Review: St John Passion (The Choir of St James’, City Recital Hall)
A fine outing of an underappreciated Passion – with a new HIP band to boot.
A fine outing of an underappreciated Passion – with a new HIP band to boot.
When Gustav Mahler composed his great orchestral song cycle Das Lied von der Erde in 1909, he almost certainly knew he hadn’t long to live. Avoiding the dreaded ‘curse of the ninth’, he labelled it “Eine Symphonie für eine Tenor und eine Alt (oder Bariton) Stimme und Orchester”, thus sanctioning the use of two male voices, rather than the traditional male female coupling most commonly deployed. Rejected by the authoritative Bruno Walther as an inadequate solution, it was Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau who began to popularise casting a baritone in the work, but until now no one singer has attempted the full six songs. Jonas Kaufmann Jonas Kaufmann has had some pretty scathing reviews for his Herculean attempt, most of them smacking of closed-minded, pre-determined opposition to the concept by self-styled Mahler ‘experts’. That’s a pity, as his beautifully recorded version taken from live performances at Vienna’s Musikverein has a great deal to offer, not least of which are Kaufmann’s textual insights, and the revelatory qualities of Jonathan Nott’s interrogation of Mahler’s orchestrations. Continue reading Get unlimited digital access from $4 per month Subscribe Already a subscriber? Log in
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Considering her sizable discography, 2015’s Fleurs was surprisingly Carolyn Sampson’s first song recital. It turned out a corker and set a very high bar for a follow-up. I can happily report that this release comfortably vaults that bar. The clever thematic programming continues, this time in various settings of Symbolist Decadent Paul Verlaine’s moonlit evocations. Debussy’s setting of Fêtes Galantes, Ariettes Oubliées and Fauré’s La Bonne Chanson are old favourites along with Hahn’s lovely L’heure Exquise and Tous Deux, but the five settings by Poldowski, aka Régine Wieniawski (daughter of the violin composer), are an unfamiliar treat; accomplished vocal writing, gorgeous harmonies and imaginative accompaniments – her En Sourdine is delicious. The performances are breathtakingly beautiful. As expected from the impeccable Sampson there is some astonishingly pure and precisely controlled vocalism, but lest she be typecast as an early music specialist there has been a perceptible increase in richness and colour over the last few years. Her delivery is mostly intimate and confessional, the full voice used sparingly so at key moments when it opens out and expands the result is spine-tingling. She has an ideal partner in Joseph Middleton, a superb musician with a keen ear whose hypersensitive touch…
Once the remit of boy choristers and early music specialists only, Pergolesi’s Stabat Mater has evolved into a star vehicle.
Spem in alium is undoubtedly one of the great masterpieces of English polyphony; in a sense the last great flowering of a magnificent tradition. Like any great masterpiece, Tallis’s astounding 40-part motet can be admired from any number of different vantage points. In this final volume of their Tallis survey, Carwood and The Cardinall’s Musick give us two versions – the original setting with its Latin text as well its contemporaneous adaptation to an English text. Both cast different lights on the music. Pleading and sorrowful, the Latin words create a sombre mood while the English text has a more jubilant effect. Choosing to record the work in a relatively dry acoustic also emphasises the composer’s extraordinary skill in manipulating such heroic forces and also the singers’ wonderful precision and unanimity of tone. The rest reminds us of Tallis’s uncanny ability to bend to the musical and religious dictates of his age, thus ensuring his head remained attached to his shoulders. Amongst deservedly popular works in Latin and English we have O Sacrum Convivium, Hear the Voice and Prayer and Verily, Verily, I Say Unto You. At the simpler end of the scale some early English liturgical works are…
Born in Venice about 1670 and dying in Vienna in 1736, Antonio Caldara not only had the good fortune to span different geographical musical centres, but also changes in musical style and taste. This programme of his music mainly devoted to the Virgin demonstrates some of these changes. The Venetian polychoral school is admirably represented by the double-choir Magnificat which opens (and also receives its first recording). A 16-part setting of the Crucifixus has more of a dramatic, high baroque sensibility akin to that of Caldara’s almost exact contemporary, Antonio Lotti. Making their first appearance in the catalogue, two charming concerted works, Ave Maris Stella and Salve Regina demonstrate Caldara’s skill in handling solo voices and smaller forces. Australian-born tenor Robert Macfarlane sings with admirable grace and clarity in the latter while soprano Nathalie Seelig and alto Franziska Markowitsch make a well matched pair in the former. String and continuo accompaniments are both sympathetic and engaging. The major work is an extended setting of the Stabat Mater. With baroque techniques like descending chromatic bass lines and stark dissonances, Caldara paints a colourful picture of the sorrowing Mary at the foot of the cross. The music is well served by the…