway point Variation 16’s “French Overture”, phrasing the notes generously rather than over-emphatically as seems to be the “period practice” wont these days. And special mention must be made of the playing here of the famous “Black Pearl” Variation No. 25 (described as such by harpsichordist Wanda Landowska) – incredible music, with the kind of sombre beauty that induces awe, especially those sounds which suggest, as here, that one is in unchartered waters, confronted by the unknowable (simply writing about these moments we heard here still gives me goosebumps!)

As for the “Holy Trinity” of the last three Variations, I (a) loved the players’ almost surreal switching between full-throated and filigree sounds in Variation 27, including some heartfelt chromatic “sighs” in places; (b) was slightly disconcerted by the heavy-handedness of Variation 28, thinking that we might have enjoyed a lighter, more circumspect or humourful touch; and (c) thoroughly enjoyed the earthy “bonhomie” of the renowned Quodlibet Variation – after all of which the return of the Aria was like a benediction in itself – as if the composer was setting the words “And we shall be changed” in a deeply human kind of context, but with every note, bowed or plucked, resonating with us and conveying more than words could ever say……

What an occasion for Jack Moyer! – playing his part superbly alongside two extraordinarily talented fellow musicians at this stage of a musical career will surely rank as an unforgettable experience,  Whatever he goes on to achieve, the uniqueness of this day’s occasion will remain – good luck to him for it all!

Orchestra Wellington’s “The Grand Gesture” presentation casts its spell

Posted on by Peter Mechen

Orchestra Wellington presents:
THE GRAND GESTURE – a reflection of music and art of the Baroque era

IGOR STRAVINSKY – Suite from the Ballet “Pulcinella”
JOHANN SEBASTIEN BACH – Concerto for two Violins and Orchestra in D Minor BWV 1043
GEORGE FRIDERICH HANDEL – Concerto Grosso Op.6 No.12 in B Minor
LUKAS FOSS – Baroque Variations (1967)

Amalia Hall (violin)
Monique Lapins (violin)
Jonathan Berkahn (harpsichord)
Orchestra Wellington (Concertmaster – Justine Cormack)
Marc Taddei – Conductor

Michael Fowler Centre, Wellington

Saturday, 4th May, 2024

On this occasion I couldn’t get to the usual pre-concert presentation which can so rewardingly illuminate what’s about to be presented in the concert – I arrived to catch only the final stages, and caught some musical excerpts from the oncoming concert played in the foyer by members of The Queen’s Closet for the audience’s pleasure and delight. It was obviously enough to whet appetites of even those like myself who were standing at the back, probably feeling a bit like those “Gentlemen of England now abed (who) shall think themselves accurs’d they were not here!”

A few empty seats on the fringes of the downstairs auditorium apart, the concert appeared well-attended, and the mood expectant – as is the usual wont with any Orchestra Wellington concert these days, thanks to the sterling efforts of the players and maestro Marc Taddei in obviously putting body and soul into their presentations, and bringing to life even what might seem at times like somewhat intractable material!

Tonight’s presentation title “The Grand Gesture” set out to demonstrate some of the continuing resonances of the work of composers from the Baroque era – if not for our present specific time, certainly of living memory for some in the case of the work of German-born American composer and conductor Lucas Foss, and delightfully so regarding a neo-classical response from twentieth-century giant Igor Stravinsky to the music supposedly the work of a contemporary of Bach, Handel and Scarlatti, one Giovanni Battista Pergolesi (1710-36), more of which circumstance below.

A good deal of thought had obviously gone into the concert’s structure (a valued characteristic of this Orchestra’s work), including what were some unscheduled appearances of musicians playing what appeared to be on “first take” simply further examples of memorable and enduring Baroque music – thus to begin the concert we were treated to a dream-like vignette of violinist Amalia Hall spotlit amid the darkness and high up on the stage platform giving us a stellar performance of the Prelude to JS Bach’s Violin Partita in E Major that transported all of us to our own “other” places for its duration, and for some time afterwards.

Then came the Stravinsky all splendidly articulated, robustly trajectoried and beautifully-voiced throughout. The original “Pulcinella” ballet had its genesis in an idea by the great impresario Sergei Diaghilev, who wanted a work based on the long-established Italian theatre tradition of “commedia dell’arte”, one that used age-old characters wearing masks, “types” such as foolish old men, wanton courtesans, devious servants, and jesters or clowns – a well-known type of the latter was Harlequin, who became the “Pulcinella” of Diaghilev’s scheme.

At that time, the music Diaghilev gave to Stravinsky was believed to have been by Pergolesi (Stravinsky regarded his contact with this music as “a love affair” with the older composer), but much of it has subsequently proved to have been the work of others. In Stravinsky’s original ballet, the vocal sections of the score were based on songs genuinely by Pergolesi which Diaghilev had found, but the purely orchestral music used by Stravinsky from the suite we heard tonight was all adapted from the works of different composers, names otherwise unknown to history – Gallo, van Wassenaer, Monza and Parisotti.

Such an “inconvenient truth” hasn’t been allowed to get in the way of anybody’s enjoyment of what Stravinsky did with this music, who added to the original themes his own twentieth-century harmonies, cadences and rhythms, producing a suitably light-textured and nimble-footed score which served Diaghilev’s purposes admirably. The suite which the composer extracted from the ballet was written in 1922, two years after the ballet’s first performance, and uses eight of the latter’s original twenty movements.

Though Stravinsky took pains to reproduce in Pulcinella something of the reduced orchestral forces of earlier times, there were certain touches that “advanced” the musical language beyond the scope of eighteenth-century practice, mainly found in the “Vivo” movement towards the Suite’s end, such as the use of the solo trombone and double-bass with their “glissando” passages. I’ve always loved this Suite, and Marc Taddei’s and Orchestra Wellington’s performance was, I thought, musically engaging, stylistically evocative and technically outstanding!

Next came what for many would have been the “jewel” of the evening’s presentations, the adorable D Minor Double Violin Concerto of JS Bach, and with two soloists whose performances I wouldn’t imagine being bettered anywhere – Amalia Hall, the usual concertmaster of Orchestra Wellington, but a frequent concerto soloist with the orchestra itself to impressive effect was here joined by Monique Lapins, the sadly-about-to-depart second violinist of the illustrious New Zealand String Quartet, leaving for pastures afresh after eight years with the Quartet. Together with the orchestra they wove a diaphanous continuum of textured interaction that allowed the music to express whatever range of emotions and awareness of structural potentialities this performance couldn’t help but inspire among its listeners.

By inclination I tend to go for warmer, fuller performances than what I sometimes hear from so-called ”authentic” ones – but this performance seemed to tread securely between heart and mind, warmth and clarity, breathing-space and momentum, and deliver spades of intent and realisation from both worlds. And though ideally matched, the pair were not carbon copies of one another’s sound – I imagined a tad rounder, and more sensuous tone from Monique Lapins’ playing compared with Amalia Hall’s marginally brighter and shinier sound, as if what was passing between them was a REAL conversation. But, ah! – that slow movement! – why does it ALWAYS seem as though it’s over too quickly, no matter who the performers are?…….

As with the concert’s opening, the second half began with another performer “spotlit” up behind the orchestral platform in almost “deus ex machina” fashion! This time it was Jonathan Berkahn at the harpsichord performing a relaxed, even somewhat “other-worldly” rendition of one of Domenico Scarlatti’s keyboard sonatas, the well-known E Major (K.380/L.23). As with the violinist’s rendition of the Bach Partita’s Prelude at the concert’s beginning, the episode had the air of some kind of “visitation” from distant realms – both beautifully-wrought moments.

In more “down-to-earth” mode then came the Handel Concerto Grosso Op.6 No.12, the last of the set of concertos inspired by Handel’s great Italian contemporary, Archangelo Corelli. I was hoping we might get my favourite of the Op. 6 set, No. 9 (with its wonderful borrowings from the composer’s famous Organ Concerto “The Cuckoo and the Nightingale”). But this work, which I didn’t know as well, was itself, in the words of the vernacular, a “real doozy”, with plenty to do for soloists Amalia Hall and Monique Lapins once again, in the form of some enchanting moments along the way. There was appropriately ”grand gesturing” at the beginning, with the two violins sharing solo passages with a solo ‘cello, both in reply to and augmenting the orchestra. And what a delicious allegro to follow! – with some enchanting dovetailing of parts, and the silvery tones of the violin soloists inspiring some similarly feathery playing from the orchestra strings. A lovely and graceful Larghetto was followed by an even more enchanting Largo section, the soloists (both, I think) playing with mutes and producing, along with the solo ‘cello, some breathtakingly unworldly textures – brief but memorable moments in time to be savoured long afterwards. A sprightly dotted-rhythmed fugal Allegro brought us home with a no-nonsense, but still ceremonial finish.

Conductor Marc Taddei then issued for us something in the nature of the old-fashioned “Government Health Warning” regarding the programme’s final item, Lucas Foss’s “Baroque Variations”. He spoke of the piece being very much of the “psychedelic era” of the 1960s during which the work was composed, with numerous allusions to sounds associated with various electronic gadgetry of that time, but with its composer bent also upon reaching back to resonances as far distant as the music from the Baroque era which we had heard earlier in the concert, including the two pieces which our celestial-like “visitors” had performed in those uplifted and spotlit places!

The first of the three movements “On a Handel Larghetto” quietly and almost spectrally elaborated on fragments of the corresponding sequence in Handel’s Op 6 No.12 Concerto, the sounds seeming to do little more than resonate each other’s muted repetitions between strings and brass, lines occasionally drifting away from one another and exploring dream-like imaginings as more instruments joined in with the reminiscings, gathering tonal weight as notes were sustained for longer periods and percussive irruptions became more frequent.

A second movement also began mysteriously, its diaphanously filmic texture of sound featuring floating droplets of notes and occasional percussive thuds, into which sounded the strains of fragments of the Scarlatti sonata we had heard in full on the harpsichord. Here its themes and rhythms seemed as if they were being disconcertingly dismembered for us, as if the music was “a patient etherised upon a table” and referred to in fragmented and mesmerizingly repetitive terms.

After two somewhat restrained movements, the third “On a Bach Prelude (Phorion)” opened up the air-waves somewhat, beginning with the reappearance of the “phantom” Bach Partita violinist, whose playing was this time “echoed” in a fragmented way by the orchestra concertmaster and the other orchestral strings, as well as being “pecked at” by the orchestral winds and “wailed over” by the brass. This process became rather Charles Ives-like as the violas and the brasses played echoing notes and phrases against skittering winds and violins “chasing down” the lines, until the orchestra seemed to lose its patience with its wayward children and exploded a volley of indiscriminate sounds that added to the “things running wild” atmosphere, awakening an electric organ’s more seismic qualities. The “Phorion” part of the movement’s title was a reference to a Greek word meaning “stolen goods”, perhaps indicating how Bach’s violin prelude music was being chaotically rent via a plethora of sounds indicating an exhilarating (and liberating?) loss of control.

Afterwards I found myself talking with others of our different impressions of the work, the opinions ranging from “genius” to “madness” in general terms, but concurring regarding the hugely fascinating range and scope of the programming and the dedication and skill with which conductor and orchestra carried out its philosophy and execution – above all else, with a whole-heartedness whose qualities we’ve come to expect and hope to continue to enjoy.