Tag: choral

Christmas presents from the NZSO….

Posted on by Peter Mechen

New Zealand Symphony Orchestra

Wellington Christmas Concert 2010

Works by Britten, Mozart, Respighi, Handel, Corelli, Reger, Adam, Nicolai, Rutter

Aivale Cole (soprano)

Choir and Choristers of Wellington Cathedral of St.Paul

Paul Goodwin (conductor)

Michael Fowler Centre

Thursday 9th December, 2010

Musically, this was a heart-warming “something for everybody” concert, presenting tried and true favorites from, for example, Messiah (fascinating to compare performances with what was heard less than a week previously from the Orpheus Choir and the Wellington Orchestra) along with relative concert-hall rarities like Benjamin Britten’s Men of Goodwill and Otto Nicolai’s Christmas Overture. Almost as rare was Respighi’s beautiful L’adorazione dei Magi, the second of the composer’s Three Botticelli Pictures. Another composer whose works rarely make concert-hall appearances in this part of the world is Max Reger, represented here by two Nativity settings for choir and orchestra.

Despite the musical interest of the program, and the excellence of the performances from soloist Aivale Cole, and the choir and orchestra under Paul Goodwin, I thought the event could have been made a bit more festive or Christmassy. True, the Wellington Cathedral of St Paul Choir and Choristers’ Santa-red robes did give a certain ritualistic air to the proceedings, and Aivale Cole’s spectacular dress with its energetic swirls of resplendent colour-energy was certainly eye-catching. But apart from these visual stimulations, there was nothing done or staged to proclaim the event had any more significance than just another concert. I actually felt sorry for the NZSO players, having to “deck the halls” in public not long after returning from an exhausting whirlwind European tour during which they obviously gave their all, wowing the critics and the audiences alike. One would have thought the orchestra had done enough for the year, and could deservedly rest on its laurels for a bit before facing the new challenges of 2011. But, presumably because it’s the “expected” thing to put on a Christmas concert, the musicians, or at least most of them, were there at the party, giving enjoyable and well-played performances of a mixture of interesting and standard repertoire.

What might have made a difference would have been somebody associated with or representing the orchestra actually welcoming the audience to the concert (and I don’t mean via one of those deadeningly impersonal recorded voice-overs which the orchestra uses to announce each event – was it David Pawsey who in the old days used to come out onto the platform at the beginning, and very sweetly ask us to make sure our cell-phones were turned off?). It’s the kind of thing that conductor Mark Taddei for one carries off with great élan when introducing Wellington Orchestra concerts – if somewhat gauche in effect when overdone, it’s nevertheless great to mark a festive occasion with something out of the ordinary like this. Alternatively, being a capital city, Wellington has no shortage of well-known “personalities” whose talents could be thus commandeered  (the city has a new Mayor, of course, who might have been thrilled to be asked to introduce something at the concert). And though it’s a bit of a hoary idea (but no more so than performing the “Halleluiah” Chorus on such an occasion, I might add), the items could have been introduced by one or two or more of these personalities reading something appropriately seasonal either from Scripture, or from literature. These are very basic “impulse” ideas, but doing something along these lines would have helped engender some extra atmosphere befitting the occasion.

Fortunately, the performances carried a certain sound and sense of seasonal celebration to convey an idea of Christmas, beginning with the Benjamin Britten rarity which I disappointingly missed, thanks to an unfortunate car-parking contretemps! Luckily, a reviewer colleague present described it all for me as “engaging and rumbustious, with a jolly fugal finale, played here by the orchestra with plenty of energy and feeling”. I do wish I’d heard it – apparently it was music Britten wrote for a broadcast of a Christmas speech in 1947 made by King George VI, though without the fugue on that occasion, due to time constraints. Britten never had the work published – whether he didn’t think much of it, or was too taken up with other projects, one can’t be sure – but Men of Goodwill had to wait until several years after the composer’s death before the score was made available by Faber Music.

Soprano Aivale Cole looked and sounded magnificent, even though her first offering, Mozart’s Exsultate Jubilate, was truncated – contrary to the programme’s indication, she performed only the work’s opening section (my colleague thought she hadn’t sufficiently “warmed up” for the rest, hence the unscheduled departure from the platform). Next was Respighi’s adorable, orchestra-only L’adorazione dei Magi, an enchanting work, featuring orchestral winds performing miracles of rustic evocation, the strings initially held back, then allowed to interact with the winds to create a sense of wonderment and exultation at the Saviour’s birth. While very much a stylistic jump from this to Handel, Aivale Cole’s re-appearance for “Rejoice Greatly” from Messiah certainly continued the Nativity sequence, even if the singer found some of the downward figurations of the opening a bit breathless and intonation-testing – after the central “He is the Righteous Saviour’,  the reprise of the opening found her voice more settled and confident-sounding. Throughout, Cole’s wonderful diction and “ownership” of the words I found a constant delight, though she changed the unidiomatic “He shall Fe-EED his flock” to “He sha-AALL feed his flock”, about which one couldn’t really complain, especially as we even got some modest decoration of the line at the reprise of “Come unto him”. The Wellington Cathedral Choir and Choristers’ first appearance was at the end of this sequence, with a swift, lithe performance of “His yoke is easy”, the interpretation missing a bit of the ending’s irony with the word “light”, but still all beautifully sensitive and finely-graded.

Corelli’s Christmas Concerto began the second half, the opening terse and snappy, but with a lovely gravity of utterance in the slower section that followed. Donald Armstrong’s and Andrew Thomson’s duo violin work was just one of the outstanding features of a performance whose stylish textures, phrasings and rhythms helped bring the work’s pictorial qualities to life – a gorgeous “Nativity” processional sequence, for example, breathed such sweet and serene air as to make the contrasting allegro section properly “bite” before returning to the opening serenities. In both of Max Reger’s Christmas hymn settings the youthful freshness of the choir’s voices also made an incredibly sweet impression, the second of the two settings in particular allowing both men’s and women’s voices individual sequences, and contrasting the strands excitingly with the vigor of the full choir in the choruses. Otto Nicolai, best known as the composer of the opera The Merry Wives of Windsor, chimed in with a substantial overture-like piece, Christmas Overture, written for what seemed like a very large orchestra, whose size proved the choir’s undoing at the very end. But Paul Goodwin and the players captured the Schumannesque beginning of the work to perfection, with cathedral-like archways of sound, leading to episodes by turns agitated and suffused with the radiance of the chorale “Vom Himmel hoch”, the choir joining the festivities towards the conclusion, but sadly proving too “voice-light” and insufficient in number to make much impression alongside Nicolai’s full orchestral scoring.

Other highlights included Aivale Cole’s expansive and lyrical O Holy Night, whose second verse, sung in Samoan, featured a glorious high note at the end which brought the singer screams of approval at the end – and deservedly so. Again the sweet, youthful choral voices were like balm to the ears in John Rutter’s Shepherd’s Pipe Carol and the same composer’s arrangement of Away in a Manger; while a swift, excitable “Halleluiah” Chorus set one and (almost)all up and on their feet in the traditional manner – a good thing, too, because at the end everybody simply walked off the stage and the applause stopped, and that was it, no recalls, flowers, kisses or anything like that – just as if it was the end of another day in the life of an orchestra…….

Bach Choir returns to homeland in visual and aural feast

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

Bach: Jesu meine Freude, BWV 227; Orchestral Suite no.3, in D, BWV 1068; Magnificat in D, BWV 243

Bach Choir, Janey MacKenzie, Lisette Wesseling (sopranos), Andrea Cochrane (contralto), John Beaglehole (tenor), David Morriss (bass), Chiesa Ensemble, Douglas Mews (organ, continuo), conducted by Stephen Rowley

Sacred Heart Cathedral

Sunday 5 December 2010, 3pm

A programme made up of three well-loved pieces by J.S. Bach was bound to please any lover of baroque music.

Jesu, meine Freude is unusually long, complex and varied for a motet. It is full of the most delicious settings of words, including extracts from Paul’s epistle to the Romans. The word-painting is just superb.

This performance did its beauties justice. After perusing the beautifully produced printed programme and looking in wonder at Stephen Rowley’s colourful garb (perhaps appropriate for Christmas) against the sombre black of the choir, one was hit with the splendid initial impact of the music.

Full-toned, meaningful singing and a fine accompaniment on chamber organ from Douglas Mews and a mainly trouble-free performance full of sensitivity and dynamic contrasts made for a most enjoyable and satisfying experience. The women particularly were splendid, with the men not far behind, though the intonation and entries were suspect at times. This choir suffers from the usual shortage of tenors; those they have at times, unfortunately, endeavoured to make up the shortfall with stridency of tone. Probably a somewhat smaller choir is better for this music.

Nevertheless it was a commendable performance; some dropping in pitch towards the end may have been due to tiredness, since this music is very demanding, with its varied moods an settings. Overall, it was a vibrant, joyful and inspiring performance of some of Bach’s most exquisite music.

The Suite was directed by Douglas Mews from the harpsichord, and featured an orchestra of approximately 21 players. I say approximately, because there were three trumpeters, but only one was identified in the printed programme. I suspect another was Danny Kirgan; the third may have been Tom Moyer.

The extended opening Ouverture was robust and quick; it was followed by the sublime Air for strings only, commonly known as ‘Air on the G string’. The brass returned for the dance movements. With much difficult music to play they were not always spot on, but in the main excellent.

Woodwind featured with delightfully floating phrases, and helped to make the whole amply rewarding.

This was not an original instrument orchestra, but one drawn mainly from the ranks of the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra. To be baroque in style required a greater lightness, and notes to be a little more separated, at least in this acoustic. Yet it was a joyful and enjoyable rendering of a work we hear too seldom. It was inspired to give the singers a rest with music such as this.

The Magnificat in D was an appropriate seasonal choice. As the programme note stated, in many ways this work anticipates the choruses of the Mass in B minor. The use of orchestra, organ, five soloists and chorus makes it of a similar large scale in terms of performers, if not of length and scope. There are no recitatives, allowing the Biblical words flow without interruption.

The words of the Magnificat, from St Lukes’ Gospel chapter one, are split into nine movements, alternating arias and choruses. The opening chorus ‘Magnificat anima mea Dominum’ is brilliant, firstly from orchestra and then from chorus. It is a splendid declamation, sung here with a good, strong sound. Lisette Wesserling sang the first aria ‘Et exsultavit’ without much expression, and a rather hard, piercing quality in the acoustics of this building. However, her vibrato-less tone would be regarded as suitable for sacred music of this period.

A second soprano aria immediately follows: ‘Quia respexit’, which was sung in excellent style by Janey MacKenzie, with feeling and expression. A lovely oboe featured in the orchestral accompaniment.

A hearty chorus is the fourth movement, ‘Omnes generationes’. The fast tempo and florid writing were managed very well. The bass aria ‘Quia fecit’ was accompanied by continuo only, giving a most attractive effect. Morriss’s tone rich and mellow, but his intonation a little suspect at the opening. This was the only contribution Bach allowed the bass,, but it was a fine one.

Next, the duet for alto and tenor with muted strings ‘Et misericordia’ is full of meditative phrases for both soloists. In this case, the tenor was a little too loud for the alto. A tenor voice will almost always stand out, so there was a need for John Beaglehole to modify his tone in order to blend and match his companion.

The chorus ‘Fecit potentiam’ is quite demanding with its florid writing contrasted with chordal statements. This performance was glorious.

John Beaglehole gave a very hearty rendition of ‘Deposuit potentes’, suitable to the subject of the putting down of the mighty from their seats, with a magnificent orchestral accompaniment.

The ninth movement was ‘Esurientes implevit’, and aria for alto. Its accompaniment was a magical flute duet; while Andrea Cochrane made a lovely job of this, her tone was a little light for the modern flutes. It would have been perfectly satisfactory with the wooden flutes of Bach’s time.

A beautiful, floating trio followed, for the three female voices: ‘Suscepit Israel’. To my mind this is the most beautiful part of the whole work, and the soloists’ treatment of it left little to be desired.

The final ‘Gloria’ began somewhat too legato, and was not as successful as the other choruses, but the orchestra was splendid, ending off in a triumphant manner a most worthwhile concert.

The Bach Choir’s performance was of much better quality than it was the last time I heard them. The church was nearly full, and the audience gave the choir, orchestra and soloists a very warm reception.


Orpheus Choir and Wellington Orchestra deliver “good tidings” from Handel

Posted on by Peter Mechen

HANDEL – Messiah

Ana James (soprano) / Helen Medlyn (mezzo-soprano)

Keith Lewis (tenor) / Martin Snell (bass)

Orpheus Choir of Wellington

Vector Wellington Orchestra

Michael Fulcher, conductor

Wellington Town Hall

Saturday, December 4th, 2010

There’s no doubt about it – nothing brings in people quite like the prospect of hearing a “Messiah”. And, as when one goes to something like a rugby test, there’s a parallel sense of occasion, of impending enjoyment, of expectation that the the experience will truly resonate with an amalgam of the familiar and the freshly-minted. So, there, queued up in lines around at least two sides of the Town Hall were, I suspect, many “Messiah veterans” as well as people who would have heard, one way or another, about the “good tidings”, and come to see and hear for themselves just what it was all about.

The last Messiah I heard was given by a different choir, the Tudor Consort, in this same hall two years ago, the differences in style and interpretation between that and the present approach a cause for endless fascination. I remember then actually sitting in the auditorium behind the conductor of the present “Messiah”, Michael Fulcher, for the Tudor Consort’s performance and wondering what his reactions were to Michael Stewart’s extremely  lean, clean-cut and vigorous interpretation of the whole. Of course I was now ideally placed to glean some of those reactions by dint of the present concert, albeit two years afterwards.

So – again a full hall, the same orchestra, a bigger choir than there was in 2008 (a most resplendent-sounding Orpheus Choir), and a very different line-up of soloists. Madeleine Pierard’s vocal beauty and polish easily stole the show on the earlier occasion, but this time the quartet was far more evenly-matched. Ana James was here a silvery-toned soprano, Helen Medlyn the characterful, dramatic mezzo-soprano, Keith Lewis the lyrical, occasionally heroic tenor, and Martin Snell a commanding, richly-toned bass. Conductor Michael Fulcher took a more traditional approach to the work than we heard in Michael Stewart’s hands, with steadier speeds throughout and more “orchestrated” dynamic contrasts in places, which I thought brought out the music’s grandeur and depth of feeling more consistently.

Of course the “swings and roundabouts” syndrome meant that this time round there wasn’t in places the same knife-edged excitement around and about the textures, and one or two of the choruses seemed to play themselves rather than be infused with fresh energies. But these differences were, of course, for the listener part of the meat and drink of the experience, of hearing a familiar work freshly realized, and revelling in the stimulation and resulting discussion that such a new realization gives. As with Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons, there doesn’t seem to me to be anything one can “do” to Messiah to blunt its effect – it’s one of those almost archetypal masterpieces of art which form an essential part of one’s understanding of human civilization in general.

To go through the performance and tease out every interpretative nuance would need an excess of world and time – any number of felicities could be cited as giving a sense of the whole, and the occasional frailty a timely reminder of the humanity of the enterprise. The soloists always generate great interest, and each of these performed with particular distinction. First up was, of course, tenor Keith Lewis, with his wonderfully poetic, liberally nuanced, yet still commanding, “Comfort Ye” (sounding not unlike a stylistically aware namesake from an earlier Handelian era, Richard Lewis), the voice opening up splendidly at “The voice of him that crieth in the wilderness”, freely declaiming (some would call it “mannered”) in places, but for me managing to suggest a compelling spontaneity of utterance. Not a heroic performance, then, but a fascinatingly stylish one – later, his voice demonstrated some frailty at the very top, with the cruel upward leaps of “Thou shalt break them” giving him some difficulty, though he had introduced the aria with a beautifully-realised recitative “He that dwelleth in heaven”.

What Helen Medlyn lacked in sheer vocal girth she made up for in both characterful expression and grave beauty of utterance – the capacity to tell a story was always evident in her singing. Her big number, “He was despised” was heartfelt and emotional at the beginning, then vehement and theatrical in the middle section, projecting the text with her articulation rather than any great power. I liked her allowing some melodic decoration at the opening’s reprise, while keeping intact the aria’s essential simplicity. The same went for her  “But who may abide”, her voice assuming an almost Greek-chorus-like solemnity at the beginning, and then using sharply-focused diction to depict the “refiner’s fire”. Though occasionally having to force her tone, as in parts of “Thou art gone up on high”, her duet with Keith Lewis “O death, where is thy sting?” was put across with engaging energy and spirit.

Vocal girth was what Martin Snell’s bass voice had in abundance, but also great agility and splendid focus throughout. His dramatic experience was evident in his word-pointing at the declamatory “Thus saith the Lord”, though it must be said his runs on the word “shake” were more considered than really seismic. Despite the disappointingly bland orchestral introduction at “For, behold, darkness shall cover the earth”, Snell evoked the gloom magnificently, arching his voice vigorously at “glory”, and summoning the light with great surety. I thought “The people that walked” a shade quick, but singer and orchestra really made something of the words “have seen a great light”. For energy and vigour at a crackling pace, singer and orchestra again sparked from off each other at “Why do the Nations?”, while “The trumpet shall sound” has surely never sounded more assertive and assured in the hall as here on this occasion, with stellar playing from trumpeter Barrett Hocking throughout, fully matching the singing’s grandeur of utterance.

Youngest of the soloists, soprano Ana James nevertheless brought plenty of concert and operatic experience to her task, displaying a bright, silvery soprano voice which charmed at her first entrance “There were shepherds…”, quickened the listener’s interest at “And the angel said unto them….”, and brightly and eagerly scintillated at the words “And suddenly there was with the angel…” It was a sound that contrasted well with Helen Medlyn’s warmly involving tones in “Come unto him all ye that labour”, but really blossomed with “How beautiful are the feet”, the orchestra matching their soloist with beguiling instrumental beauty. Inevitably, everybody waits for two moments in Messiah, one of which is “I know that my Redeemer liveth” – here, Ana James spun her line out beautifully, surviving a touch of awkwardness at a breath-taking moment (literally) at “upon the earth” the first time round, and enchanting us with tasteful embellishments at the main theme’s reprise, with a beautiful stepwise ascent on the word “Redeemer”.

Michael Fulcher’s work with the Orpheus Choir made for many richly sonorous moments and some exciting contrasts in places – the “other” moment in the work, of course is “Halleluiah!”, which here was wonderful in every way. I confess that every time I’m taken by surprise when people leap to their feet for this chorus, and on each occasion it’s an exhilarating experience – the sudden irruptions of timpani and brass (trumpeters Barrett Hocking and Tom Moyer, and timpanist Laurence Reese on tiptop form) never fail to raise goosebumps! But conductor and choir made the most of the other big festive numbers as well, glorious soprano sounds in both “And the glory of the Lord” and “And He shall purify”, and all sections relishing their upward-thrusting lines and their concerted acclamations in “For unto us a Child is born”. I didn’t feel quite enough was made of the contrasting sections of “Since by man came death”, beautifully prepared for by the choir’s hushed opening tones, but needing a bit more attack at “by man came also the resurrection…”, though “even so in Christ” did seem sharper and better-focused. And while “The Lord gave the word” seemed to me to have a dogged quality throughout, elsewhere there was a real sense of the music invariably taking the performers and listeners somewhere. I liked, for instance, the building-up of the “Amen” chorus from tones of quiet confidence at the beginning to sounds of the utmost splendor at the end – beautifully and grandly achieved.

Working hand-in-glove with the singers throughout was the Wellington Orchestra, sounding ever stylish and rising magnificently to the occasion of those resplendent moments. There was the occasional moment where I felt the players weren’t being asked for anything special, such as at the beginning of “For, behold…”, which was more dull than gloom-laden; and some people would have thought that the string scintillations at “And suddenly” were workmanlike rather than celestial. But from the opening of Part Two, with the stern focus of the accompaniment at “Behold the Lamb of God” the concentration of the playing was palpable and arresting; and the strings’ accompaniment to “He was despised” beautifully echoed the singer’s pathos and dignity. And for energy and excitement the sizzling orchestral momentum at “Why do the nations?” really delivered the goods, underlining the contrasting grandeur of the playing throughout “Hallelujah” and during those final choruses.

The standing ovation at the end of what was a fairly long haul, was a richly deserved one – a heartfelt response to richly-committed music-making from all concerned.

Shakespeare in Song – choral settings by Cantoris conducted by Rachel Hyde

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

Songs from the plays; Sonnet No 18; and other songs by Gibbons and Ramsey

St Andrew’s on The Terrace

Saturday 20 November 2.30pm

Here was a most interesting programme, introduced in an engaging manner by conductor Rachel Hyde, who attempted to demonstrate the essential musical quality of Shakespeare’s language and the way in which music permeated Shakespeare’s work and Tudor society in general. For example, she said that someone had counted some 300 musical stage directions in the plays.

To her credit, Hyde kept away from the most common settings of the songs, though many might have waited for them: the agenda was choral settings, so no Finzi or Quilter, no Schubert or Brahms or Mendelssohn; no Tippett and Britten; or less familiar names like Frank Martin, Amy Beach, William Mathias; New Zealanders David Farquhar and David Hamilton are just two who have set the songs – the latter for choir; instead, American and Finnish composers seemed to dominate.

There was nothing from the huge number of operas based on the plays.

One of the curious sidelights to which Rachel Hyde drew attention was that almost all the songs in the plays were written for minor characters, whose role it was to entertain or divert rather than to advance the story; and she expressed doubt, in the event justified, about the success of setting the blank verse of some of the great episodes. She mentioned Komulainen’s ‘To be or not to be’, and I agreed – it quite lacked Hamlet’s profound self-questioning anguish. The only one of that group of four that found tolerable musical setting was ‘O weary night’ from A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

All but one of the songs (William Schuman’s ‘Orpheus with his lute’) were unaccompanied; the Schumann sounded distinctly more secure than some the others, and it made me wonder about the usefulness of denying such support to amateur singers, especially when the choir is small.

Schuman’s fine song set words from Henry VIII, believed to be a collaboration between Shakespeare and Fletcher. The words struck me, indeed, as lacking Shakespeare’s verbal whimsy.

Many of the songs were either melodically devious with sequences of taxing intervals, or harmonically testing, all of which caused intonation difficulties and some less than precise ensemble and articulation, evident in songs like Lindberg’s ‘Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day’ (Sonnet 18), or Vaughan Williams’s ‘Over hill, over dale’ from A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

The more successful setting of Sonnet 18 was by Robert Appelbaum, capturing a sunny spirit, the music interesting but not too difficult so the choir sounded comfortable.

I approved of the decision not to print the words in the programme, which leads to the prospect from the choir’s side of the tops of heads buried in programmes. Instead, choir members read the lyrics before the performance, some well, some not so well. But it was an excellent idea.

Hyde warned us about the John Rutter setting of ‘It was a lover and his lass’ from As You Like It; it was a good start, sounding barber-shop, using bass voices to simulate a string bass underlay, singing ‘Doo-wa-doo’, the modern equivalent of ‘Hey nonny nonny’.

There were two probably non-Shakespearean songs. The first was by Orlando Gibbons, ‘What is our life?’ After the somewhat superficial group by Komulainen, it came as a piece of genuine musical inspiration, though the reduced, and so more exposed, choir did it less than justice. ‘Sleep fleshly birth’ by Jacobean composer Robert Ramsey was again accorded to a smaller ensemble which made intonation less secure and the pulse more difficult to maintain.

There were two songs by American composer Matthew Harris, one of the three settings of ‘It was a lover and his lass’. It, and his other song, ‘Take, O, take those lips away’ from Measure for Measure which brought the concert to an end, were among the more successful as music, and the choir delivered full, confident sound.

There were a couple of other groups, as well as the aforementioned Komulainen’s: Vaughan Williams’s three settings and four by Finnish composer Jaakko Mäntyjärvi. The Vaughan Williams songs did not generally impress me, though ‘The cloud-capped towers’ from The Tempest captured its misty gothic turrents. Another was ‘Full fathom five’, also from The Tempest, but I enjoyed more its setting by Mäntyjärvi – the penultimate song in the concert.

‘Double, double, toil and trouble’ from Macbeth was also in this Mäntyjärvi group; its words were recited by a French choir member whose accent lent it a curiously covenish effect; and the music, too, caught its atmosphere most effectively.

Such an imaginative undertaking deserved good support and the audience of perhaps a hundred responded well.

Festival Singers delight with Rossini’s “Little, Solemn Mass”

Posted on by Peter Mechen

ROSSINI – Petite Messe solennelle (for soloists, choir, harmonium and two pianos)

Lesley Graham, soprano / Linden Loader, alto / Jonathan Abernethy, tenor / Roger Wilson, bass

Jonathan Berkhan, Louisa Joblin (pianos) / Thomas Gaynor (harmonium)

Rosemary Russell, musical director

Cathedral of the Sacred Heart, Hill St., Wellington

Saturday 20th November 2010

“Good God—behold completed this poor little Mass—is it indeed sacred music [la musique sacrée] that I have just written, or merely some damned music [la sacré musique]? You know well, I was born for comic opera. Little science, a little heart, that is all. So may you be blessed, and grant me Paradise!”

With these words Gioachino Rossini prefaced his Petite Messe Solennelle, written in 1863, and called elsewhere by the composer the last of his “pêchés de vieillesse” (sins of old age). Characteristically, the music is neither “petite” nor particularly “solemn” – but there’s little doubt as to the work’s sincerity – an expression of faith and piety from one, in his own words, “born for comic opera”.

One of the most engaging aspects of Rossini’s work is its complete lack of sanctimoniousness – nowhere does one sense a feeling, emotion or impulse that doesn’t spring straight from the composer’s essential nature. As with the Stabat Mater, written in 1842, the music unashamedly evokes the theatre in places, an example being the “Domine Deus” section of the Gloria, which featured a ringing, heroic tenor solo reminiscent of the famous “Cujus animam” aria in the earlier work. Tenor Jonathan Abernethy made an excellent fist of this, singing with flair, accuracy and plenty of dynamic and tonal variation – his work featured some lovely high notes in places such as the concluding “Filius Patris”.

Immediately afterwards, soprano Lesley Graham and alto Linden Loader took us to more sombre realms with “Qui tollis peccata mundi”, piano and harmonium setting the scene with piquant and dramatic utterances (great playing from the instrumentalists throughout) leading to further heartfelt sequences such as beautifully essayed chromatic ascents in thirds by the two singers, and a lovely blend by the two at the haunting “Miserere Nobis”, which developed into some positively theatrical Verdian duetting throughout those same words’ final repetitions.

Always one to relish his opportunities, bass Roger Wilson, in resplendent voice, splendidly delivered the “Quoniam”, at once finding the music’s lyricism and energising the sequences up to “Jesu Christe” with the help of Jonathan Berkahn’s vivid, very orchestral piano-playing. With Louisa Joblin on the second piano deliciously bringing extra “galumph” to the accompanying textures, the choral fugue “Cum Sancto Spiritu” sounded simply glorious, director Rosemary Russell characteristically finding a “tempo giusto” which brought out a polka-like “schwung” to the music that even Smetana might have envied.

I hope these descriptions of “flow” throughout just one of the work’s many sequences  will give a sense to readers of the music’s dramatic coursings from episode to episode, with  every impulse the seeming result of the composer’s instinct to speak in a language that comes naturally, with nothing contrived or laid on for a generalised effect. I loved the Britten-like energies of the Credo’s opening, vigorously ascending piano figurations answered by the choir, with the soloists’ contributions dancing in and out among the exchanges. Another treat was the almost Wagnerian “descendit de caelis”, outrageously visceral downwardly-rolling sequences for choir and piano, relished with splendid elan by the performers . By contrast, the “Crucifixus” featured Lesley Graham’s soprano movingly evoking with piano and harmonium something of the awe and pity at Christ’s own suffering in sacrificing his own life for all mankind. Although the second fugue, at “Et vitam” was initially less than tidy between voices and instruments, Rosemary Russell and her sopranos pulled things together, with the cries of “Amen” at the end a grand focal point, before a brief hiatus and final shout of “Credo” ended things triumphantly.

What the sleevenotes of my old LPs refer to as a Prélude réligieux followed, played as a piano solo by Jonathan Berkahn (my recording features the harmonium at this point) – a mesmeric fugal keyboard meditation, beginning and ending with imposing, Beethoven-like chords. In its way, it made a telling prelude to the Sanctus, whose interchanges between soloists and choir had a kinetic energy as well as drama, finely sung, with the men in the choir especially strong. Lesley Graham then made the most of O Salutaris, her equivalent operatic “scene” for soprano, a big-boned and lyrical outpouring, whose mirror image was the contralto solo at Agnus Dei, introduced by portentous piano and harmonium tones, and simply and gravely sung by Linden Loader, balancing dignity with moments of theatrical expression – her cries of “miserere”, supported by lovely chorus work, were truly supplicatory, leaving Jonathan Berkahn to complete Rossini’s piquant piano solo farewell at the end – a wry gesture, entirely characteristic of the composer.

Immense pleasure was to be had from all of this, completing a concert and a year the Festival Singers can, I’m certain, be proud of.

Sacred Heart Cathedral Choir sings Victoria – a moment in time

Posted on by Peter Mechen

A Requiem for All Souls

Tomás Luis de Victoria – Mass for the Dead

Sacred Heart Cathedral Choir

Michael Stewart, director

Sacred Heart Cathedral, Hill St., Wellington

Saturday, 30th October 2010

I ought to confess right here and now to having a bias towards presentations of liturgical plainchant, as it was very much the kind of church music I grew up with, being a Catholic and a New Zealand child of the 1950s. So, of course, this concert touched so many of my points by dint of sheer content, the effect immeasurably augmented by the general excellence of the singing and the music’s direction throughout. This was a reconstruction by Michael Stewart and the Cathedral Choir of Renaissance Spanish composer Tomás Luis de Victoria’s Mass for the Dead, or Requiem, in a proper liturgical setting – that is, in the context of the Catholic Mass. The placement of Victoria’s beautiful polyphony amidst the plainer and starker liturgical chants worked to the advantage of both, creating a well-nigh unique ambience, one to which the Cathedral surroundings gave even more atmosphere and impact.

Throughout the opening Introit Requiem I got the impression that these choir voices hadn’t been overly-moulded and honed into an excessively homogenous blend, a quality which I liked in this circumstance, as it gave to my ears a plainer, more direct and accessible feeling to the singing, almost as if the music was something one could oneself join in with. Having said this, in no way do I want to give the impression that the singing was anything but beautiful throughout – if the lines were not always ideally pure, they were still in tune; and invariably made up in focus and fervour for what they occasionally lacked in elegance. The middle voices gave consistent pleasure at the outset, with “et lux perpetua luceat eis”, bringing into relief moments such as the sopranos’ strongly-etched “et tibi reddetur” which followed. But most telling was the reprise of Requiem, which had a wonderfully charged devotional quality, an evocation whose intensity set the tone for everything that was to follow, such as the succeeding Kyrie, beautifully blossoming upwards from its first phrase, and contrasting nicely with its hushed, ethereal companion Christe.

Choir and conductor brought out the beauties of the Graduale, with its flourishes at “dona eis Domine” and timelessly-wrought cadences at the word “perpetua”. There was delight at a single soprano voice at “In memoria” being joined by others and reaching full resplendent tones at “mala non timebit”, the latter sequence  all the more wondrous through being “ritualized” by the plainchant exchanges between celebrant and choir. But what really set my pulses racing was the singing of the Dies irae, all eighteen verses of it, each poetic metre of three lines a self-contained meditation or beseechment regarding the Day of Judgement. When I was at school, we sang this alternating verses between small group and larger choir; but here, tonight, this was performed with full choir throughout, each verse given subtle variations of colour and emphasis depending on its content. The last, Lacrimosa, breaks the metre somewhat and features a new melody, which releases the tensions built up by the previous repetitions and their ever-growing emphasis, here realized by Michael Stewart and his choir in a profoundly satisfying way, at once sturdy, resigned and aspiring to the celestial.

And so it all proceeded, ritualistic gestures of exchange alternating with Victoria’s exquisite word-settings, such as those of the Offertorium, allowing us to relish the choir’s surge of emotion at “de poenis inferni”, and the luminous soprano lines at “repraesentet eas in lucem sanctam”, both moments to be treasured. And I enjoyed the celebrant’s intoning of both “Vere dignum et justum est” at the Preface and the Pater Noster, once again losing myself in remembrances of the patterning of the chants and their variants. Alternatively, Victoria’s treatment of the Sanctus put me in mind of Thomas Tallis in places, while the Lux aeterna again featured a nicely-distilled soprano line at the outset, and a properly devotional “quia pius es”, though I did register a touch of “hooted” tone from those same sopranos in the “Requiem aeternam” section. With the Libera me, the Proper of the Mass concluded, Victoria leaving the opening line as plainchant before developing “Quando caeli movendi sunt et terra” into vivid descriptions, tenor, alto and bass lines standing forth at “Tremens factus”, and with the whole choir excitingly igniting the textures at the point of return to the “Dies irae” text. As was fitting, the lovely cadential resolutions at “Requiem aeternam” worked their spell alongside the varied reprise of “Libera me”, extending the music’s mood, colour, declamation and harmony, and leaving the plainchant Antiphon to bring things to a properly poised and dignified end.

Given that my appreciation of this concert was undoubtedly coloured by my own history and experience of the music’s liturgical context, I felt confident nevertheless that my enthusiasm for the singing and conducting, as well as for the overall conception of performance, was well-founded. I’m sure my enjoyment would have been shared by all at the Cathedral that evening.

Wellington Youth Choir enlivens Rossini’s great Petite Messe

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

Rossini’s Petite messe solennelle – selections from, and pieces by Vaughan Williams, Rachmaninov, Rheinberger and others

The Wellington Youth Choir conducted by Isaac Stone

Church of St Mary of the Angels

Friday 15 October, 7.30pm  

It’s usually a mistake not to go to concerts by our youth choirs and orchestras, because any lack of individual maturity or technical skill is completely subordinated, given a reasonably inspiring conductor, to the energy, enthusiasm and readiness to respond that young people can deliver.

The concert was a varied one, ranging from this rather extraordinary work by Rossini, through traditional choral sounds from Rachmaninov and Rheinberger to spirituals and solo performances.

Rossini’s liturgical essay was composed in the 1860s within five years of his death, an unexpected example of his remarkable sense of humour, both verbal and musical. Famously, it is neither short nor solemn, except for occasional moments (the solemnity, not the shortness).

The whole work takes over an hour and quarter and only about 25 minutes of it were sung here. The choice of sections was well made, offering a representative range of moods and styles. It was written for accompaniment by two pianos and harmonium but is also performed with orchestral accompaniment. One piano and discreet interjections from the organ were the rule here.

My first hearing of the whole thing was in rather memorable circumstances. In 1992 I ran into New Zealand percussionist/conductor Gary Brain near Place Victor Hugo in Paris – a singular enough chance – and he told me that he was to conduct his first major concert in a couple of days at a small festival on the Loire – comprising this Rossini work. I didn’t need encouragement and was on the train to Saint-Florent-le-vieil, between Angers and Nantes, to arrive in time for the concert. Gary was conducting the chorus of the Opéra-comique with a couple of pianists, in a small church that held 300 – 400 people – it was full. Having no other performances to compare it with, I was very ready to be delighted by the whole experience, and I was. Next evening over the phone I dictated a review to The Evening Post (pre-email).

It’s hard to convey in words the character of this work, so unorthodox and studiedly other than what any other famous composer would have dreamed of writing; a masterpiece of provocativeness, irreverence, tongue-in-cheek sincerity, music-hall vulgarity, jocularity, sobriety and finally passages of what had to sound like genuine religious feeling.

This was 21-year-old Isaac Stone’s first public outing as a conductor, and there seemed to be no sign of diffidence or nerves, such was the impression of his rapport with his singers and his mastery of the music. The writing for the choir varies greatly in style and in mood, sometimes transparent and delicate at other times with the full weight of an 18th century choral work. But there was never a hint of its actual time, when Europe’s choirs had become very large and grandeur and insistent piety were expected.

What Rossini does demonstrate, without ado, are the fruits of his thorough early training in counterpoint and fugue and these, juxtaposed with rhetorical phrases or light-spirited solos maintain a level of enjoyment, variety and sheer musical inventiveness that rarely left him. There were solo roles in most of the sections which were varied in quality but generally attractive and vigorous. Haydn-like in the Kyrie, after its dance-hall piano introduction; a brass-style fanfare starts the Gloria retreating to a calm section for three solo voices.

Again in the ‘Qui Tollis’ a piano introduction that suggests attention to Beethoven, is followed by duet between soprano and alto making step-wise intervallic moves and then an operatic sequence in thirds. An allegro choral opening of the ‘Cum Sancto Spiritu’, becomes quite elaborate, weaving counterpoint that the choir managed admirably: there was skill and humour that led to a fine build-up of a typical Rossini crescendo that defied any categorisation of good or bad taste. 

The Credo for example alternated between sober polyphony and passages by a small ensemble; it was just one time for me to note the choir’s strong bass section (and the sometimes thin tenors).

In the Agnus Dei the piano makes dramatic play with bass figures before an alto solo enters with ‘Dona nobis pacem’, a long solo, leaving us with the enigma: how much of an agnostic was Rossini, as were most of the composers of great religious works in the 19th century.

The conductor and several choir members spoke about the music, but while they often conveyed engaging enthusiasm, they typically spoke so fast, with careless articulation, that I understood very little.

Given that, I rely on the names of accompanists as recorded in the programme, Evie Rainey and Louise Joblin – the first presumably at the piano, the second at the organ. The latter was a minor role, but the piano was well played, carefully adapted to the singing; it was both interesting and quite demanding.

The second half of the programme was a mixture: proof against boredom perhaps but not of even value or interest. They began with Vaughan Williams’s Antiphon from his Five Mystical Songs, a very powerful statement, involving a striking (and a bit too loud) piano introduction from Isaac Stone, to Aidan Gill’s singing.

Rheinberger’s Abendlied was a fine display of traditional late 19th century choral style, which prompted the thought that there’s hardly another Wellington choir that can produce such beautifully balanced, luminous, spirited singing and the same went for the more subdued Rachmaninov piece, ‘Bogoroditse devo’ (Rejoice O Virgin), from his Vespers, Op 37. 

Things went popular and variable thereafter, spirituals Elijah Rock and Deep River, both sung with total conviction; then an arrangement of ‘We shall not be moved’ by the conductor; though it seemed to engage the choir thoroughly, it sounded excessively varied in style and rhythm, modulated too much.

The final offering was ‘Let everything that hath breath’ which appeared to be a version of Psalm 96, ‘Sing unto the Lord a new song’,  whose jazzy character the choir tackled with the greatest gusto. And they sang ‘Ka Waiata’ beautifully as an encore in response to the warm applause from the audience.

Auckland’s entertaining V8 Ensemble at Waikanae

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

Programme of arrangements of folk songs, Beatles’ songs, sacred choral pieces and popular songs (Waikanae Music Society)

V8 Vocal Ensemble (Judy Dale, Albert Mataafa, Virginia Le Cren, Stephen Rowe, Carolyn Medland, Brendon Shanks, Celia Aspey-Gordon, Rowan Johnston)

Waikanae Memorial Hall

Sunday 10 October, 2.30pm

These Auckland musicians who form V8 are all former members of the New Zealand National Youth Choir and members or former members of Voices New Zealand chamber choir. Their years of working together show: their presentation is slick, blended and highly musical.  Half of the members have sung with the group since its formation; the other four are more recently acquired.  Their origins are in various parts of the country, and their individual choral experience is extensive.

The group sings without a conductor, Rowan Johnston simply starting the singers by eye contact, and cutting them off with the slightest movement of his music folder.  The selection of items showed skill in all fields of choral singing, but the most effective were perhaps the popular items.  The items were introduced by mezzo-soprano Carolyn Medland in a manner both informative and, at times, amusing. All the singing took place in front of the platform rather than on it.

A stunning start was made with ‘The Star of the County Down’ arranged by Goodall (presumably Reginald), in which the tenors sang the theme with enviable tone and character.

The spiritual ‘Deep River’ (arranged by the group’s undeclared leader, Rowan Johnston) displayed beautiful ensemble, and the outstanding men’s voices.  The women’s voice were very good, but the lack of real contraltos was a disadvantage in this piece.

The traditional Irish song ‘She Moved through the Fair’ (arranged by Daryl Runswick) proved to be an interesting version of the song, with unexpected harmonies.  The tenors performed the solo sections superbly, with lovely pianissimo accompanying parts.  Words were very clear.

One of two arrangements in the programme by Ward Swingle (though in this case he had reverted to Single status) was entitled ‘Country Dances’, and proved to be an amalgam of a number of American folksongs, very much in the Swingle Singers’ style.  It was good fun, and the enjoyment was assisted by precise words, with authentic accents being thrown in for the cowboy sections.

Two items from the classic repertoire followed: a very complex ‘Cantate Domino’ of Monteverdi, which featured a little too much vibrato for this music, and ‘Plorate Fili’ from Jephte, an oratorio by Carissimi. This was quite ravishing, the singers giving great attention to detail.  The use of the soft Italian ‘t’ rather than the hard English ‘t’ was most commendable.   The mood of the story was rendered most tellingly.  Here, and throughout the programme, endings were absolutely together.

The next items introduced a lighter tone, firstly with three arrangements of Beatles songs: ‘Blackbird’, complete with expert whistling, ‘Penny Lane’, and ‘Ob-la-di’, in which Albert Mataafa sang the solo, the others using various mouth techniques (not all were vocal) to accompany.  All very expertly done. Hearing these reminded me of the curious fact that all popular music appears to be in 4-4 time.

The other Swingle arrangement followed – a Chilean folksong ‘De Punta Y Taco’, meaning ‘Heel and Toe’.  Various vocal sounds were employed to accompany three male singers, who obtained an authentic Spanish folk sound to their singing.  The soloists changed to three women singing the tune, with the others accompanying.  It was very professional, sophisticated and skilful.

After the interval came the other two ‘classical’ items: an Ave Maria from recent composer Franz Biebl, and a Pater Noster of Jacob Händl, who lived in the 16th century.  The group divided to sing polyphonically in the Biebl item, with three singers to the left (mezzos, one tenor) and five to the right (soprano, one tenor, two basses).  There was a solo introduction from Johnston (bass) and a tenor solo in the second verse.  The balance was excellent, and the singers proved what agile voices (and lips) they have.

A different polyphonic arrangement was observed for the Händl work: women to the left and men to the right, but positioned closer to each other than in the previous item.  This produced attractive antiphonal singing, although with too much vibrato for my taste.  Balance was gain superb: in an ensemble of only eight singers each individual is very exposed.

Reverting to popular repertoire, V8 displayed their versatility in a perfect harmony arrangement of ‘Goodnight, My Angel’ by Billy Joel, followed by ‘Fever’ (John Davenport & Eddie Cooley) in which Medland sang the solo and the men provided good vocal percussion, and ‘Africa’ (Paich & Porcaro) where vocal doo-be-doos accompanied Johnston singing solo into a microphone, the while drumming on what appeared to be the amplifier.

New Zealand composition featured in the programme in the form of ‘Plumsong’ by Philip Norman (performed on record by the NZ Secondary Schools Choir).  In the V8 version the reading of the poems by A.K. Grant preceded the singing of the verses of the song.  The recitations were great fun: the poems had been written in the styles of various New Zealand poets, telling the story of Little Jack Horner in their very different ways.  The music then followed the styles of the words.

The first was in the style of Jenny Bornholdt, and was a very intricate piece.  A touching piece in Sam Hunt’s style followed – with tenor Brendon Shanks’s rendition of the poem being a hilarious imitation of the poet’s hoarse voice and reciting style.  Bill Manhire’s was a lament in formal style, as was the music, reminiscent of William Byrd.  Michelle Legat was represented by a kind of singing through the words.  The whole work was both clever and funny, and very well performed.

The concert ended with ‘Humpty Dumpty Medley’, a medley of English nursery rhymes arranged by Hart, as sung by the King’s Singers, in which the rhymes were all related back to poor old Humpty. This was most entertaining.

As an encore, the group sang Kern & Fields’ ‘The Way You Look Tonight’ in a gorgeous arrangement, very expressively performed.  This made an appropriate conclusion to the Waikanae Music Society’s enterprising, artistically superb, interesting and thoroughly enjoyable 2010 concert series.

Wellington Community Choir’s 5th Birthday Gala Concert

Posted on by Peter Mechen

Wellington Community Choir and Nota Bene Choir, Julian Raphael (director),  also featuring:
Carole Shortis (composer/conductor), John Rae (composer/drummer), Club Ukulele / Marimba Mojo / Djansa Djembe Drummers

Wellington Town Hall

Saturday 18th September, 2010

The printed programme accompanying this rousing and heart-warming event contained a number of enthusiastic testimonials from members of the Wellington Community Choir regarding the group and their activities, one of which I thought beautifully summed up the reason people get involved with music, be they music-makers or listeners:

“…The choir is a place where I found my inner voice. Not only my singing voice, but my real inner voice. When I sing, I feel I can sing my being – I can BE….”

I quote without permission; but though it expresses a kind of metaphysical idea, the sentiment readily puts into simple words the power of music to act upon people, be they performers or listeners – to connect with the spirit and move the deepest emotions, as well as warm towards and bond with others. All of these impulses were triumphantly on display in and throughout the Wellington Town Hall on Saturday night, through the auspices of the Wellington Community Choir and Nota Bene Choir, under the directorship of music educator and inspired conductor Julian Raphael. The Hall was as full as I think I’ve ever seen it, and at times the place simply shimmered with sounds and rocked with rhythms which seemed to engage one and all, musicians and audience.

Along with Julian Raphael and the two choirs, a number of various groups and individuals specifically contributed to the evening’s kaleidoscope of colourful music-making – composers Carole Shortis (Wellington) and John Rae (Scotland) both contributed pieces to the concert, and each took part in the performances, the first as conductor, and the second as the drummer. Instrumental groups such as Club Ukulele (players from within the Community Choir), Marimba Mojo (from Lower Hutt), and the Newtown-based percussion group Djnsa Djembie Drummers added their distinctive and ear-catching timbres to particular pieces, their participation underlining a community spirit pervading the whole, while maintaining a high level of performance expertise which marked the presentation throughout.

Having attended many “classical” concerts of all kinds in the Town Hall I couldn’t help but draw comparisons with some of these past experiences and the present concert, being as I was mightily impressed at the Community Choir’s level of support and the degree of involvement with and enjoyment of the performances by this near-capacity audience. Given that classical music organisations everywhere are concerned with trying to make ends meet, faced with the problems of aging audiences and decreasing numbers of attendees at concerts, I wondered whether there were things to be learned from the success of this present undertaking.

Of course, the “families and friends” factor would have provided a good deal of fuel for the occasion’s popularity, something that professional performing groups don’t generally rely upon to generate good houses. But quite apart from the numbers attending, I thought that what any classical concert organiser would envy here was the out-and-out identification and involvement of those present with what the performers were putting across – in short, those almost palpable lines of connectiveness between performers and listeners.

To be fair, I have to say that I’ve experienced several classical concerts this year which have demonstrated a similar frisson of inter-communication, in one or two cases at events which weren’t particularly well-attended. Sometimes it’s the music itself which generates the initial excitement, as with the recent presentations of Monteverdi’s Vespers of 1610 at St.Mary of the Angels Church in Wellington. Sometimes particular musicians can themselves create in advance powerful and compelling expectations of involvement with what they present, as invariably happens whenever the charismatic New Zealand String Quartet performs (the group’s Schumann-and-Shostakovich concerts, for example). Also, anybody who’s experienced a song recital presented by soprano Margaret Medlyn would readily testify to her all-embracing identification with what she performs and her ability to get it out there in no uncertain terms (in a particular recent case before a resoundingly enthusiastic Hunter Council Chamber audience).

Finally, the Vector Wellington Orchestra regularly presents its concerts with wholehearted enthusiasm from conductor Marc Taddei and with total commitment from its players. In each of these instances, the experience for me was of something out of the ordinary – not a whiff of routine, of stuffiness, of blandness or tired convention. And so it was with this present concert – still, would that such mutual engagement could happen more regularly in the classical music world!

The items chosen by the Community Choir for the concert covered an enormous range of human emotion and activity – spiritual, political, cultural and environmental. They were grouped partly for variety’s sake, and partly to allow different performers opportunities to give of their best. The first bracket of songs featured the Choir itself, the singing testifying to both the arranging and conducting skills of the director, Julian Raphael, who unerringly guided his wholly-amateur voices through pieces featuring rich-toned unisons and complex contrapuntal lines alike. His arrangement, for example, of the Shaker melody “Simple Gifts” featured the unadorned tune as a prelude to increasingly complex and interesting variations; while the traditional (though not the commonly heard version of the song) “Amazing Grace” was launched by men’s voices in parts, and joined by women’s voices, the arrangement featuring haunting fourths and lovely, tightly-wrought harmonies.

I also liked the choir’s singing of the “traditional Sotho songs of struggle”, registering the voices’ change of timbre to a striking “ethnic” quality, as well as the muscularity and confidence of their rhythmic syncopations. The final song in the bracket was “Come by Here” from Liberia, performed in this case in memory of the well-known and much-respected Wellington ethnomusicologist Allan Thomas, who had died during the week.

A brief but entertaining trio of items featuring the instrumentalists of “Club Ukulele” featured two Lennon-McCartney songs, one of which prompted some startlingly-focused deliveries from the women’s voices of the phrase “I Wanna Hold Your Hand!”, the climactic interval as resonant as any period ensemble’s singing of a fourteenth-century motet! The Nota Bene Choir were then introduced; and the group rang the changes with a bracket of songs, including an arrangement of “Waltzing Matilda” (by Ruth McCall) that seemed to fuse traditional Aboriginal chant-ambiences with fragments of the well-known tune, concluding with echo effects and “overtone” resonances, the whole creating a properly haunting impression at the end.

I liked also Carol Shortis’s arrangement of “Khutso”, which was described as “a song for Soweto”, one which combined a native African dialect with the Latin words “Agnus Dei”, setting the rhythmic native chant against the more flowing Latin phrase, then alternating fragments of both at the end – extremely haunting and effective. Carol Shortis was both composer and conductor for “People Come and Sing”, written especially for the choir, with this evening’s performance of course a world premiere! A resonant opening, with overlapping lines of declamation led to a unison imperative to “Come and Sing”, the rhythm developing a swinging trajectory whose fervour evoked Gospel-like singing in places, the voices of the choir responding with proper “ownership” to the music.

After the interval the Djansa Djembe Drummers got things away to a stirring restart with rhythms and resonances that reminded me of the last Phoenix football game I attended at the Westpac Stadium (it might well have been the same group performing on that occasion!). Changes of stage lighting added plenty of atmosphere and colour, ambiences that continued throughout the bracket of African songs, with their rhythmic pulsings, in places having a pronounced “protest movement” feel, especially Julian Raphael’s arrangement of “Woyaya”, a song from Ghana.

As colourful and ear-catching was the work of the group Marimba Mojo, whose instruments, besides looking fantastic, produced a great sound, the players performing dance music from Zimbabwe, and inviting audience participation in the dance (a number obliged,and were then invited onto the stage!). Of course the nature of marimba performance itself suggests a specific gestural choreography, with which the group delighted us throughout its bracket of items.

The other major commission for the concert, beside that of Carol Shortis’, came from Scottish composer and jazz drummer John Rae, in this country of late as composer-in-residence at the New Zealand School of Music. His work Ricky, a setting of words by a choir member, Sarah Hughes, was a tribute to his father-in-law, and featured a lovely, leaping choral melody line, the tune’s trajectories mingling a second time round with instrumental colourings creating folkish ambiences, strings, guitar and marimbas contributing to the resonant glowing of the whole, the chorale punctuated with drumming rhythms, and coloured by what sounded like Gaelic chanting. I loved the rhythmic ambiguities of the voices’ interactions with the instruments, creating a “Music from the Spheres” kind of effect, an endless paean of life’s celebration.

To conclude, Nota Bene’s voices took the stage again for an entertaining “dialogue” song from Mexico (arranged by Mike Brewer), the choir establishing the music’s infectious rhythmic carriage, and with soloists from the choir interlacing their conversational/confrontational singing lines with wonderful elan. Some heartfelt tributes paid by choir members to Julian Raphael, and a couple of audience-participation songs later, the Choir’s Fifth Birthday Gala Concert was over – on the face of things quite a haul, but with energies from performers and enthusiasm from the audience seemingly undimmed to the end, a tribute to all concerned!

Great liturgical works from the Bach Choir

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

The Bach Choir conducted by Stephen Rowley

Frank Martin: Mass for Double Choir; Cherubini: Requiem Mass in C minor (1815)

St Mark’s Church, Basin Reserve

Sunday 29 August, 2pm

The Bach Choir has a distinguished history in Wellington since 1968, when it was founded by the gifted organist and musical scholar Anthony Jennings. Like all choirs, its fortunes have fluctuated: for the past two years it has regained its position, directed by Stephen Rowley; its recent achievements have included the B Minor Mass, Elijah, a concert of Handel and Purcell, and Bach’s Christmas Oratorio.

It was an adventurous concert. In Frank Martin’s Mass for Double Choir the two choirs of about 20 singers each, were placed diagonally, at right angles to each other, facing the conductor.

But ideally it needed more singers to give a more homogeneous sound to each section; among other things, there were too few altos and tenors to provide a uniform carpet of sound. Whether that realisation was what caused the evident shakiness at the beginning, and which recurred quite often, I cannot say; another blemish, quite early, was a worrying abrasive sound from one or more male singer, perhaps pushing too hard and high at fortissimo. However I was told that the dress rehearsal had gone very well.

One of the most rewarding books on music of the past few years is Alex Ross’s The Rest is Noise. He remarks that Martin’s Mass has been “entrancing audiences with the archaic majesty of its language. Martin had a gift for immersing himself in styles of the past without seeming to imitate them.” That is nicely put. It is not to say the music is easy to sing or to ingest. The Kyrie begins with an indeterminate plainsong-like prelude that may not be hard to sing, but seems hard to place before the bolder polyphonic entry by the full choir. The sound might be Palestrina or Victoria.

The antiphonal possibilities of writing for two choirs were notable, using, say, sopranos on one side and basses on the other, or using entrances of various sections, aurally spaced, with striking effect. The contrasts between somber passages in the Gloria such as ‘Domine fili unigenite’ and the more excited ‘Quoniam tu solus sanctus’ were examples of the composer’s detailed conception of the mass, which the choir dealt with scrupulously. Later, in the Credo, I enjoyed the onomatopoeic rising and falling scales that illustrated ‘Et ascendit in coelum’.

Stephen Rowley succeeded very well, given the music’s difficulties, in expressing the varied emotions and religious sentiments, the sense of the words and the contexts of Martin’s very meticulous, intricate scoring that so rewards careful study and rehearsal.

Martin’s view of religion was nowhere more clear than in his setting of the Sanctus: reverent and sober; compare with the almost ecstatic Bach, heard only a week earlier.

It was only when I looked into the music itself that I realized why Douglas Mews’s organ accompaniment was so tentative: it was simply to support the choir in an otherwise a cappella work.

I was looking forward even more to hearing live for the first time, Cherubini’s Requiem for mixed choir; he has always interested me for his place in music history, bridging the classic and romantic eras, and the Italian, the German and the French, as well as for the real strength of his own music.

He was commissioned to write this one to commemorate the execution of Louis XVI in 1793, following the defeat of Napoleon in June 1815, when Louis XVIII returned to Paris in July, evidently to Cherubini’s relief. Later, the forces of conservatism throughout society, unleashed in the backlash to the ‘radicalism’ of the Napoleonic era, brought back a ban on women singing the liturgy, and Cherubini wrote a second requiem in 1836 in preparation for his own funeral, for men’s voices only.

On the whole, this was easier for the choir to sing. Though the electronic organ hardly offered the supporting grandeur of a pipe organ, let alone the original orchestral accompaniment, Douglas Mews supplied valuable sonorities.

The Requiem is a remarkably strong work without being adorned with particularly memorable melodies. It has the character of the quintessential requiem, having absorbed that of Mozart and probably the liturgical music of Zelenka, Haydn and Salieri, but before Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis and the requiem’s secularization by Berlioz and Verdi. It sounds rather like what Beethoven might have written if he had decided to (and he admired Cherubini, especially this work).

The dramatic character of the work, to be expected of a composer whose career till he was over 40 had been dedicated mainly to opera, though only occasionally with great success (particularly Lodoïska, Médée and Les deux journées), is part of its strength.

It pays close attention to the sense of the text, starting the Introit in a very subdued manner, allowing a subtle crescendo with the words’Exaudi orationem meam’ which the choir handled carefully. But soon, in the tutti sections, one rather longed for the richness and sustained body of voices in a bigger choir.

A more sanguine tone flourished in the Graduale however, but the ferocity of the start of the Dies Irae was a little subdued, though there was more venom towards the end in ‘Confutatis maledictus’. However, other parts of the Dies Irae where Cherubini typically overlaps phrases and divides words between sections of the choir for narrative purpose, and  through the more emphatic ‘Mors stupebit’, were effective. The change of style in the ‘Recordare’ hinted at Cherubini’s opera habits, to handle the tripping trochee meter of the liturgy in this section, and it might have benefited from greater rhythmic vitality.

The long Offertorium was kept alert with a quasi-marching, open-air, staccato tread, here conspicuously supported by the organ.  After the gentle Pie Jesu faded away, the final, momentarily forceful Agnus Dei and ‘Lux aeterna’ (left out of the programme), lent renewed vitality that ended with the prayer for eternal rest. Again, a smallish choir fell a shade short in creating a profound sense of peace through the music’s long-sustained harmonies.

Given that ideally both works would have gained so much from a rather larger body of singers, I was very glad to have heard these admirable live performances, a real credit to conductor Stephen Rowley.