Tag: choral

Many Magnificats in interesting Bach Choir concert

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

“Songs of Mary”

The Bach Choir of Wellington

Magnificats by Tavener, Stanford, Andrew Carter, Herbert Howells and CPE Bach; Totus Tuus by Górecki

Stephen Rowley, (conductor), Lisette Wesseling (soprano), Megan Hurnard (contralto), John Beaglehole (tenor), David Morriss (bass), Douglas Mews (organ)

St. Peter’s Church, Willis Street

Sunday, 11 August 2013, 3pm

Another interesting and imaginatively programmed concert by the Bach Choir was presented to a well-filled (but not full) St. Peter’s Church.  The first half comprised pieces composed by mainly British composers of the twentieth century (aside from the late nineteenth-century Stanford piece), while the second commemorated the three-hundredth anniversary of the birth of Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach.

John Tavener’s Magnificat Collegium Regale featured chromatic writing progressing in semitones, giving a mysterious, other-worldly feeling to the music.  The programme note described it as having “a melody with a drone in the Greek style.”  The verses of the canticle were interspersed with a statement in honour of Mary.  Much of the tessitura was very high, especially in this reiterated statement.  Some strain was evident, especially in the soprano section of the choir.  While varied dynamics were employed, greater variety of expression from ways of phrasing and delivering and emphasising the words would have added interest.

This was a difficult work, sung in English.  The choir did not entirely rise to these difficulties, and certainly not above them.

Górecki’s piece was unaccompanied, as was the Tavener, but this time the language was Latin.  A slow, extremely effective work, Totus Tuus utilises most affecting harmony.  It is not easy to sing, as I know
from experience.  The high tessitura in all parts, and much repetition of the high passages can be quite an effort.  The measured, sustained nature of the chords make it difficult to retain correct intonation. Here, the voices blended very well, the tone was lovely, and though occasionally everyone was not together, there was good attention to detail.  The pianissimo passages were beautiful.

Also in Latin and unaccompanied was Charles Villiers Stanford’s Magnificat.  It was a difficult work for double choir, and given the paucity of tenors in particular for this concert, the pressure showed. Here and there, mainly on top notes, intonation was suspect.  The main problem was that the work did not hang together well; it was probably a little too difficult for the choir.  Blend was not consistently good, with one or
two voices, particularly in the sopranos, too prominent.  Dynamics served the text well, and though this was not on the whole great performance, it had good moments.

Mary’s Magnificat by contemporary British composer Andrew Carter was completely different. Accompanied by organ, this Magnificat is in the nature of a Christmas carol.  An attractive setting, it featured clear solo singing from a soprano in the choir.  It was delicious music, evoking both a pastoral setting and a lullaby, and received a fine performance.

The high point of the first half for me, both in the calibre of the music and its performance was the Herbert Howells work.  It was a highly accomplished setting for choir and organ.  The contrast between soft and loud sections was most effective.  One could, in the mind’s eye (and ear) hear and see a skilled Anglican choir performing this lovely Magnificat.  It had the best word-setting so far, and the use of the organ, thrillingly played by Douglas Mews (also helping pitch-wise) added immeasurably to the beauty and grandeur of the work, especially in the Gloria.

After the interval, CPE Bach astonished us with a brilliant organ introduction.  The choir’s opening was slightly flat, but there was plenty of attack and spirit; a truly joyful hymn of praise.  The soprano solo was stylish, accurate and clear from Lisette Wesserling, who has a fine technique, although sometimes the singing was a little shrill for a church of this comparatively modest length.

The tenor solo followed.  ‘Quia fecit mihi magna’ was difficult, but sung in a very accomplished fashion, with good word-painting and very clear words.  Tricky runs were managed successfully.

The chorus ‘Et misericordia eius’ was notable for excellent phrasing.  As the programme note stated, the writing was indeed in both the baroque style of Bach’s illustrious father, and ‘points forward to the Classical style’.  The higher tessitura was rather taxing in this chorus.

‘Fecit potentiam’ was the bass aria, and David Morriss gave a fine account.  Its jolly dotted rhythm was sung with strength, suiting the music to the words.  Douglas Mews’s organ part was delightful,  as was Morriss’s enunciation of the words – a thoroughly accomplished performance.

The following alto and tenor duet began with a high entry for the tenor; John Bealglehole was spot on.  Megan Hurnard sounded quite gorgeous, with variety and richness of tone, great control and evincing excellent blend with the tenor.  Again, the composer’s word-painting was highly skilled, but subtle, and intensely musical.  This was an extended duet, skilfully and appealingly brought off.

The alto solo, ‘Suscepit Israel’, received a fine involving and committed performance of quite a complicated aria.  The singer’s evenness of tone throughout her range and her excellent voice production blended well with the calm, lilting organ part.

The final Gloria for chorus was introduced by a scintillating passage that continued to be the backbone of this cheerful litany of praise.  The ‘Amen’ was very florid and complex, but was performed with panache; obviously it was thoroughly rehearsed.  The polyphony was clearly and accurately rendered.

A lot of hard work has gone into producing a concert of varied interest, and on the whole, good quality.  It gave the audience an admirable opportunity to hear Bach’s excellent writing for voices.  The choir stood throughout; perhaps this accounted for their sounding  a little tired at times, towards the end.

There was an excellent printed programme (owing a good deal to the Internet).  It included the Royal Festival Hall (London) statement about the decibels produced by an uncovered cough, and concluded “Please be considerate to others in the audience”.  Bravo!  While it did not eliminate the phenomenon totally, it may well have reduced its frequency of occurrence. A little heating in the venue would have enhanced the pleasure.

A disappointment was that when conductor and a choir member spoke to the audience, their voices were not loud enough for the back rows in the church to hear.

 

 

 

A challenging conspectus of unfamiliar Nordic song, from Kapiti Chamber Choir

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

Nordic Music and Myths: Songs from Sweden, Finland, Denmark and Norway by Alfvén, Sibelius,
Nørgård, Grieg, Sandstrøm, Sallinen, Langgaard, Rautavaara, Nielsen, Gade, Nordraak
Elgar: Scenes from the Saga of King Olaf

Kapiti Chamber Choir conducted by Eric Sidoti, with Jennifer Scarlet (piano), Sunny Amey (narrator), Pepe Becker (soprano), John Beaglehole (tenor) and Roger Wilson (baritone), Irene Lau (piano)

St. Paul’s Church, Paraparaumu

Sunday, 27 July 2014, 2.30pm

The fashion for themed concerts seems now firmly entrenched; whether it produces the best results is another matter.  This concert’s intention of covering a broad theme was perhaps its undoing.  I have attended numerous concerts by the Kapiti Chamber Choir over the years, but this one did not reach the standard of its predecessors.  Instead of trying to cover all the Nordic lands (except Iceland) and languages, it might have been better to concentrate on fewer composers, and perform more of their work, e.g. do a greater number of songs by Sibelius and perhaps of one or two of the others represented.  This would have been more cohesive, instead of the huge range we heard, some very briefly.

The only familiar item (to me) from the choir was Sibelius’s ‘Finlandia’, though sung with words (English) I had not heard before. Mellifluous tone and clear words made this a fine performance.  The other well-known piece was not sung, but played as a piano duet: Sinding’s old pot-boiler ‘Rustle of Spring’.  I don’t think this added any value in a choral concert.  A solo from Roger Wilson, Grieg’s sad song ‘A Swan’ effectively employed the baritone’s lower register.

None of the choral items in the first half was an easy sing, and most  were unaccompanied.  Good observation of dynamics was a significant feature, and the songs in English demonstrated the delightful
word-setting by the composers, particularly those by Finn Aulis Sallinen (1935-  ).

The songs in Finnish and other languages seemed to have more tuning problems, and variety of pronunciation made for a muddy sound at times. A couple of songs were sung with repetitive accompanying syllables from the lower voices, with varying success. The national anthem of Norway, by Rikard Nordraak (1842-1866) featured excellent tone and harmony – a fine performance.

Elgar’s King Olaf is little performed these days; perhaps there is a good reason for that.  It lacks the inspiration, melodic inventiveness and attractiveness of Dream of Gerontius or even The Music Makers.  Grove (Dictionary of Music and Musicians) says that it, along with other of Elgar’s choral works, ‘…suffer from poor librettos’ and ‘…here he chose texts which are sometimes muddled dramatically and often commonplace, or worse, in style.’ While Longfellow is much revered in the United States, and was in an earlier time in Britain, some of the verse Sunny Amey was required to declaim, and the soloists and choir to sing, was not far removed from doggerel, with ludicrous rhymes and conventional imagery.

The writer of the Grove article calls the first five movements memorable, but implies that the later ones are not of the same quality.  I would agree; they became tedious, until suddenly I was lit up when, almost at the end, we had the lovely song, often sung on its own, ‘As torrents in summer’.  I would call this the most inspired section, and the most beautifully sung, of the whole work.

The work comprised the second half of the over-long concert.  Spoken interventions by conductors have become a custom.  These were quite unnecessary, since much information was given in the excellent printed programme, and only served to take up time.

A difficulty for choirs is being able to provide an orchestra for works requiring one.  In this case, the piano was used instead.  However, a small upright piano in a fully carpeted church is but a poor substitute, despite the magnificent efforts of Jennifer Scarlet on this occasion.  Not only does it not give the variety of sound colours required, it does not support the choir sufficiently.
Whether frequent lapses of intonation, especially from the sopranos, can be blamed on this, I am not sure.  Much of the time the choir seemed under-rehearsed.  ‘S’ word-endings were not together, and individual voices were too prominent at times; at others, the tone sounded forced.  I think that Elgar would have written for a larger choir than this one consisting of 35 singers.

Of the soloists, John Beaglehole was the most distinguished.  His lively tenor gave some drama to his solos – he sang as if he meant what he was saying.  Pepe Becker is a wonderful singer of baroque and early music; I felt she was miscast in this late-Victorian cantata, in which Elgar adopted some of the
compositional style of Wagner.  These remarks applied also to the solos from these performers in the first half of the concert.  The style involved much use of chromatic writing – a trap for choirs, and one the choir frequently fell into, in terms of tuning.

Of course, not all was poor.  There were moments when the choir expressed the drama of the piece well, even though some of it was couched in musical and linguistic clichés.  There was some very attractive singing, especially in quiet passages.  In contrast, the loud passages sounded harsh, the voices not well supported.

It was remarkable how some of the men, particularly, managed to sing the whole work with but few glances at the conductor.

Maybe the music would serve well as background to an action film on the life and adventures of King Olaf.

I admire the conductor’s energy and innovation in producing this programme; he is musical director of the larger Kapiti Chorale, St. John’s in the City choir and the Hutt Valley Gang Show in addition to Kapiti Chamber Choir, but I have to say that this concert was a disappointment.

 

Baroque Voices – resplendent 20th birthday offerings

Posted on by Peter Mechen

BAROQUE VOICES – 20th Birthday Concert
Music from 20 years of performance

Baroque Voices
Pepe Becker (director)
Douglas Mews (harpsichord, organ, piano)
Robert Oliver (bass viol)
Daniel Becker (guitar, percussion)

Sacred Heart Cathedral, Hill St., Wellington

Saturday, 28th June 2014

Wellington’s Baroque Voices celebrated twenty years of music-making with a concert on the last Saturday of June given in the same inaugural venue, the Cathedral of the Sacred Heart, in Hill St., Wellington – a splendid place for music-making by vocal ensembles.

It was a truly epic and resplendent affair – perhaps a trifle overlong for listeners and performers alike, though the presentation certainly succeeded in bringing to the fore a sense of the variety and depth of repertoire the ensemble has tackled since its inception. Music Director Pepe Becker, in the programme accompanying Saturday’s concert, outlined something of BV’s history, in the process setting down something of the extent of the ensemble’s range and sympathies regarding performance.

In those twenty years the group’s personnel has markedly changed, the only original BV members remaining being Peter Dyne and Pepe herself. But though singers have come and gone, the performance standards have been maintained, judging by the invariably enthusiastic reviews the group has received. I’ve been going to their concerts for at least ten of those years, and have always been delighted with both the repertoire and its presentation.

On this occasion I actually thought that the ensemble warmed increasingly to its task as the evening progressed, becoming more relaxed and better-focused, though I did get the feeling that the group had worked harder on some of the pieces than on others. Given the range of repertoire covered in the concert this wasn’t really surprising – in fact it was amazing that the group maintained the levels of accuracy and energy that they did, especially towards the end. We would, I think, have been more than satisfied with about four-fifths of the items – especially given that a few of the choices seemed to me a tad insubstantial compared with some others.

But any more comment along these lines would sound curmudgeonly – faced with such generosity of performing spirit one feels far more inclined to celebrate what was done with the group’s usual skill, refinement and panache – which was, in fact, most of the programme (all of the bits I would have wanted to keep!). These alone were in themselves worlds of delight and wonderment, and their performances worthy exemplars of the ensemble’s quality.

The concert’s very beginning in a sense paid homage to the venue, which repaid the gesture with appropriate resonance and ambient warmth – the singers came in from the church’s congregational entrance behind the audience, Pepe Becker leading the way and singing, purely and rapturously, Hildegarde of Bingen’s haunting plainchant O Euchari, with the other singers humming in the style of an accompanying hurdy-gurdy. It all made for a William Blake-like “augury of innocence”, of wonderment such as one might experience as a child at a rare and mystical ritual – a moment of magic!

Baroque Voices followed this with another special moment – a performance of the very first item sang by the ensemble at that inaugural 1994 concert. This was Monteverdi’s madrigal Ch’ami la vita mia (That you are the love of my life), from the First Book of Madrigals, for five voices – a sonorous, flexible performance with moments of pure quicksilver. Of course Monteverdi’s music subsequently became a major focus for the group, presently exploring the entire series of Madrigals, and having already performed, most brilliantly, the resplendent 1610 Vespers in 2010 (can it really be four years ago?). Two other Monteverdi madrigals were presented in the concert’s second half, contrasting the composer’s later (Second Practice) style, accompanied by continuo instruments, with his earlier practice, using voices only.

Another particularly fruitful undertaking for the group has been the commissioning and premiering of no less than thirty-five new works (to date!) by local composers. A number of these drew their initial inspiration from existing works, or from texts set by composers already in BV’s repertoire. We were “treated” to four instances of this during the evening, all of which the group had previously performed, two from Jack Body, one from Mark Smythe, and one from Ross Harris, as well as more “stand-alone” works by Carol Shortis and Pepe Becker herself.

Jack Body’s Nowell in the Lithuanian manner followed a lovely, properly austere three-part performance of the anonymous 15th Century English carol Nowell, sing we – Body’s work, from 1995, was a setting for four voices, with the interval of a second dominating the music, making for a resonant and repetitive antiphonal exchange of excitable impulses tossed back and forth in a kind of minimalist-folksy way, sounding fun to perform, as it certainly was to hear.

More resplendent and declamatory was the same composer’s Jibrail (the Islamic word for Gabriel), here performed immediately after its Latin equivalent “Veni Creator Spiritus” – we heard the Latin chant sung antiphonally by two groups, most of whose members then re-formed in a semi-circle as a gong ritualistically sounded (played by Daniel Becker), the singers chanting the word Jibrail, and capping the growing vocal intensities by picking up and activating hand-held gongs, as if the tintinabulations were spreading through the world like wildfire.

This wasn’t exactly conventional vocal or choral music, but was a demonstration of how a creative imagination can at times defy convention and produce something that really works by its own unique lights – rather like Beethoven introducing voices to symphonic structures, which no-one had ever dared do before him. It’s also a matter of having the versatility to employ non-conventional means for expressive or creative purposes, which composers like Jack Body have demonstrated on many occasions.

A different kind of creative inspiration produced a work by composer Mark Smythe (Pepe Becker’s brother, incidentally), from music originally written for rock band.This was a setting of an anonymous Latin text A solis ortus cardine (From the far point of the rising sun) which Voices first sang as per Nikolaus Apel’s fifteenth-century Kodex (collection), in which version the lines had a gorgeous “floating” quality, the effect being of several plainchant strands beautifully interwoven.

Mark Smythe’s setting followed, employing an electric guitar as a kind of ground bass (the premiere of this work in 2005 used voices only, the guitar being a more recent addition, played here by Daniel Becker), and assigning to the vocal parts the “rock” song’s main melody supported by harmonies from the guitar parts. The result was rhythmically catchy, and harmonically attractive, having what I think of as a kind of oldish, modal flavour in places, with ear-catching modulations. I also enjoyed the purity and sense of freedom and space evoked by those stratospheric vocal lines drawn by Pepe Becker and Jane McKinlay.

A composer whose music has always intrigued and delighted me is Carol Shortis, who’s written a number of commissioned works for BV. Each of her works has seemed to me to inhabit its own world, with nothing generalized or taken for granted; as with the work presented in this concert, five settings of Japanese “death-poems” called Jisei, which Baroque Voices premiered in 2010. Typically succinct and intensely focused “final thoughts”, the poetry required similarly precise, sharp-edged sound-impulses which would “inhabit” the words, and vice-versa – and Carol Shortis’s music seemed to speak, sigh, sing and breathe with the verses to a remarkable extent.

Except that I thought the second Jisei, Senseki’s “At last I am leaving” could have been sparer of tone, more distilled in its realization (evoking more sparingly the “rainless skies” and the “cool moon”), I thought the performances evocative and finely-drawn. I enjoyed especially the third setting, Gesshu Soko’s “Inhale, exhale”, with its wonderful oscillations, and soaring lines describing the flight of arrows through the void. And the wordless realizations of the concluding Jisei, the letter “O”, were appropriately remote and self-contained, a final exhalation of breath closing the symbol’s circle.

Ross Harris contributed a work via a Baroque Voices’ commission in 2009, a setting of the anonymously-composed hymn Ave Maris Stella  (Hail, Star of the Sea). The ensemble again “prepared” the audience by performing a mixture of the plainchant verses with parts of another setting by Guillaume Dufay, a wonderfully tingling, ambience-stroking activation. Ross Harris’s work was itself described by Pepe Becker as “sumptuous”, doubtless as a result of her having previously performed the work – its premiere, in 2009.

I enjoyed the music’s oceanic evocations, sounds patterned like recurring waves, the voices interlocked, and the lines clustered – but then I thrilled to the growing intensities of sounds at the words “Qui pro nobis natus tulit esse tuus” (Who, born for us, endured to be thine), and a corresponding rapt, haunting withdrawal of tones and colour at “Ut videntes Jesum semper collaetemur” (That, seeing Jesus, we may forever rejoice together). And both the joyous affirmation of “Summo Christo decus Spiritui Sancto” (Honour to Christ the Highest, and to the Holy Spirit) and the deep, sonorous closing pages were intensely moving.

I ought to mention Pepe Becker’s own work, the Kyrie from her Mass of the False Relation, a title which had me intrigued until I read about the particular compositional device employed by the composer – the substitution of a sharpened or flattened note, a “false relation” of the original, sometimes in juxtaposition with the actual original, the harmonic tensions and clashes making for highly expressive results – colourful and piquant in places, tense and edgy in others, the listener waiting the whole time for lines and harmonies to resolve. I liked the “hollow cluster” effect of the “masquerading relatives” towards the piece’s end, during the final “Kyrie”.

I’ve unashamedly concentrated on the New Zealand composers and their works written for Baroque Voices, in this review – the concert contained a number of other delights which time and patience preclude a mention. But I mustn’t forget to pay tribute to the continuo musicians, Douglas Mews, who moved adroitly between harpsichord, piano and organ, as the items required, and Robert Oliver, whose bass viol playing was, as always, a delight. These two players have especially supported Baroque Voices down the years, almost to the point where any concert by the group wouldn’t seem quite the same without them.

To my mind, this concert reaffirmed both Baroque Voices’ and director Pepe Becker’s status as national treasures. These are musicians whose efforts help us find and nurture expression for whomever and whatever we are, occasionally, as here, holding our efforts up against the rest of the world’s by way of reaffirming both our identity and our individuality. May Baroque Voices continue to do the same on our behalf with distinction for at least the next twenty years!

 Click on this link to comment and discuss the review on Reddit!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Choral Symphony in a triumphant end to NZSO’s monumental Beethoven symphony cycle

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

New Zealand Symphony Orchestra and the Orpheus Choir, conducted by Pietari Inkinen
Soloists: Tiffany Speight, Anneley Peebo, Simon O’Neill, Peter Coleman-Wright

Beethoven: Symphonies No 8 in F and No 9 in D minor (Choral)

Michael Fowler Centre

Sunday 15 June, 3 pm

In the NZSO’s Beethoven cycle of 1995, the Choral Symphony was accompanied by Symphony No 1, an arrangement just as interesting as linking it with No 8. Each is similar in length, and both represent Beethoven writing in a style more traditional than some of those he would write or had written.

These juxtapositions, that have illuminated each concert, have been as rewarding as the performances themselves; probably none has looked as dramatic as this one. To begin, No 9 is nearly three times the length of No 8: I’d guess it clocked in at a bit over 70 minutes, and it breaks conventions by setting a famous poem as its last movement.

Unlike any of the earlier ‘classical’ examples, there is no slow introduction; instead it hits the ground running. It’s in the same key as the Pastoral and though its first movement is faster than that of the Pastoral, it’s also in triple time and there is a distinctly similar tone, that suggests the flavor of the Ländler of the countryside.  Yet neither at its first performance nor in the centuries since (and this year in the two hundredth anniversary of its first performance) has it become a popular work.

I guess it was pure chance that it was the first complete symphony that I bought – 78s of the pre-WW2 Weingartner performance with the Vienna Philharmonic, for 18 shillings and sixpence – at the age of about 19. It’s generally slower than Inkinen’s and most modern performances.  The records are still enjoyable: I have a soft spot for it.

The second movement, Allegro scherzando, led by a bright tune in the strings, is in common rather than triple time and so it’s a cross between traditional slow movement and a bright dance-like episode. The orchestra seemed to relish the abrupt ending.

To add confusion for the traditionalists, the third movement is Tempo di menuetto with a slower, more convincing minuet character than the minuets in either Symphonies 1 or 4. However, the bassoon lent it a kind of comic, peasant character that might reinforce a link with the Ländler rather than the genteel minuet.

If speed had given me a bit of trouble elsewhere, that of the last movement, Allegro vivace, seemed entirely justified: speed was of the essence, even though my Weingartner benchmark hardly supports it. What I enjoyed about the whole performance was a kind of serious-minded joyfulness.

Perhaps it was hardly fair to have it play the part of a light-weight curtain-raiser to the main event.

When we came back after the interval the empty choir stalls were full of singers in black and white, ranged from sopranos on the left to basses on the right, opposite to the orchestra where cellos and basses were arrayed on the left behind the first violins. Was there some arcane intent here?

The Ninth Symphony broke all sorts of conventions, the most obvious of which are the inclusion of a choral element with soloists in the fourth movement, and its length, which can take between around 65 and 75 minutes. I didn’t time this, but it was brisk and I’d guess would have been nearer 65 minutes, about 25 of which are taken by the last movement.

Though it is more common to dwell on the character of orchestration in the music of the later 19th century as more instruments, particularly percussion were incorporated and wind instruments became more varied and numerous; and technical improvements made them more versatile and in theory a bit easier to play. But in the hands of a Mozart or a Beethoven the imaginative employment of what was normally available in orchestras of the late 18th and early 19th centuries, was often very beautiful, rich in nuances and arresting effects.

Beethoven’s increasing deafness mattered (especially to him), but his years of good hearing had filled his memory and he could obviously hear in his mind what his imagination created and could write down a good representation of it. So the very talented body of wind players in the NZSO could take full advantage of his colouful use of wind instruments in these two symphonies. Beethoven’s dramatic use of timpani was a relatively new phenomenon as was the introduction of trombones, in the last movements of the 5th, 6th and 9th, and four horns in the Choral. In the 9th he also uses a bass drum (tucked under the wall on the right side), cymbals and triangle. Thus one could well enjoy the diverting instrumental effects that Beethoven created, especially if one felt, for example, that the metronomic games in the Molto vivace (Scherzo in all but name) were a bit prolonged.

So a little more flexibility with the tempo might have better held attention. The fact is, however, that variety consists in the rallentandos that Beethoven marks at structural junctures in each movement, and in the dynamic changes that Inkinen marked vividly. It’s also true that the dramatic turning points deliver so much more power and impact if relative calm has preceded them, and Inkinen’s management achieved that most effectively. It was the slow (third) movement that seemed to lose its way; beautiful as it is and regardless of the care and subtleties of the playing, I lost concentration during the repeated episodes, though tiredness may have been to blame.

Everything that can be said about the fourth movement has been said: there are so many ways in which its structure can seem problematic or awkward, and commentaries these days often dwell on those. However, the unassailable aspects of Sunday’s performance were the orchestral playing: painstakingly careful dynamics, well balanced against choir and soloists, bluster set against ethereal moments, as the famous choral theme arrives, pianissimo, before chaos interrupts, and the violent fortissimi at climaxes that might be heard as ‘cheap’ effects but are usually wonderful.

The splendid chorus (rehearsed with obvious rigour and insight by Mark Dorrell, whose work hardly gets noticed in the programme) that filled the auditorium with clearly articulated German words was almost too vivid, exposing the (wash-your-mouth-out!) bombastic poetry, all in honour of something called “JOY”. Surely poetry of such passion and high-mindedness is about something of greater, more profound significance, even given that “joy” doesn’t seem to represent such a universal emotion as “Freude”! The substituted word “Freiheit” (freedom), which has often been suggested as what Schiller actually expected to be inferred from “Freude”, was in fact used at the famous 1989 concert under Bernstein at the Brandenburg Gate to celebrate the smashing of the Berlin Wall.

The soloists are a special problem. Here, we had Peter Coleman-Wright in the bass part, launching the singing with the mighty exhortation to warring parties, “O Freunde, nicht diese Töne…”.  But surely “joy” is not the medicine for the chaos that prompts this mighty command; the word the chorus is looking for in response is surely “Freiheit”. Coleman-Wright’s name is familiar both in Australia and Europe; I’ve heard him several times in principal baritone roles for Opera Australia. In addition, at Covent Garden for example among many major opera companies, he has sung Dandini, Billy Budd, Papageno, Marcello, Gunther and Donner as well as Beckmesser.

It’s cruelly exposed, and he made a strong impact even if the sound, slightly uneven in production, was not a perfect fit for the job. Soprano Tiffany Speight (Australian) and mezzo Annely Peebo (Estonian) had a well projected duet of good clarity, and both displayed, as far as the roles allowed, attractive and theatrical voices. Simon O’Neill was the only New Zealander to make the cut (really! – surely we could have done better! On the other hand it’s important for us to hear top class overseas singers); he clearly relished his big solo moment, with commanding vocal incisiveness and physical stature – he looked as if he enjoyed singing this part, back home. When tenor and baritone reopened a soloists’ episode at Allegro ma non tanto, with “Freude, Töchter aus Elysium…” the low-pitched line didn’t allow their voices to emerge so well; otherwise the following quartet was glorious.

The great final peroration with the orchestra and choir in sublime and ecstatic accord leaves the soloists standing helplessly, contributing only with their faces in a semblance of engagement. But O’Neill could be detected participating, mouthing the words, quietly, with every appearance of involvement in the music and its message.

This time there was no hesitation from the audience. All able-bodied members of the audience sprang to their feet, clapping, shouting and whistling. A triumphant conclusion to a landmark symphonic cycle.

 

Requiems and delights à la Francaise – Duruflé and Fauré

Posted on by Peter Mechen

Choirs Aotearoa New Zealand Trust presents:

DURUFLÉ – Requiem
Bianca Andrew (mezzo-soprano) / Christopher Hillier (baritone)
Michael Stewart (organ) / Jane Young (‘cello)
Voices New Zealand Chamber Choir
Karen Grylls (conductor)

FAURÉ – Requiem
Jayne Tankersley (soprano) / Christopher Hillier (baritone)
Michael Stewart (organ) / Matthew Ross (violin)
Voices New Zealand Chamber Choir
Orchestra Wellington
Karen Grylls (conductor)

Wellington Cathedral of St.Paul, Molesworth St.

Saturday, 7th June, 2014

Big and ungainly though it can seem, the Wellington Cathedral of St.Paul is a remarkable music-making space for the “right” kind of repertoire. It’s repeating something of a truism to suggest that most of this would be church or sacred music, though Wellingtonians were fortunate enough to experience, two weekends previously, a performance of Bruckner’s Seventh Symphony featuring an impressively-augmented Orchestra Wellington conducted by Marc Taddei. It was music that resonated most positively with the acoustic, which more than made up for a small loss of clarity with oceans of sheer tonal splendour.

Even more “hand-in-glove” a match of music with the venue was provided by the present concert, featuring two of the most beautiful choral works in the repertoire. On paper the idea of having two Requiem Masses butted up against one another in the same concert might appear too much of a good (!) thing – but each of these works, though having certain things in common with the other, makes a markedly individual impression on the listener.

Though both French-born there was little other direct connection as such between the two composers of these Requiems – Fauré wrote the first version of his work in 1887, one which was first performed the following year (other versions appeared in 1893 and 1900); whereas the much younger Duruflé, whose student years centered around Rouen, and the Gregorian plainchant tradition fostered at the cathedral school, completed his Requiem in 1947. Duruflé, like Fauré, produced a number of versions of his work, one for orchestral accompaniment (the composer’s favorite), followed by a version with organ and ad lib. solo ‘cello, and then a “reduced-orchestra” version.

Duruflé undoubtedly based his Requiem on the older composer’s in terms of structure – the text is largely the same as Fauré used, with the “Dies irae” sequence (used by Mozart, Berlioz and Verdi) all but completely omitted. The younger composer’s work is similarly non-apocalyptic, though both occasionally allow moments of anxiety and fear to darken and dramatize the textures, albeit briefly (Duruflé’s “moments” are a tad more explicit than those of Fauré’s).

Where the composers part company is with their compositional style – though Fauré drew inspiration from Gregorian plainchant in the Mass’s recitative-like moments, his work is late-Romantic in its expression of melody and harmony – for instance, I love the unashamed tribute made to the Wagner of Die Walkure at the beginning of the Lux aeterna, following the Agnus Dei.

Duruflé, on the other hand, drew his inspiration from his early studies of plainchant, incorporating into each section of his work corresponding chant-like sequences from the sung Latin Mass for the Dead, and building on these figurations with harmonies and extended melismas, though nothing too florid or wide-ranging. The work to my ears sounded paradoxically at once more modern and yet older than Fauré’s – and as such, the two pieces made well-nigh perfect and complementary companions.

For the performance of Duruflé’s work conductor Karen Grylls judiciously opted for the organ-accompanied version (with ad.lib.’cello obbligato during the Pie Jesu movement). Presented alongside Fauré’s particular version of HIS work which featured an ensemble with strings and brass as well as organ, I thought the contrast between the two sound-worlds was stunning, and worked entirely in favour of each piece’s distinctive character.

From the outset of the Duruflé, the superb focus of the Voices New Zealand Chamber Choir was evident, their tones set off to perfection by the brilliant playing of organist Michael Stewart. But it seemed the opening Requiem was more floated by the choir than sung, an impression which in various places throughout the work returned, shining and glistening like silver-tapestried thread.

After a radiant Kyrie, the music darkened, and the vocal lines beseeched, calmly at first, but then with great urgency and impassioned attack, the organ excitingly joining the fray – “Libera eas de ore leonis!” (Save them from the lion’s jaws!), with the baritone soloist, Christopher Hillier, sonorously raising his voice for the “Hostias” by way of offering sacrifice and prayer for the sake of the departed souls – wonderful, heart-stopping moments!

I loved the rippling organ and the angelic tones of the opening of the Sanctus, relishing all the more the gloriously contrasting irruptions of energy for the “Hosannas”, and then savoring to the full the rapt, devotional ardor of the Pie Jesu which followed, mezzo-soprano Bianca Andrew and ‘cellist Jane Young singing and playing like angels to Michael Stewart’s beautifully-sculptured accompaniment.

How beautifully the choir managed the wordless accompaniments to the melodic lines in Lux aeterna – the singing and playing quite superbly setting off the sudden angst brought about by the organ’s clarion call, followed by the choir’s and the baritone soloist’s strongly-projected agitations. Though brief, the appearance of “Dies illa, dies irae” caused further choral combustion, culminating in one of the few Fauré-like moments in Duruflé’s work, the heart-easing, melodic unison reiteration by the choir of the “Libera Me”.

And what a wondrously rarefied, even austere world is that of the In Paradisum  sequence! – such a marked contrast to the older composer’s setting! – something that here evoked the “unknown” so potently that we sat in the midst of its wonderment for a long time afterwards before marking our appreciation of the performance with rapturous applause.

I confess to experiencing some anxious moments myself during the interval, arising from sudden doubts and fears regarding the Fauré work’s pending performance. By this time I’d noticed that the printed programme, through some vagary or other, had omitted the names of several of the orchestral musicians, including those of the horn players! My relief was great when, in due course, the instruments in question made their appearance – the thing was, the two previous performances of the work I’d heard recently were both with organ-only accompaniment, and….. yes, I expect organists will possibly sniff and smart at my none-too-subtle inflections surrounding that “organ-only” usage – but anyhow, I’ll further explain below…..

Karen Grylls chose the 1893 version of the work to perform, here – the composer’s original 1887 version featured only five movements (no Offertory and no Libera Me),  later adding the extra movements and a baritone soloist. There has over the years been a degree of “creative agglomeration” practiced upon this work in performance, the situation due partly to the later, 1900 edition of the score which featured an extended orchestration entrusted by Fauré to one of his pupils, and which, according to choral-conducting doyen John Rutter, is filled with both printers’ and editorial errors.

But here we were, about to hear an authentic performing edition which called for a goodly number of instrumentalists on the performing platform – including horns, and also a solo violinist! – along with the choir, soloists and conductor, and the organist ready in the loft. The opening was spaciously and dramatically sounded, with the silences “surging softly backwards” after each cadential pause. At first I though the orchestral tones too fulsome for the voices – the tenors had a lovely plangency which seemed, however, in danger of being submerged within the acoustic in places, but things seemed to refocus with the great cries of “Exaudi” and “Orationem” – and thereafter it seemed as if I could hear everything.

Gorgeous string tones introduced the tenors and altos duetting at “O Domine”, making a lovely sound and building each repetition of the opening words upwards and towards the string modulations which prepared the way for the baritone’s entry with “Hostias”. Christopher Hillier here wasn’t particularly honeyed in tone, but his voice was perhaps instead more appropriately textured with vibrant strands of supplication. And the choir’s reprise of “O Domine” would, I swear, have melted hearts of stone with such celestial ascending lines.

Came the Sanctus, and with it, for me, one of the work’s great moments, but to my ears invariably and frustratingly muted whenever the performance is simply organ-accompanied – yes, you’ve guessed it! – those great horn fanfares which introduce and reaffirm the “Hosannas”! Well I have to register some disappointment mingled in with my delight, here, as I thought Karen Grylls didn’t encourage the horn-players to sufficiently roar out their notes with truly joyous exuberance! The singing was splendid, though, short of an “Anything you can do I can do better” kind of scenario, I simply wanted ALL of the sounds to ring out through those vast spaces, just for a few seconds! I should mention the solo violin playing as well, Matthew Ross’s instrument making a suitably sweet-toned sound, the intonation not entirely blemish-free, but certainly creating the desired cherubic effect.

Another truly memorable sequence was the Pie Jesu (so different an effect to that of Duruflé’s setting!) – of course, nothing less than the voice of an angel was needed, and soprano Jayne Tankersley touched many of those tingling stratospheric places with some beautifully-floated sounds. Though perhaps not ideally serene, not as uniformly pure of tone as I expected, she nevertheless inflected the words with real feeling – but I did wonder, having enjoyed her vibrant, engaging (and invariably spectacular) singing of Monteverdi’s music so much over the years, whether her voice as naturally took to this music’s cooler, far less-inflected lines of relatively chaste expression.

The Agnus Dei and the Libera Me have the work’s darkest moments – Karen Grylls got a particularly wonderful “floating” response from her voices for the Lux aeterna  sequence, though I would have liked the horns once again to have interjected in more baleful tones just before the reprise of the opening Requiem aeternam. Christopher Hillier’s lean, forceful tones had an almost operatic intensity when delivering his Libera me, one which conductor and singers took up with ferment and gusto at the words “Dies illa, dies irae”, and carried over to the reprise of “Libera Me”, horns beautifully darkening the voices’ beseeching phrase-ends, before allowing the baritone to join in with a final, exhausted plea for deliverance.

Having done with anxieties and fears, voices, solo violin and organ then turned their attentions, most affectingly, towards the prospect of eternal bliss, with the beautiful In Paradisum – and though I wanted organist Michael Stewart’s arpeggiated accompanying figurations to oscillate rather more brightly and forthrightly, the singing was appropriately angelic, and the soaring solo violin line a delight. The sounds of the voices blended with the instrumental tones towards the end and then with the eternal silences…….as with the Duruflé’s conclusion, we registered the gradual disappearance of those affecting sounds before showing our appreciation of the music and performers’ efforts – including those of Michael Stewart, who was somehow stranded on one side of the platform at the end, away from all of the others!

But very, very great credit to conductor Karen Grylls and to her soloists, instrumentalists and singers, for a splendid  and long-to-be-remembered pair of performances!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Programme ‘by popular request’ calls for wide-ranging period and stylistic variety from The Tudor Consort

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

The Tudor Consort conducted by Michael Stewart

By Popular Request

Frank Martin: Mass for Double Choir – Kyrie
De Lassus: ‘Matona mia cara’
Josquin des Prez: Missa ‘L’homme armée’ – Gloria
John Dunstaple: ‘Veni sancte spiritus’
Stanford: The Bluebird
Pärt: Summa (Credo)
Allegri: ‘Miserere mei’
Vaughan Williams: Mass in G minor – Sanctus/Osanna I/Benedictus/Osanna II
Byrd: ‘Ave verum corpus’ and Agnus Dei from Mass for Four Voices

Cathedral of the Sacred Heart, Hill Street

Saturday 30 May 2014

It seemed a good idea: invite their subscribers/audiences to suggest music to be sung at the next concert, which should ensure a good audience, comprising those who’d submitted ideas and lots of others, who would be curious about the result of the game.

But it was a cold night, though fine and clear, and maybe there was something unmissable on television, and since I’d arrived about 7.15pm I waited for the church to fill. It didn’t.

Swiss composer Frank Martin’s Mass for Double Choir is probably one of his best known works, yet he held it back for forty years, feeling that it was too private a communication with his deity to be exposed to the rude masses (my gloss). The ‘doubleness’ of the music refers to the number of parts, yet it was curious to have it sung by this pretty small choir (16).

The Kyrie opens with what is described as a ‘quasi-plainchant’, spare and ethereal but it soon expands to involve the whole choir, and the two pleas ‘Kyrie eleison’ and ‘Christe eleison’ are in stark contrast between calm beauty and serious agitation. The singers dramatized it with a feeling of driving conviction.

There could hardly have been a greater contrast with the next piece, of 450 years earlier. A delightfully bawdy little ditty, ‘Matona mia cara’, from the 16th century master of religious polyphony, Orlando de Lassus (you can take your choice of variations from Roland de Lassus, Orlande de Lassus, Orlando di Lasso, Orlandus Lassus, or Roland de Lattre). Though he was equally famous for his chansons.

This was a song sung by a German lancer who attempts to woo an Italian girl in very basic Italian muddled with Spanish and German, employing ill-understood, suggestive words that just might have succeeded with a fairly knowing and susceptible lady. Even the onomatopoeia had an erotic ring to it and the choir evidently enjoyed themselves. So did we.

The music moved another century back to a Mass by Josquin des Prez, one of two based on the widely popular L’homme armée, this one on the sixth tone, in other words the Aeolian Mode, equivalent to A minor. They chose the Gloria which is opened by a tenor followed by sopranos and altos, and the tune lent the setting a character that modern ears could more easily absorb than is often the case with Renaissance polyphony; this in spite of the sophistication of the counterpoint. Most striking perhaps was the lengthy Amen in canonic style. Even more striking however was the sheer skill and idiosyncratic familiarity of the choir, including the voices that were given solo episodes here and elsewhere.

Then came a motet by English composer John Dunstaple (most of us are probably more familiar with the spelling Dunstable) who lived half a century before Josquin: Veni sancte spiritus, ‘Come holy spirit’. (You’d expect both the adjective sancte and the noun Spiritus to have the same ending. Sancte is the vocative case, used to address people, Spiritus must also be in that case but with the ending ‘–us’ is presumably a fourth declension word where the vocative takes the same ending, as the nominative case.)

Here was the only intrusion by non-voice in the concert: bass Timothy Hurd (otherwise known as the City Carillonist) produced a tenor dulzian (or dulcian), the predecessor of the bassoon, though I suppose the several smaller members of the dulcian family might be closer to the shawm, the oboe’s ancestor. This lent the music a very distinct quality, in addition to the interest of the structure and rhythm of the short line of the Medieval Latin verses that recall parts of the Carmina Burana.

Then a leap five hundred years toward the present with a short and lovely part-song, The Bluebird, by Stanford, evocative and a little sentimental, where soprano Erin King sang the touching solo part. With Arvo Pärt’s Summa, his setting of the Credo, came the only piece from the late 20th century: faced with the words, I was struck for the first time by the way the music seems to move, or not move, in reflection of the words, denying the singers much opportunity for tonal or dynamic variety. The choir performed immaculately.

By this stage it had struck me that while following suggestions of music for this concert, choir director Stewart had arranged them following the order of the Ordinary of the Mass, interspersed with motets and songs that could be considered as representing the Proper of the Mass.

The second half began with Allegri’s Miserere, with John Beaglehole singing the tenor part from the pulpit while four other soloists from the choir sang from the gallery. But for the first time in the evening the performance revealed characteristics that suggested a lack of confidence, even a lack of rehearsal that appeared in their handling of ornaments and even occasionally with intonation. There was no other item in the programme where I felt the choir had not quite the measure of the style of the early Italian 17th century.

The following movements from Vaughan Williams’s Mass in G minor also called for a group of soloists whose performances were an impressive demonstration of the strength and polish of the choir’s individual voices.  The Vaughan Williams Sanctus and Benedictus were marked by the most scrupulous intonation, articulation of varied tone and tempo changes.

Byrd’s Ave verum corpus for nine voices brought the choir back to its home territory, in a truly beautiful performance and, following the order of the Catholic liturgy, the concert ended with the Agnus Dei from the Mass for Four Voices. It found them in complete sympathy with the idiom, comfortable: the lines flowing and weaving with the ease that comes from familiarity and confidence.

The concert deserved a much larger audience.

 

The Orpheus Choir – music of here, and now……

Posted on by Peter Mechen

Orpheus Choir of Wellington presents
DREAMS LIE DEEPER
A concert dedicated to the Pike River Miners

Ross HARRIS – If Blood Be the Price
Dave DOBBYN – This Love
James McCARTHY – 17 Days

Dave Dobbyn (vocals and guitar)
Katherine McIndoe (soprano)
Orpheus Choir of Wellington
Wellington Young Voices
Lyrica Choir, Kelburn School
Wellington Brass Band

Christopher Clark (conductor for Harris)
Mark W.Dorrell (conductor for Dobbyn and McCarthy)

Michael Fowler Centre, Wellington

Saturday, 10th May, 2014

I’m normally accustomed to encountering seemly, well-regulated conversational tones and discreet movements of habitually circumspect classical concertgoers at Michael Fowler Centre concerts. However, I was aware straightaway of something different and palpable in the air when entering the doors of the same venue on Saturday evening to attend the Orpheus Choir’s concert “Dreams lie Deeper”.

Here were vibrant swirlings of people thronging the foyer, staircases and mezzanine floor of the erstwhile concert venue, people whose dress and demeanour proclaimed their expectation of being witness to something which suggested promises of glamour and glitter – so, was I in the right place, or had I perhaps gotten my dates or the venue confused?

Amidst a sea of unfamiliar faces I caught sight of somebody I recognized, behind an official-looking table – “Ah, Peter!” he cheerfully hailed – “I was told to expect you…” – this was encouraging! –  “and I have here a ticket for you!” I took it gratefully, not REALLY expecting a kind of instant stylistic makeover, transforming my outer persona, but at least feeling that this talismanic touchstone had transferred a kind of “imprimatur” onto my presence – I was now one of the chosen, as it were……

As if I hadn’t been taken aback sufficiently at this stage, I caught my breath upon entering the auditorium – I haven’t been to a “pop” concert since my teenaged years (a gradually receding memory….) – but I fancied I recollected enough of those ambiences to glean that I was in for a different kind of concert experience to that which I’ve become accustomed. It was then that the thought “Will I be up to this task?” suddenly struck me!

It was all very theatrical – the choir was already seated on-stage, their figures outlined in the half-light and no more – the atmosphere was attenuated by what seemed like a kind of “nightclub haze”, though it obviously wasn’t cigarette smoke! Occasionally a billowing of freshly-conjured mist (probably dry-ice) would well up, thermal wonderland style (though not as aromatic!), catching the play of the spotlights and intensifying the mystery and ritualistic aspect of it all.

In the aisles were technical-looking people with what looked like television cameras and microphones on the ends of long poles. Some filming was going on already – it seemed as though people were being interviewed. A glance at my programme told me what was happening  –  that this concert, or at least part of it, was being filmed for television as well as being recorded by radio.  So it was, in effect, a kind of media event.

I guessed the subject matter of the music we were to hear was  largely what had compelled attention – the two New Zealand works scheduled were each inspired by a specific event involving mining activity. Ross Harris’s work consisted of settings to music of words written by poet Vincent O’Sullivan, dealing with the Waihi Miners’ Strike of 1912, during which a miner, Fred Evans, was clubbed to death by government vigilantes for allegedly shooting at a policeman during a demonstration – New Zealand’s first serious casualty of an industrial dispute.

Following this came Dave Dobbyn’s song “This Love”, written to commemorate the deaths of 29 miners in the 2010 Pike River mining disaster, on the West Coast. The singer wrote both words and music, and a supporting choral part was devised by the choir’s music director, Mark W.Dorrell.

The third item of the evening’s program was the work of an English composer, James McCarthy. Entitled “17 Days”, the work explored the events and associated emotions of people involved surrounding the collapse of a mine in northern Chile, also in 2010. Unlike what happened at Pike River the Chilean miners were rescued, word coming to the surface on the 17th day after the collapse that the men were still alive.

Wellington City Councillor Ray Ahipene-Mercer began proceedings by speaking to the audience, briefly telling us of his Welsh mining ancestry, and of his family’s involvement in mining in this country on the West Coast. The latter part of his karakia was expressed in Maori, both welcoming people from different part of the country to the concert, and farewelling the spirits of the dead, invoking the “mauri-ora” the “breath of life”, to come forth and give life to the gathering and the performances.

Ross Harris’s work came first, consisting of settings of words written by his long-time collaborator Vincent O’Sullivan. In seven separate sections, the work is inscribed “In memoriam: Fred Evans”, though none of the sections actually describes the events of the killing. In one of the songs, a brash, over-bright waltz with the title ‘Here’s a Toast!”, the brutal methods of the gangs formed by the anti-strike forces are compared with the methods of both Tsarist Russia and the British ruling class in dealing with protest or insurrection – so we have “Massey’s Cossacks” (the name of the New Zealand Prime Minister of the day), as well as a reference to the “Tory batons”, weapons associated with the murder of the unfortunate Fred Evans.

It seems to me that Ross Harris has deliberately gone for a more direct and unequivocal approach with this music – the tunes have an immediate and relatively unvarnished impact, matching Vincent O’Sullivan’s words in their relative economy and no-nonsense manner of expression – they could be called Workers’ Songs, in that they forcefully conveyed the Socialist ideologies of the miners and their unions, in sometimes brutal conflict with the established consortium of business interests supported by the Government of the time.

Vincent O’Sullivan used the strike’s best-known slogan in the work’s final setting, called “The Words on the Banner” – I actually remember these words from a photograph of the strikers which was displayed of the front cover of a book “THe Red and the Black” written in 1the 1970s about the strike – on a banner one could clearly read the words: “If blood be the price of your cursed wealth, Good God, we have bought it fair!” The directness of the writing of words and music was brought out with considerable impact by singers and instrumentalists under Christopher Clark’s focused direction.

Though the technical apparatus and technicians were a “presence” of sorts throughout these opening parts of the concert, they didn’t swing fully into action until Dave Dobbyn walked onto the stage to introduce his song “This Love”. There were ambient scintillations of lighting, colonnades of hues and colours bedecking the ceiling and walls of the auditorium, and (most disconcerting of all) a wondrously elongated “dinosaur-head” of a camera which, with neck protruding from its upstairs gallery “lair” swooped backwards and forwards over our heads like a curious brachiosaurus surveying a swampful of delicious succulents. I didn’t actually register any kind of rhythmic pattern to the beast’s – sorry, the CAMERA’S movements, but I wouldn’t have been surprised if there had been.

Technical jiggery-pokery apart, Dave Dobbyn’s song was a direct and heartfelt appeal to the emotions to “honour our 29”. Before the song the singer read out the names of all those who had died in the mine and whose bodies are to this day unrecovered. The subsequent audience response to the singer’s, the choir’s and the accompanying musicians’ efforts was properly and palpably life-affirming.

With the departure of the “technical people” and the migration to another undisclosed swamp of our friendly brachiosaurus (having presumably captured the “frisson” of Dave Dobbyn’s live performance of his song) one could focus more readily on the music scheduled for the concert’s second half. This was James McCarthy’s “17 Days”, commissioned originally by London’s Crouch End Festival Chorus and premiered by them at the Barbican in 2012. Tonight’s was its first-ever performance outside of the UK.

McCarthy’s work used largely traditional, essentially tonal harmonies and melodic structures throughout. It was music that didn’t to my ears make any cathartic demands of an interpretive nature on either performers or listeners – there were no grinding, shattering, shell-shocked moments of terror, panic or bleak despair depicted in the writing for either voices or instruments. The evocations were more reflective than immediate, though some sequences of the music “told” instantly and effectively, such as  the rhythmic chattering of the children’s choir depicting the broken, piecemeal nature of the first news reports concerning the tragedy.

The texts chosen largely reinforced this reflectiveness (one of the poems, “Do Dreams lie Deeper?” by Charlotte Mews gave the work its title), though a different poet’s words later in the work brought forth what I thought the most interesting music from the composer – the poem “We live in mud” by Carol S.Lashof. In this work the all-pervading choking opacity of the mud, dirt and dust endured by the miners was contrasted with their thoughts of the radiance of their feelings for their loved ones above the ground, waiting. I thought this desperate love-song the most touching and telling moment of the piece, though Katherine McIndoe’s lovely solo soprano voice sounding from within the choir gave an added poignancy to parts of Charlotte Mews’ poem “A quoi bon dire”.

There was no doubting the work’s whole-heartedness at any given point – and the response by the forces, singers and instrumentalists, under Mark W. Dorrell’s enthusiastic direction was as radiant and forthright as could be imagined, with the Lyrica children’s voices in particular making finely-focused contributions to the setting of Emily Dickinson’s “Hope” such as with the words “And sweetest in the Gale is heard….” The performance deservedly brought forth at the concert’s conclusion enthusiastic acclaim from all sides.

 

 

 

Audience stands to honour fine performance by Secondary Students’ Choir

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

New Zealand Secondary Students’ Choir in Concert directed by Andrew Withington, accompanied by Brent Stewart

Wellington Cathedral of St. Paul

Saturday, 26 April 2014, 7:30 pm

I reviewed the choir almost exactly two years ago; now they are here for another school holiday course.  My enthusiasm for their performance has not diminished, nor has the choir’s skill and versatility, despite the changes of personnel in the meantime.  There was a good-sized audience, but the back third of the Cathedral should not have been empty; this choir is deserving of a larger number of listeners.  Choristers came from all over New Zealand: Whangarei to Invercargill, with representatives from some small towns: Arrowtown, Shannon, Hawera for example.

Most of the programme was sung without printed scores; it was mainly the newer music for which scores were used.   The choir put on a highly professional concert, which I am sure will impress those who hear the singers later in the year in Singapore and Malaysia.  (Their singing won’t be poor, and I’m sure there will be no malaise – excuse me!)

As at the concert two years ago, the opening was with the church in darkness, the women processing in with candles, singing Jerusalem, an ancient Irish chant arranged by Michael McGlynn.  It featured a solo (rather too quiet) while the other singers backed with ‘oo-oo’, before the piece became multi-part.  This made a remarkable sound in the resonant cathedral, but few words could be perceived.

The full choir followed with the ‘Dies Irae’ from Mozart’s Requiem.  The piano accompaniment sounded strange – this is not a building that is kind to that instrument.

However, there was a strong, well-balanced sound.  The tempo was quite fast compared with what I have usually heard – or sung.

Mendelssohn’s Weihnachten followed.  The German was pronounced well, and uniformly, as it was in the Heinrich Schütz Psalm 115 that came next.  For this item, variety was provided by the appropriately baroque accompaniment on a spinet, and the division of the singers into three separate choirs.  The antiphonal singing and responses were superbly done; here, the scores were used.  There was plenty of depth in the basses. Confident attacks and dynamics were notable.  Most of the members watched their conductor almost  constantly.  Some tenors were a little too prominent in this work.  Part of the work was in a faster tempo, with more quavers and slurs.  This daunted the choir not in the least; it was a most creditable performance.

Throughout the accompanied items Brent Stewart, the choir’s principal accompanist, was lively, sympathetic and a thoroughly accomplished performer; the deficiencies were not to do with his technique or carrying out of his role. Items were introduced in groups by members of the staff of the choir and a few of the singers.  The microphone’s use was for the most part appropriate, and their words were heard clearly.

Ave Maria by Franz Biebl was sung by tenors and basses, including a solo trio and piano accompaniment, most effectively.  I knew nothing of Biebl, but on consulting Google, I found that he was a German who died in 2001.  According to the Wikipedia entry, the commonly-used programme note for the Ave Maria is by Dr. Wilbur Skeels – a former New Zealander, later resident in the US, and interestingly, composer of a setting of ‘Do not stand at my grave and weep’, another setting of which by David Childs (also a US-based New Zealander) was sung later in the concert.  The men made a gorgeous sound, especially in the opening unaccompanied section.

The soloists all had excellent, well-produced voices, especially fine in the piano and mezzo piano passages. The singers were utterly secure in the moving parts, and the Latin words were very clear.  I see how valuable it was when church singing was always in Latin; the clarity is so much greater than in many other languages in large, high venues.  There was a little stridency crept into the choir tenors at the forte ending.

A pleasing factor was the design of the men’s outfits.  Though I see no reason for all to be dressed in black, nevertheless, the men’s loose, collar-less shirts were a handsome choice.

Brahms was up next, the whole choir singing, with scores and piano, ‘Vineta’ from Drei Gesange, in total unanimity.  For something completely different, the men then performed ‘Mouth Music’, with resonant n and ng sounds, and drum accompaniment played by Brent Stewart.  Another light music piece was Scarborough Fair, sung by the women, in an interesting arrangement with a very well-played violin solo part from Theo Moolenaar that failed to sound out well enough in the Cathedral.

A David Childs item not listed in the programme was Remembrance, on the text referred to above.  The slow opening harmonies were very effective, while the contrasting fast section was lively and with beautiful tone – but there was more difficulty in picking up the words.  The slow passages returned, and both the soloist, Kelly Kim, and the high soprano ending were dramatic.

Twa Tanbou (Three Drums), a Haitian song was tricky, with cross-rhythms, but made an energetic impact just prior tot he interval.  Many syllables, in French Creole, were sounded in this fun piece with its dramatic ending.

We were recalled from the interval by a loud karanga, introducing Kua Rongo by the Wehi whanau.  The choir members now wore shoulder sashes over their garments. The women used single pois through part of the item, while the men did actions with notional taiahas. Memorising music and words, plus all the many movements was a considerable feat.  They were accompanied by Andrew Withington on guitar.

Two more pieces by David Childs followed, the first commissioned in memory of Lois Coplon, NZSSC’s Executive Officer from 1996 to 2009.   This was performed with piano, and began with soprano and alto voices only.  I found the choral harmonies interesting, but the melodies rather sentimental.  Despite the title In Requiescat, it was sung in English.

Between the Childs pieces, an unprogrammed piece, Lux Aeterna by Christchurch composer Richard Oswin, revealed again how well the Latin language sounds in this space.  The effective choral writing included unusual harmonies, chords and vocalisations, which were beautifully controlled.  Excellent low bass notes helped to support this unaccompanied item.

Childs’s Sonnet of the Moon was attractive (but who wrote the words?).  However, I found it became a rather soporific ballad, although sung with great beauty.

Two pieces from Suite Nordestina by Ronaldo Miranda, a contemporary Brazilian composer, were next – Portuguese another language to add to the already lengthy list the choir sings in. The cadences in the very rhythmic ‘Bumba Chora’ reminded me of that other Brazilian choral work, Ariel Ramírez’s Misa Criolla. ‘Dende Trapia’ was lively, and featured precise and uniform pronunciation of syllables.

A leading contemporary American choral composer is Eric Whitacre; his Cloudburst was sung in Wellington by the Orpheus Choir a number of years ago.  It used three soloists, piano, drums and win sheet (these in the upstairs side-gallery), hand-bells, and rhythmic clapping and finger-clicking.  It is a complex, multi-part work featuring close intervals. Despite its English title, it is sung in Spanish. The characterization of rain falling, the build-up to storm, and the lighter rain following are most accurately portrayed, though sometimes the voices didn’t penetrate all that rain.  The closing section of humming completed the drama of this quite lengthy, multi-faceted work, which gave plenty of opportunity to demonstrate the versatility of these singers, and how much they are able to achieve in a short course together.

Why does such a concert always have to conclude with lighter items?  These did not reveal the best singing by the choir, and were for the most part not appropriate to the building – I mean acoustically, not theologically.  Most were too fast and too loud to be heard to good effect.  Why ‘America’ from West Side Story needed to be included in a full programme, I do not know.  It was faster than I’d ever heard it; the only word that was distinct was ‘America’.  It is better sung by an ensemble, not by a large choir.

Another lighter item with piano was Celebrate by Keith Hampton (he and a number of the other composers featured also in the 2012 programme).  Again fast, loud and without perceptible words.  There was a soloist, but she was rather lost standing behind a much taller person.  I’m afraid the style sounded almost ugly in this building, as did the next piece, I’ve got the World on a String in which choir members performed the actions of playing wind instruments.

The concert ended with cultural items – the first, Tate le fia Manatua was acted out by two choruses; it was to do with the possible marriage of Samoan and Tongan prince and princess.  Gestures, movement and facial expressions, particularly of the two leaders, made for a very splendid performance.  Again, fortissimo singing lost the subtlety that at times the gestures were conveying.  However, the latter were quite complicated, and graceful.  It all made up to an exciting performance, and again was a great act of memory.

Finally Siyabangena and Ke Nna Yo Morena, two South African traditional pieces, were very rhythmic.  They were conducted (the previous item was not) and involved a lot of clapping.  Then the choir paraded down the side aisles of the Cathedral, and the audience ended the concert standing to honour the skill of the choir and the thorough enjoyment of the performances.

 

Superb performance of Renaissance Easter music by Tudor Consort

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The Tudor Consort, Directed by Michael Stewart

Music for Holy Week

Lamentationes Hieremiae Feria sexta in Parasceve à 5, Orlande de Lassus
Et egressusest, Manuel Cardoso
Da Jesus an den Kreuze stund , Michael Praetorius
Stabat Mater, John Browne
Christus factus est, Felice Anerio
Incipit lamentation Jeremiae prophetae, Thomas Tallis
In monte Oliveti, Sarum chant
De lamentation Jeremiae prophetae, Thomas Tallis
Ne irascaris Domine satis/Civitas sancti tui, William Byrd

Wellington Cathedral of St Paul

Saturday 12 April 2014

This Lenten programme for Holy Week offered some acknowledged treasures of Renaissance a
cappella choral music, with the opening item being the first lesson for Good Friday from the five voice setting of Lassus’ Lamentations. It was a beautifully controlled, contemplative interpretation which established an atmosphere of deep lament, and it was given a breadth of tempo that enabled the cadences to resolve clearly in the echoing acoustic of St. Paul’s Cathedral. Yet there was always momentum to carry the effortless, floating sound through the space in the idioms so indelibly associated with the great European cathedral choirs.

The following Et egressus est by Portuguese composer Manuel Cardoso continued a similar contemplative approach, with the interweaving lines of polyphony beautifully balanced. The prophet’s closing admonition to Jerusalem to “return to the Lord your God” was not a fiery tub-thumping catapult, but a moving plea in keeping with the somber reflection of the earlier verses. The short chorale of Praetorius is set for double choir although they sing simultaneously almost throughout, so their  distinctive parts were not distinguishable from the body of the nave where I was sitting. This did not seem any drawback however, and the work highlighted the warm, rich tones this ensemble produces so well.

The Stabat Mater dolorosa is by composer John Browne, of whom nothing is known other than his ten surviving works in the Eton Choirbook, which is considered a most prized collection of early Tudor music. The programme noted that Browne’s style “typically pits a group of solo singers against lush full choir sections, and employs incredibly florid rhythms”. The spare sound of the solo group sections was, in fact, a very effective mechanism to provide a contrasting relief from the unbroken, full bodied sound of the tutti group which, in a text of this length, can become overwhelming, especially in the swirling reverberation of spaces like the Eton chapel and St. Paul’s Cathedral. Clear diction is not attainable in such places; what is so effectively provided is the colour and mood of worshipful devotion created by the music, where even the humblest medieval peasant, illiterate and ignorant of Latin, might perceive the brush strokes of the Celestial Painter in myriad hues.

After the interval we heard the brief Christus factus est from the pen of Anerio, who followed Palestrina in 1594 as official papal composer, the most prominent position for a composer in Rome. The writing and singing was full of richness, and this work actually provided the clearest diction of the evening.

The lamentations of Jeremia were performed with a brief Sarum chant setting of Jesus’ prayer In Monte Oliveti interposed between verses 1-2 and verses 3-5, and in Tallis’s original scoring for Alto, two Tenors and two Basses. This was a good programming choice, as the lower voice registers provided a contrast with the constant ringing soprano sound, which benefits from intermittent relief in such reverberant spaces when it is not broken up by spoken or intoned liturgy. It also gave the chance to appreciate better the quality of the alto and male voices in the group. Michael Stewart’s direction here again amply demonstrated that he understood how best to complement the acoustics of St. Paul’s, enhancing the music with the pauses and intervals of silence it needs if its artistry is to be fully realised.

The evening closed with Byrd’s wonderful motet Ne irascaris Domine, which the programme described as “one of a number that Byrd wrote to reflect the tribulations of the persecuted Catholic population during the reign of Elizabeth I”. This plaintive text can be read as a cry of despair from ‘papists’ living in Protestant England at the time, lamenting the desolation of their fate and pleading for God’s mercy. It is full of rich, full writing, where the soprano lines do not stray into the upper stratosphere, yet the choir produced a beautifully balanced, floating sound enhanced, as always, by impeccable intonation and wonderfully shaped phrasing and cadences.

I found myself pondering the immense power of words, music, and traditions to shape our views of historical events. Holy Week is a time marked by the church for contemplating the crucifixion and its significance for Christianity. What was surely a hideously sordid crowd puller, and the most painful method of Roman execution, has been transformed by such words, music, and traditions into an occasion of spiritual contemplation clothed in transcendent holiness. The chaste white altar drapery, the simple ‘candle’ lights borne by the choristers, and the paired arches of palm fronds in the nave all helped set a scene that was played out with superb artistry and wonderful musicianship by Michael Stewart and The Tudor Consort. Wellington is very privileged to have opportunities such as this to hear the European choral tradition presented at its very best.

 

Impressive performances of Brahms choral works, including the German Requiem from Kapiti Chamber Choir

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

Brahms: Nänie, Op.82
Alto Rhapsody, Op 53
A German Requiem, Op 45

Kapiti Chamber Choir and orchestra, conducted by Eric Sidoti, with Ellen Barrett (contralto), Janey MacKenzie (soprano), Roger Wilson (baritone)

St. Paul’s Church, Paraparaumu

Sunday, 6 April 2014, 2.30pm

A full church greeted choir, soloists and orchestra for a very rewarding concert of Brahms’s choral music.  It was a very warm afternoon (Paraparaumu reached 24deg.) which was hard on the performers.  Nevertheless, they responded magnificently.

The first work was new to me, a piece written in memory of a friend of Brahms.  The title means ‘song of mourning’.  It had an appealing orchestral introduction, in which an oboe melody was particularly notable.  The choir sopranos then entered quietly; it seemed to take them a few moments to settle in. A gradual crescendo emphasised the words of the poem by Friedrich Schiller – all of the German pronounced exceedingly well and clearly by the choir.  There were tricky chromatic passages to be negotiated, on the whole successfully.  The men’s tone was smooth, but lacked character much of the time.  However, in the main the attractive work was tastefully and carefully performed.

Having had Schiller, we now turned to the other great German poet, Goethe.  The setting for contralto, male chorus, and orchestra is a moving, even heart-rending piece.  The arresting orchestral opening sends shivers down the spine, while the striking alto solo and the sombre orchestral accompaniment are richly Romantic, in the best sense of the word.

Throughout this and the following work, the flutes and oboe were particularly outstanding, but all the players and singers performed well. Ellen Barrett’s singing was beautifully controlled and impeccably phrased, although she employed a little too much portamento for my taste – but I daresay it was authentic for Brahms’s time.

The entry of the men was very well done; the rich harmonies and mellow yet soft tone were most satisfying.  The gorgeous ending on the words ‘sein Herz’ (his heart) left a feeling of nostalgia, yet completeness.

Ambitious it was for the choir to tackle Brahms’s Requiem, which is one of the major works in the choral repertoire, though not one of the really large ones.

The deliberate opening tempo was appropriate for the theme, and it was immediately apparent that great attention had been given to detail.  Words were excellent, tone mainly fine, and generally, intonation was good, although the occasional top note here and in the earlier works was not quite reached. Dynamics were well observed.

The choir had complicated fugues to sing in at least two of the movements, and in the 6th movement, ‘For here we have no continuing city’, the choir is in eight parts.

The choristers were obviously well-trained and secure; the orchestral horns were not so, but then they had a great deal to do, and I doubt it was easy playing.  All the orchestra worked hard, not least young trumpeter, Sarah Henderson.

The third movement, ‘Lord, make me to know mine end’ comprised  mainly a solo for baritone Roger Wilson.  Roger has sung this work many times; the printed programme reported that he first sang it in the Durham St. Methodist Church in Christchurch, and he dedicated his performance to the memory of the three organ builders who were killed in that building in the February 2011 earthquake.  I found I was sitting on the ‘wrong’ side of the church to hear him to the best effect; the space required for the orchestra meant that the soloists for this work were very much to one side.  However, any deficiency was not due to lack of clarity or tone from the singer.

The fugue for the choir at the end of that movement, ‘But the souls of the righteous are in the hand of God’ is a very taxing sing, as I know from experience.  Of the various entries the clearest was from the sopranos – but the acoustic could not really cope with the complexities.

The beautiful chorus usually known in English as ‘How lovely are thy dwellings’ was captivating; the beautiful suspensions in the orchestral part were splendid, the cellos being particularly important. The men’s entry and accompanying part were sung with sensitivity and grace.

‘And ye now therefore have sorrow’ featured Janey MacKenzie singing strongly, and with great clarity of diction. A little more soft singing would have made her performance even more memorable.  The choir’s part in this movement, sung seated, was very grateful on the ear.  The beauty of Brahms’s writing on the words ‘As one whom his mother comforteth, so will I comfort you’ I always find very moving.

The sixth movement, ‘For here have we no continuing city’ (Roger, and Christchurch again?) features choir as well as the soloist.
Here, as elsewhere, the pizzicato from the cellos was very telling, having both accuracy and tone.  The choir excelled itself in the varying moods of both text and music.  There was plenty for the young trumpeter to do, and she did it well.  The words ‘O death, where is thy sting, O grave, where is thy victory?’ were sung as detached notes, giving emphasis to the meaning.

The seventh movement, ‘Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord’ had the woodwind giving a thrilling edge to the climaxes.  The soaring, rising melody on the words ‘their works do follow them’ (denn ihre Werke folgen ihnen nach) was supremely beautiful and peaceful, leaving the audience with a blessed experience indeed.

I learned that Helen Griffiths, violist, was responsible for getting together the 22-piece orchestra, as she has on many previous occasions.  The choir must be very grateful for her efforts, contacts and not least her persuasive powers.

The printed programme was well set out, and in case of the Requiem, it was very helpful to have not only have full translations but also the Biblical reference for each passage.  It was a nice touch to use Gothic script for the titles of the movements; the script would have been the norm in Brahms’s day.

I find that in reviewing last November’s concert by the choir I said: ‘It struck me that it was high time a district with the population of the Kapiti Coast had a proper performing venue; many towns and districts of smaller size have such a facility, e.g. Martinborough with its Town Hall.  Here, choral concerts are held in a church with an airfield opposite, while chamber music concerts are in a large hall designed primarily for indoor sports, where the audience have to sit on plastic chairs!’

I would reiterate that even more firmly now; a work of the size and complexity of the Brahms Requiem, incorporating an orchestra, deserves a much larger venue, with more spacious acoustics than St. Paul’s Church can offer.  I was told that this venue may not be available for much longer.  In that case, it emphasises the need for a proper performing venue in the district. Not only Martinborough, but Ngaio and Khandallah have their own Town Halls, the former having been built by Wellington City Council, not by a now-defunct local authority.  Upper Hutt has a splendid performance venue.

College halls are a possibility, but are unlikely to have comfortable chairs comparable to those in the church.  However, they would not be likely to have aeroplane noises or flapping blinds, either.

The abiding thoughts on the concert must not be about these factors, but about such wonderful invention on Brahms’s part, and such variety of composition, realised in an impressive performance from all concerned.