Clever idea for a programme this: an evening of musical prayers juxtaposing a sacred masterwork by a great Italian opera composer with a series of operatic supplications to divine beings by his contemporaries. The combined forces of the Sydney Philharmonia Choirs Festival Chorus and the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Choir under SPC Music Director Brett Weymark were joined by a fine quartet of Opera Australia regulars and the frankly excellent Sydney Philharmonia Orchestra in an appealing concert of Mediterranean passion and religious sentiment.

As a prequel to Rossini’s Stabat Mater – an underrated masterpiece if ever there was one – the first half began with one of Verdi’s most tuneful pieces from his neglected ‘galley years’, the overture to Giovanna D’Arco. From the dramatically energised opening, through the beautifully finessed woodwind trios of its pastoral central section and on to the martial finale, Weymark proved a dab hand in the genre, unafraid to relish the rum-ti-tum jollity of it all. His tempi were spot on, while his sense of phrasing lifted the music from the routine to the genuinely inspired.

Once a staple of 19th and 20th-century concert programmes, the...