Chelsea Festival Concert

Despite a variety of alarums and excursions, we had a most successful concert at the Chelsea Festival last night, with a most enthusiastic audience. My Nunc Dimittis (which we first performed in 2004) was probably the biggest hit, but a number of people were complimentary about the new Tagore settings, Crossing, some said it was very moving. This was doubly gratifying as the piece had been tricky in rehearsal as the communication between organ and choir in St. Mary's leaves a lot to be desired. Our 3 soloists sang the Byrd 3-part Ave Maris Stella, which the 5 of us in the FifteenB Consort had sung last year. It was fascinating, and lovely, hearing it sung again by professionals.

Rowena and I sang one of Gavin Bryars's Laudas; it went pretty well I think, but I need to listen to the recording to see how we did. The 5 of us also repeated my Salve Regina a 5, it will be nice to have a recording of this. The other Salve Regina, adapted from the Sanctus of my first mass was, for me, a great success.

We did a Palestrina Salve Regina for 4 male voices (though I suspect it is adapted from a piece for female voices). It seems very striking, though there are possible errors in the edition. Still, it was rather fun to have a men only piece to complement the women's pieces by Faure and Saint-Saens.

When the recording arrives I hope to post some of successful items on audioblog, they'll be on this blog in a week or so.

Recent CD Review

My review of a disc of music by Katharine Parker is here on Music and Vision. Parker was someone I'd not come across before, an Australian who was encouraged by Percy Grainger and who was married to tenor Hubert Eisdell. The disc is well worth exploring.

The Orlando Consort at the Chelsea Festival

To the Chelsea Festival last night as audience rather than performers; we saw the Orlando Consort giving their programme of medieval/renaissance music (from 1280 - 1560) on the subject of flowers and gardening, based on their most recent disc The Rose, the Lily and the Whortleberry. The music fitted into roughly 3 categories, songs in which flowers were referred to as metaphors for love and the beloved, pieces setting extracts from the Song of Songs and songs about gardens themselves, often suggestive or bawdy. The enclosed garden (hortus conclusus) was a useful place for assignations in an age when privacy was difficult. Rather strangely, the term hortus conclusus is used in the Song of Songs and there is taken as a metaphor for the Virgin's virginity, a lovely example of medieval double-think.

We had to take the suggestiveness of the words on trust as the Chelsea Festival programme book did not include the words, which was shame. At the end of the concert we were encouraged to buy the CD so we could read the full set of words.

This was a beautifully put together programme, finely performed. The group seemed a bit stiff to start with but by the end were more relaxed and seemed to be enjoying themselves. I would have quite like a few more substantial items in the programme, as it concentrated on what might be termed lighter, more melodic repertoire. But not everyone has my taste and the festival music appeal to all. Still, one of my highlights was the Agnus Dei from Walter Frye's Missa Flos Regalis. A curiosity was the piece in praise of the pruning knife!

Chelsea Old Church is an ideal place for this style of concert (despite the hardness of the pews). The original church was founded in 1290 and you are surrounded by historic funerary monuments, some quite spectacular. (It was bombed during the war and much of the fabric is now modern). The space is surprisingly intimate for a church, the body of the nave seated the 60 to 70 strong audience comfortably but made us feel close to the group. Making possible the sort of communication which is difficult in larger spaces, but which a small vocal ensemble depends on for their best effect.

The programme was warmly receive and we were treated to a lively and entertaining encore, a short (v. short) extract from a mass in the lively, hoketus style.

Extreme cellists hit the roof

I've had my attention drawn to the Extreme Cellists. They are a group of cellists who specialise in playing in awkward and remote places. They are doing a tour to raise money for charity playing on the roofs of 42 different Cathedrals (!!!!). The details of the tour are here. If humanly possible I want to be at St. Paul's or Southwark, if only for the curiosity of it.

As another taster for tommorrow night's concert, here is a recording of my Nunc Dimittis which was recorded at the FifteenB concert at the Chelsea Festival in 2004. The choir are conducted by Paul Ayres and the organist is Malcolm Cottle.

As a taster for Saturday's Chelsea Festival concert, here's my motet Gaudete from Tempus per Annum, recorded live last year. We'll be premiering another of the motets from the set on Saturday (http://www.chelseafestival.org.uk/whatson.html)

Final preparations

Well its only a couple of days to our Chelsea Festival concert. We have the first rehearsal with the organist, Malcolm Cottle, tonight. Which means that I will be on tenterhooks as it will be my first opportunity to hear my new piece, Crossing with the organ accompaniment. As the piece is a Passacaglia, with the main passacaglia tune in the organ for all but its final incarnation, this means that the organ part rather important and something more than accompaniment. So tonight is my first go at hearing what the piece really does sound like.

Though the concert is part of the Festival, there are still logistical things we have to worry about like rehearsal times, making sure we don't impinge on the church's regular services and finalising programmes. Oh, and trying to work out where we'll be going for a drink afterwards since both the nearby pubs have closed (this part of Chelsea seems to have become completely dry). Not to mention the little matter of who is playing whom during the world cup.

Review of L'Elisir d'Amore

My review of L'Elisir d'Amore is here on Music and Vision, complete with 6 photos of the production.

I've seen that one before

Saturday night's sparkling productionL'Elisir d'Amore at Grange Park (review to appear in due course) was set in the 1950's. This is the 3rd time that I've seen this opera transposed to this period. Part of the charm of moving the setting to mid-20th century is the ability to give Dulcamara a motorised vehicle.

But more than this, the production set me wondering about the influence of older productions and whether its possible to come up with anything new.

When Josephine Barstow went to the Soviet Union to sing her husband, Ande Anderson, took her through the possible productions (seven I believe) so that she'd be prepared for anything. The idea that there are a given number of basic configurations possible in a production is both appealing and appalling.

I first saw L'Elisir d'Amore in the 1970's in Scotland. Scottish Opera's production was set in the 20th century and Dulcamara made a very striking entrance in a stylish car, quite a coup on the relatively small Glasgow Theatre Royal stage. I have since seen 2 further 20th century settings for this opera (including Grange Park), plus a couple of traditional ones. Does this mean that the 20th century setting says something profound about the way producers see the opera. Or was is simply that a whole generation of UK producers grew up knowing about a particular influential production of the opera, perhaps even the Scottish Opera one that I saw.

If there is indeed nothing new upon the earth, then the air of desperation that attaches itself to some rather modish productions, becomes more understandable; the producer's desire to say something new fighting with the essential inability to create anything which has not been tried before.

Similarly, Scottish Opera in the same period had a production of Don Pasquale set in modern times. This is again a conceit which re-occurs. Though I did not like it much, Jonathan Miller's new production at Covent Garden at least had the apparent novelty of mining a vein not tried before, moving the opera to the 18th century.

Another area where production repeats occur is in the operas of Richard Strauss; it has become a common place to perform them set during the time of their composition.

The most recent productions of Arabella and Ariadne auf Naxoz at Covent Garden tried to get out of this rut by being determinedly modern, but simply fell into another of the 'standard' seven productions. In fact, when ENO first mounted Ariadne they managed to be totally unusual by setting it in the original period of Strauss's intention.

Perhaps there is scope for a book of production family trees, tracing the influence of notable productions. Not necessaily the biggies, like Wieland Wagner, but those productions which have stayed in memories and produced numerous sibilings, children and cousins.

Chelsea Festival and beyond

Today is the opening day of the Chelsea Festival. Our little event, is next Saturday (24th) on the last night. Preparations are going on apace, we now have a running order and a finished programme (well, just about). We have one more rehearsal (on Wednesday) before the day.

Its only one Wednesday that I will properly get to hear my new piece Crossing with the organ part. As it is a passacaglia, the organ has a significant role to play.

But of course, even in the run up to a concert other things have to be planned for. London Concord Singers are currently planning their 40th anniversary concert (on November 18th at St. Giles Cripplegate) and so I have dusted down the final draft of the work I've written for the occasion and am tidying it up. In theory, I'm trying to make the awkward bits less awkward for the singers but somehow you always miss something. So that, when rehearsing a piece you realise how you could have made tricky corners rather less tricky. I suppose that's what you call experience and in theory we should get better at this as we get older!

I am also trying to finish my new mass (in A minor). I've got the Kyrie, Gloria, Sanctus written out and the opening of the Agnus Dei but somehow got stuck. Too much admin going on in my brain I suspect.

More opera

Last night we went to the Royal Opera House to see their double bill of Bartok’s Bluebeard’s Castle and Schoenberg’s Erwartung. It was the 2nd to last performance and Christine Rice had taken over from Petra Lang as Judith. Also, Angela Denoke was ill so Virginia Kerr had taken over.

Kirill Petrenko conducted and from the hushed opening notes of the orchestra, the sound was spine tingling. The double bill opened with the Bartok and producer Willy Decker had included the spoken prologue, read in hushed tones by Katalin Bogyay.

The setting was a dark space, a series of doors along the left hand side, a distressed wall to the right and the stage covered in detritus including a huge chandelier, as if Bluebeard’s whole life had collapsed around him. Rice, as Judith, does not have the big, dark voice that you might expect but she is a passionate singer and Petrenko accompanied sensitively. This was definitely not a blast it out type performance both Rice and Albert Dohmen delivered subtle, nuanced performances.

Willy Decker’s handling of the action was generally metaphorical rather than real, but effective nonetheless. His biggest coup was when Judith sees Bluebeard’s whole realm, the great C major episode, the side walls moved to further apart and the dark rear wall turned into a huge glowing disc. Not sure what it meant but it looked v. good. Then when she opened the final door, the door was a huge one at the back of the stage and Bluebeard’s 3 wives appeared all wearing variants of Judith’s red dress (rather a 50’s style number). Each wife a different age, the first the oldest. They stood, in a stylised manner, at the back of the stage looking v. elegant and for all the world like a Norman Parkinson photograph. Whether or not Decker or his designer, John Macfarlane, are familiar with Parkinson’s work I don’t know.

For the 2nd half of the double bill the stage set had changed subtly and suggested that we were still in Bluebeard’s domain, perhaps beyond the door. The woman appeared dressed in the same dress as Judith and the whole of Schoenberg’s drama, whether it is happening in reality or just in the woman’s head, made sense as a sort of follow up to the events in Bartok’s opera.

All in all a very satisfying evening. The opera house was not terribly busy, which was a shame but as England were playing it was perhaps not surprising.

On a follow up note to my review of the Chelsea Opera Group I Puritani on Saturday (which appeared on Music and Vision), I should note that Judith Howarth had not sung the role of Elivira before. She had sung the mad scene and learned the rest of the opera in under 2 weeks. Impressive going and I look forward to hearing her again in the role.

Tomorrow we're off to the opera again, to Grange Park to see Donizetti's L'elisir d'Amore, let's hope that the weather is kind.

Recent CD Reviews

My review of the Naxos disc of Lehar excerpts (sung in French) is here on Music Web International.

Style and charm personified ...

And my review of a disc of music by Clemens non Papa and other composers associated with the publisher, Pierre Phalese from Louvain, is here.

Pierre Phalese might not be known to you, but this charming disc
provides an enjoyable means to learn more about the music printed by
this influential publisher. ...

Recent CD Review

My review of the new disc of Mendelssohn Sacred Music from St. John's College, Cambridge is here on Music Web International.

If the repertoire on this disc appeals, you won’t go far wrong. Impressive …
there is something quite thrilling, hearing the trebles singing Mendelssohn’
s lovely vocal lines. ...

Review of I Puritani

My review of the Chelsea Opera Group performance of I Puritani is here on Music and Vision.

Recent CD Review

A rare outing for Handel's Arianna on disc; my review is here on MusicWeb International.

One of Handel’s underrated works ... never less than interesting ... a
strong performance where vivid, dramatic values are to the fore ...

Recent CD Review

My review of an historic re-issue of Puccini's Il Tabarro is here on Music Web International.

Last night we were again rehearsing for our Chelsea Festival concert on the 24th June. We obviously must have been making some sort of nice noise in one of my pieces, because the caretaker of the venue where we were rehearsing came up to me and asked if any of my stuff had been recorded.

We've reached the point where much progress has been made, and in my new pieces I am constantly aware of the difficulties which I did not intend, the tricky passages which have slipped under my radar (not a difficult thing to do, I must admit. I'm never very good at assessing the real difficulty of pieces). Its the moment when you need to have confidence, you know that everything will come right in the end.

Tonight, its more opera. Bellini's I Puritani given by Chelsea Opera Group at Cadogan Hall in Chelsea.

Powder her Face

On Thursday we went to see the LSO doing Thomas Adès's opera Powder her Face, not the full LSO of course but a large chamber ensemble, some 15 people, conducted by the composer. Mary Plazas was the Duchess with Daniel Norman (tenor), Valdine Anderson (soprano) and Stephen Richardson (baritone).

The work is still astonishing, over 10 years since its first performance, partly because of the elan and confidence with which Adès handles the orchestra, deftly producing an entrancing array of sounds. Under the composer's direction the LSO ensemble realised his wished brilliantly.

The other area where the opera impresses is in its libretto and in its construction. Philip Hensher's libretto is a model of compression and manages to convey everything necessary using as few words as possible. He has also enabled Adès to indulge in his love of popular melodies and found objects.

Where I remain less impressed is in the quality of the vocal writing. There is not doubt that it is expressive; Mary Plazas sang the Duchess with wonderful dignity, hauteur and touching frailty, even managing the notorious oral sex scene with aplomb. But I am not sure that the actual melodic lines she is given are as memorable as the orchestral web which surrounds them.

Valdine Anderson was completely up to the astonishing feats of coloratura which she was required to perform. The characters which she plays seemed to spend much of their time laughing above the stave and Anderson conveyed a sense of joy and amusement, never strain or anxiety.

Daniel Norman was elegantly ironic in his role as lounge lizard but managed easily to switch to being an electrician or a waiter being propositioned for sex. Stephen Richardson used his dark voice very aptly in his triple role as the Duke, the Judge and the Hotel Manager.

I was not entirely happy about the presentation of the opera. The singers were placed towards the rear of the stage at the side of the orchestra, presumably so that they had a good view of the conductor. This meant that to see Mary Plazas (we were sitting at the front on the right), we had to constantly move our heads to dodge the conductor and his rostrum, not ideal at all. The other point was that the singers were discreetly amplified. I've never heard the opera live before, so am not sure if this is standard procedure. It did seem that the 15 players of the LSO ensemble produced a remarkable volume of noise at times. The amplification, whilst not too disturbing, did reduce some of the directionality of the voices. I would have far preferred it if the orchestra had been encouraged to keep it down and the singers placed at the very front, so that they did not have to use amplfication.

But those complaints aside, this was a most enjoyable evening and Mary Plazas succeeded in making us not a little bit sad for the monster of a Duchess as she left the hotel at the very end.

Review of Thais

My review of Thais at Grange Park Opera is here on Music and Vision.

Ivan Ho!

I see in the latest British Music Society newsletter that Chandos are planning a new recording of Sir Arthur Sullivan's only grand opera, Ivanho. The Sullivan Society are helping with funding. Amazingly, it will be the opera's first fully professional recording and will be one of those once in a lifetime occasions to remedy the work's bad reputation. Of course this does not always work. The BBC bravely did a concert performance of Dame Ethel Smyth's The Wreckers which went on to disc but the performance had nothing of the dash and verve that it seemed to have when I saw it staged at Warwick University. Still, I await the recording of Ivanhoewith bated breath.

As ever, foreigners seem to be better at doing these things than us. The Spanish are bravely ploughing through the English language operas of Albeniz despite their rather lamentable librettos.

Other items from the newsletter which caught my eye include the possibility of a recording for Tovey's opera The Bride of Dionysius. I heard an extract of this, done in concert once and would be curious to hear how it sounded complete. But expertise in writing symphonic music do not necessarily bring expertise on the opera stage.

A recording from the 1950's of Douglas Coates's Violin Concerto has re-surfaced on Divine Art. Rather sadly, this composer's scores seem to have evaporated and despite Rob Barnett's excellent review for the Violin concerto, our chances of hearing the cello concert and the violin sonata would seem to be slim.

Recent CD Review

My review of the Handel/Mozart arrangement of Messiah is here on MusicWeb International

If you want a traditional Messiah with added wind parts, you cannot go
wrong with this. It has the added advantage of having Mackerras at the
helm ... a guilty pleasure for solitary listening. ...

Well, it has been quite a busy old few days. Thursday were were at the first night of Ariodante, friday we had the first rehearsal for the FifteenB concert at the Chelsea Festival, Sunday morning St. George's Church, Hanover Square performed my Missa Veni Sancte Spiritus as 11.00am Sung Eucharist and the in the evening we saw Grange Park Opera's new production of Massenet's Thais

The Mass at St. George's came off brilliantly, the choir sang the Kyrie, Gloria, Sanctus/Benedictus and Agnus Dei so we had a musical feast. It was the first time that I had heard the 4-part version of the mass and I thought that it worked very well. The performance was excellent.

We enjoyed Thais immensely and a review will appear later this week.

Review of Ariodante

My review of Friday's performance of Ariodante at ENO is here on Music and Vision.

Well, last night was the first rehearsal for our concert at the Chelsea Festival. I know, its not far away, but this year we're trying concentrating all the rehearsals in a short period - sort of short, sharp, shock treatement. I always find the first run through of a piece unnerving, but things went very well and my big new piece, Crossing sounds rather promising.

Tomorrow we're off to Grange Park Opera in Hampshire, so see Massenet's Thais an opera I fell in love with when I saw it at the Royal Northern College of Music in 1974 (with a young Robin Leggate as Nicias) and have not seen it staged since.

Thursday night's Ariodante at ENO was fabulous and a review will appear in due course.

Tomorrow morning I'm playing hookey from St. Mary's Cadogan St., Chelsea, and going to St. George's Church, Hanover Square where they are performing my Missa Veni Sancte Spiritu, great fun.

Recent CD Review

My review of La Ricordanza's disc of English Baroque music by expatriate composers is here on MusicWeb international.

Even with the disc's catchy title, this repertoire can seem a little
forbidding. Don't let that put you off. Be caught up in the spell of these
performances. ...

This month in Opera magazine

A number of interesting things in this month’s Opera magazine. I’ve just reviewed a disc of Judith Weir’s music, so it was interesting to read Julian Grant’s article on her operas. I’ve always felt that she was under used by our opera companies and hope that the recent spate of performances of her operas in the UK means that we might hope to see more of her work on the bigger stage.

Reading about Peter Jonas’s time at ENO and Munich makes laudatory reading, until I remember that when Jonas left, ENO possessed a significant number of productions that I would not want to take my mother to; I particularly remember the Traviata with Helen Field in the title role, a Pountney production I think. And Jonas’s devotion to baroque opera at Munich has always looked mouthwatering until I look at the producers. I saw production photos of Richard Jones’s Julius Caesar and certainly could not cope with Anne Murray in a kilt and large plastic dinosaurs on stage! But that might be me jumping to conclusions again, after all I do enjoy the David Alden Ariodante at ENO (we’re going tonight to see it, with Alice Coote in the title role). Quite often I find that cutting edge productions of opera seria don't pay enough attention to the conventions of the genre; if you subvert convention sufficiently then the entire structure become meaningless.

Interesting movements on the conductor front. Mark Wrigglesworth is going to La Monaie in 2008; a great opportunity for him, but a loss for a UK house. There again the amazingly talented and amazingly young Robin Ticciati (we saw him recently conducting the Salomon Orchestra) is taking over as Music Director of Glyndebourne on Tour. Alas, he’s not conducting the Cosi van Tutte which we’re seeing in Norwich in Novemeber.

Hugh Canning’s profile of Soile Isokoski makes an interesting point. Evidently she learned many of her early roles in Finnish at the Finnish National Opera and Canning feels that singers who learn roles in the native language first become the most rounded and perceptive interpreters of the roles when they move to the original language. Discuss!!!

Dessau mounted a new production of Aufstieg und Fall der Stadt Mahogonny. The role of Jenny Hill was sung by Stefanie Wüst, who studied with both Edith Mathis and Gisela May; a remarkably combination that would seem to make Ms. Wüst perfect for this sort of part. I still treasure the time when, in 1988 on a visit to Berlin with the Pink Singers we visited East Berlin and saw the Berliner Ensemble in Mother Courage, with Paul Dessau’s original music and with Gisela Mai in the title role. Fabulous, even though I could only understand one word in three.

A production of Das Rheingold in Thailand with the gods displayed using Thai imagery. Part of a planned complete cycle. Sounds fascinating, O please, someone bring it to Europe!

A bizarre quote from John von Rhein in his review of Gluck’s Orfeo from Chicago. Harry Bicket resisted the temptation to turn the reduced orchestra into a period band, enforcing proper articulations, balances and transparency of texture while keeping things moving along lightly and crisply. Well that sounds like period performance practice to me.

Most curious casting. Jane Eaglen as Rosalinde in Die Fledermaus! Not a complete success I gather, but she’d have work really hard to match the spectacle of Dame Gwynneth Jones singing the Csardas (on a TV programme). Pity the review was not enamoured because it sounded like interesting casting. The sort of thing that works on paper but does not always come off in practice I suppose.

Out of Tune

We went to the Barbican last night for the performance of Bach's Mass in B Minor by Bach Collegium Japan under Masaaki Suzuki. Suzuki's work is something that I'm only familiar with from listening to the Radio when I've heard a number of his Bach cantata performances, which have always seemed impressive.

I am one of those people who find Bach best listened to when performed with very few singers, preferably one per part (but of course you have to have good singers). I knew that Suzuki would not subscribe to this, after all I'd heard some of his recorded performances and knew that he'd studied with Ton Koopman. But somehow, I still found myself out of tune with the performance.

Suzuki's way with the music was quite measured and rather sombre. Granted, there were lively moments and the articulation of the orchestra was excellent, sometimes a little at the expense of line. But my overall impression was of the darker, quieter hues. Perhaps it was because we were sitting at the side of the hall, hidden by the harpsichord. An instrument, incidentally, which seemed curiously reticent in the ensembles at moments when I felt it should not be reticent at all.

When performing with a decent size choir (18 singers to around 20 instrumentalists), Bach presents the conductor with a number of problems of balance. In the fugal opening of the Kyrie, the choir's first entry comes after a long orchestral peroration and each voice should enter simply as part of the texture. But what frequently happens is that the choir suddenly dominates and instead of being an equal partner the orchestra's role degenerates into one of buzzing accompaniment. Some conductors have solved this problem by getting the initial entries sung by just one voice with the main chorus coming in later. Suzuki's solution, which was almost successful, was to have the chorus subdue its tone. Perhaps this set the general timbre for the evening. But at least the balance in the performance was pretty good and there were not too many moments when you felt that the chorus was master. Though there were times when individual musicians could have been more prominent. This was very noticeable when flutes and oboes had been prominent during one of the solo sections, but suddenly disappeared when the chorus came in.

I felt his general attitude to be quite Romantic, which is perfectly valid. After all, I don't subscribe to the view that everyone needs to perform Bach in the way that I want. Perhaps it just didn't chime in with my feelings that evening.

Amongst the soloists, alto Robin Blaze particularly impressed. His lovely bright voice with its wonderfully edge and sense of line came over as a breath of fresh air in the performance.

Of course, what people will tell me is that what counts is Suzuki's wonderful musicianship and his spiritual way with Bach. But I'm afraid, last night this rather washed over me and all I was left with was a picky little voice in my head, pointing out things. I just hope that Ariodante at ENO tomorrow finds me more responsive, after all it does have Alice Coote in the title role.

Recent CD Review

My review of Hyperion's re-issue of Westminster Cathedral Choir's disc of music by he Anerio brothers is here on MusicWeb International.

A fascinating disc of music in fine performances. In performances as passionate as this the works of the Anerio brothers make riveting listening. ...

Met Gala

I caught the end of the Met gala (in aid of Volpe's retirement) at the weekend and it seemed very much a mixed affair. The chorus seemed to be labouring somewhat in the Easter Hymn from Cavalleria Rusticana, the choral sound was heavily overladen with what I thought was unpleasant vibrato; rather worrying. I am not quite sure that having Frederika von Stade and Kiri te Kanawa doing something from Cosi van Tutte was ideal, could they have found them something a little more suitable for divas of a certain age? Still it was lovely to hear the younger generation (Susan Graham et al) in another excerpt. I must confess that I was also a bit bemused by Karita Mattila's Hanna Glawari, but perhaps she was a bit bemused as well having only just sung the title role in Fidelio in the same house. I realise that I did not hear the whole gala and probably missed the best bits, and also it was one of those things where the best response is probably 'you really just had to be there'

Figen Phelps added a comment to my post about the Turkish Ballet; it seems I got my facts confused and the interview with Madam was made in 1996. I was probably not clear when writing my original comments, but all the dancers in the film were Turkish though they did interview one or two of the British teachers. Rather hearteningly, Figen confirms that the film is part of a longer documentary. So I look forward to seeing the full film.

The audience at the Turkish Ballet's performance on Thursday seemed to consists principally of members of London's Turkish community and distinguished choreographers. I really hope that the general British public were present in greater numbers at the other 2 performances.

35 Degrees East

It was the Italians who were responsible for fostering ballet in Russia. It was only when the Tsar’s son’s mistress, Mathilde Kchessinska, equalled the prima ballerina’s feat of doing the 32 fouetteé turns in Swan Lake, that importing Italian dancers became unnecessary. So, it should not be a cause for surprise that it was the English ballet who were responsible for introducing ballet into Turkey.

In the mid 1940’s the chaplain to the British Embassy in Turkey had previously been the incumbent at a church near the Old Vic and had become a keen ballet-lover. At the time Turkey had a thriving opera and theatre companies, but not ballet. Taxed by the British chaplain on this subject the Turkish Education Minister invited Dame Ninette de Valois (Madam) to Turkey. The result was a school, Turkey’s first ballet school, founded in 1947; this lead to the first native ballet performance, Coppelia, in 1953. The company was closely watched by Madam and fostered by British ballet masters, ballet mistresses and choreographers. From the first, Madam included Turkish folk dancing into the curriculum and choreographed 2 ballets for the company, using music by Turkish composers and including Turkish folk dance. By 1973 the company could put in a whole evening of dance by Turkish choreographers.

As part of the celebrations of the Royal Ballet’s 75th birthday, a group of dancers from the Turkish State Ballet companies in Istanbul and Ankara brought a programme of dance to the Linbury Theatre at the Royal Opera House. The current director of the Turkish State Opera and Ballet is Meric Sümen Kanen who was herself a ballerina under Madam.

The evening opened with a short film which mixed archive photographs and movie footage with interviews with Madam (dating from 2001) and other British dancers involved with the company. It was a fascinating film and could have been far longer. Then 2 dancers gave us a charming pas de deux from At the Fountain Head, a ballet choreographed in 1963 by Dame Ninette de Valois. There then followed a programme of 5 ballets choreographed by 3 Turkish choreographers and 1 ballet choreographed by a German couple.The programme was a mixture of short ballets and extracts from longer works. Perhaps the most memorable was the excerpt ‘the storm… Dervishes dance’ from Beyhan Murphy’s Travelogue.

The first 5 works were all generally modernist in their outlook, though most used music by modern Turkish composers but one used Chopin. For the finale, Mehmet Balkan had choreographed 2 movements from Rachmaninoff’s 2nd Symphony and these were danced in real classical style.

The choreographer’s response to the music seemed to be somehow different to what I would have expected, I can’t really describe it as I have no dance training to describe what I saw. The standard of the recorded music that they danced to was rather variable, particularly the Rachmaninoff. But the programme left us wishing that we could see more of the Turkish company.

Recent CD Review

My review of Handel's Messiah from Trevor Pinnock and the English Concert, is here on MusicWeb International.

You can't go wrong with this Messiah. It should have a firm place at the centre of the library shelves. ...

Estonian alterations

London Concord Singers are travelling to Estonia in July to do a concert in the Lutheran Cathedral and sing a service at the Charles XI Church. The programme for the concert was intended to be a repeat of our concert on July 13th at St. Mary's Church, Cadogan Street, Chelsea. That programme includes 2 Estonian works, Veljo Tormis's Jaanilaulud (St. John’s Day Songs) and Urmas Sisask's Benedictio along with Richard Rodney Bennett's Missa Brevis, which was written for Canterbury Cathedral Choir.

Unfortunately, we have discovered that we cannot perform secular pieces in our Estonian concert, so despite bravely learning to sing in Estonian for the Tormis, we will not be able to sing it in Tallinn as Jaanilaulud is most definitely secular. We'll just have to hope that we attract some Estonian's to our London concert.

Tuesday's Salomon Orchestra concert at St. John's Smith Square went very well. The orchestra, under Dominic Wheeler, were on terrific form and all three works (Ravel's La Valse, de Falla's El amor brujo and Rimsky-Korsakov's Scheherezade) were outstanding. The hall in not large so the orchestra made a wonderfully full, thrilling sound in the louder passages (I know, loudness is not everything, but its still fun occasionally). The soloist in the de Falla piece was Sara Gonzalez, a mezzo-soprano from the Canaries currently studying in London, she displayed a lovely dark, Spanish-hued voice.

Interestingly, all 3 works had dance links. Ravel's work was written for Diaghilev's company (but wasn't used), de Falla wrote his work initially for a Spanish dance company and it included spoken sections but in the 20's he transformed it into a ballet and of course Diaghilev's company did a ballet version of Scheherezade with Nijinsky as the Golden Slave.

MusicWeb Reviewers Log

I keep a sort of diary of the discs I review for MusicWeb and every so often its published along with the links to the relevant reviews. The diary for Feb 06 to May 06 is here
on MusicWeb International. If you ever wondered about what I think about when reviewing discs, then this may help!

Recent book review

My review of Changing Tunes: The Use of Pre-existing music in Film is here on MusicWeb International.

Recent CD Review

My review of Sara Botkin's recent disc is here on Music and Vision.

Edington Festival

The brochure for the 2006 Edington Festival of Music within the Liturgy has just popped through our letter box. We are planning to go down there for the whole week this year so should be able to saturate ourselves in the 4 services per day with music from 3 choirs. The programme this year is particularly delectable. Amongst the things that I noticed on first glance:-

• Hymne a la Vierge by Pierre Villette, a composer that we discovered in Concord last year and whose lovely motets we sang with great success.
• Victoria's O Quam Gloriosam mass sung at a service where the preacher is Lord Carey
• Tallis's O Nata Lux
• The festival commission: 'Before Abraham was, I AM' by Anthony Pitts
• Agnus Dei from Poulenc's Mass in G
• Britten's Festival Te Deum and Walton's Jubilate
• James MacMillan's Mass and Tippett's Plebs Angelica in the same service!!!
• Giles Swayne's Magnificat - another piece I know from London Concord Singers - paired with Charles Wood's Nunc Dimittis

There is of course much, much more. You can get leaflets and information from the festival here

Salomon Concert

We're off to see the Salomon Orchestra tonight at St. John's Smith Square. Their being conducted by Dominic Wheeler and the programme is rather attractive, Ravel La Valse, Rimsky-Korsakov Scheherezade and Falla's El Amor Brujo, works that I've always been rather fond of. Possibly because, in my orchestral playing days I played in the Rimsky-Korsakov piece and played in a couple of the suites of music extracted from Falla's complete ballet. Salomon are doing El Amor Brujo complete, with mezzo-soprano soloist, which is rather unusual in the concert hall.

Recent CD Review

My review of Judith Weir's The Consolations of Scholarship and other pieces, performed by Janice Felty, Judith Kellock and Ensemble X is here on Music Web International.

I can wholeheartedly recommend this disc to those who would like to get
to know the music of this approachable but elusive composer. ...

Makropoulos Case

We went to the Makropoulos Case at the Coliseum on Saturday. For me, it is a wonderfully memorable Janacek opera and I look forward to performances. Having seen Elisabeth Soderstrom, Catherine Wilson and Ana Silja in the role, I attempted not to sit back and simply complain that Cheryl Barker was none of these.

Christopher Alden’s new production uses a single set, designed by Charles Edwards. A white walled room dominated by the RH wall which is a wonderful Art Deco confection of metal and glass. It looks very much like the sort of room you might see in a 1930’s Italian railway station. The room doubles as Dr. Kolnaty’s office, Elina Makropoulos’s dressing room and her hotel room. As such it is too large for strict naturalism, but then naturalism was obviously not Alden’s main concern.

The glass wall was used to enable strong raking side lighting to be used throughout the production and a row of doors facilitated the numbers entrances and exits. The usual Alden concerns were present; spare set, lots of chairs, characters lurking on stage, stylised action. Quite often the cast sit or stand in rows, as if waiting for their next cue for action, what they don’t always do is react to what is happening on stage. Given the stylised action it was difficult to believe that Gregor (Robert Brubaker in wonderfully passionate form) fell in love with E.M. in an instant. The men were all in grey suits, the general tone-colour of the production was grey.

The production seem to be aiming to distance the audience from the plot, to objectify E.M. Perhaps this would have worked if Alden had been working with an experienced E.M, but Cheryl Barker was making her role debut. She was impressive and from the outset came over as mysterious and sexy, despite a range of desperately unsexy outfits designed by Sue Willmington. Barker’s was a highly promising debut and she will grow into a powerful protagonist. What she lacks, at the moment, is the ability to command a stage with a mere gesture, the ability to force us to focus just on her so that we believe that she fascinates every person on stage. Barker’s E.M. was attractive and passionate, but rather cool (in tune with the rest of the production) so we did not quite believe in the effect she had on everyone.

Barker was surrounded by a strong cast. Neal Davies was Dr. Kolenty, John Graham Hall was Vitek, John Wegner was Prus and Graham Clark was Hauk Sendorf. Clark’s scene with E.M in act 2 was one of the highlights of the production.

Musically the production was memorable, being in the wonderful hands of Sir Charles Mackerras. Music and drama came together at the end, when Barker’s final scene overcame the limitations of the production.

Sleeping Beauty

Friday night's Sleeping Beauty at the Royal Opera House was our first view of the new/old Oliver Messel/Peter Farmer designed production. The sets are very handsome and reminded me of a number of other Beauty's that I've seen over the years; a tribute, presumably, to the influence of Messel's original production. Act 2, with its layer upon layer of gauzes representing the magic forest covering the castle, was most atmospheric and effective. Farmer has re-worked Messel's costumes, changing them to a rather more pastel palette. The original costumes for the 4 princes (in Act 1) were used in the re-opening gala and I remember them as having a far stronger colour palette, much more reminiscent of Leslie Hurry's rather strong colours for his Swan Lake from a similar period. Still the results were undoubtedly effective.

Roberta Marquez was tiny and made a most effective Princess, with plenty of charm and technical ability; her rose adage was lovely. Rupert Pennefather made a noble prince.

The ballet was conducted by Valeriy Ovsyanikov, a name unfamiliar to me. Though he and the orchestra produced a fine, big boned sound in the louder moments, I felt that in general the account of the score was a little too understated for my taste. Perhaps Ovsyanikov's conducting was just a little too careful.

Review of Tolomeo

My review of Handel's Tolomeo is now on-line here at Music and Vision.

Handel's Family Tree

My review Wednesday night's performance of Handel's Tolomeo should be appearing at the weekend. Rather interestingly, the opera features 2 historical characters. Ptolomy IX (Tolomeo) and Ptolomy X Alexander I (Alessandro) of Egypt. Their mother (who does not actually appear in the opera, but is referred to) was Cleopatra III, who features as the Cleopatra character in Handel's oratorio Alexander Balus. Ptolomy IX was succeeded by his daughter Berenice III, who features as the lead role in Handel's opera Berenice.

Plans

Tonight we're going to see Handel's Tolomeo at the London Handel Festival. The performance takes place in the Britten Theatre of the Royal College of Music, a theatre which is ideal in size for this sort of opera. I've been cudgeling my brains trying to remember what the 'hit' number is from this opera; I don't know the opera but I'm sure that one particular piece gets into recital programmes. No doubt all will be revealed tonight.

Previous opera productions at the festival have been variable, but tonight's production is a co-production with English Touring Opera and being directed by James Conway. So it should be good as long as he keeps away from Scottish manses (the mis-en-scene for his production of Ariodante).

Then on Friday its Sleeping Beauty at the Royal Opera House, their reconstruction of the 1949 Oliver Messel designed production. This production was one of the highlights of my Mother's ballet-going career and was much talked about. I shall be interested to see what the 2006 version is like; at least the reviews have been promising.

Saturday its off to the London Coliseum for the new production of The Makropoulos Case. Having seen Catherine Wilson (Scottish Opera), Elisabeth Soderstrom (Welsh National Opera) and Ana Silja (Glyndebourne) in the title role, Cheryl Barker will have to be good!

So blogs do have their uses

As I sing in London Concord Singers and act as their secretary, the doings of the choir find their way into my blog. I was recently in contact with Mary Jane Leach whose work, Song of Sorrows the choir performed at their April 6th concert. It turns out that she'd read about the performance in my blog - so blogs do have a use after all.

The choir are assembling a programme of music for their July concert, this will be repeated in Tallinn at a concert in the Lutheran Cathedral and at a sung service. We're going to be singing some Estonian music, in Estonian. So I'm now tracking down contact email addresses for Urmas Sisask and Veljo Tormis, to let them know of our performances.

We're doing Sisask's Benedictio and Tormis's St. John's Day Songs. But we're not negelecting English music as the programme will also include Richard Rodney Bennett's Missa Brevis, written for Canterbury Cathedral Choir.

Recent CD Review

Monteverdi's Orfeo in a recording based on live performances by Pinchgut Opera in Australia, reviewed here on MusicWeb International.

Recent CD Review

My review of Dan Welcher's Haleakala is here on MuscWeb International.

A fascinating disc but now that the disc is on my library shelves I am
honestly not sure how often I will listen to it again. ...

The Paper Factory

Last week we sent out the new edition of my printed catalogue, necessitating piles of envelopes and papers and a horrendous number of stamps to be stuck. I won't be posting my catalogue on the blog, but I have also updated my publishers web site, http://www.sphericaleditions.co.uk/, so it now has all my most recent activities available.

Then this weekend I produced the choral copies of the music for the forthcoming Chelsea Festival Concert, so there was yet more organising of piles of papers. But now it is all done and the house is back to normal. We've finalised the programme for the Chelsea Festival Concert and will be starting rehearsals shortly. I'm always a mixture of excitement and anxiety at the prospect of running through a new piece.

Recent CD Reviews

My review of a disc of Thomas Tallis motets from the Rodolfus Choir is here.

These are lovely, well crafted performances ...

My review of volume 2 of Naxos's Tito Schipa edition is here. Both reviews are on MusicWeb International.

Anyone interested in hearing Schipa in his prime should invest in the disc
...

Recent CD Review

My review of Nick Davis's Candescence is here on Music and Vision.

Recent CD Reviews

My review of Lydia Vierlinger's Handel recital is here.

I can recommend this disc for its musicality and feel for Handel’s music,
but must warn off those for whom good English is a sine qua non of
Handel performance. ...

My review of Pinchgut Opera's Orfeo is here. Both are on MusicWeb International

A strong, involving production which stands up well to other performances
even if it is not first choice for the library.

Review of Götterdämmerung - Part 3

The 3rd (and final) part of my review of Saturday's performance of Götterdämmerung from Covent Garden.

Act 3 opened with the Rhinemaidens cavorting in front of the Act drop. When they too 'lifted' it up, it revealed a bank of the Rhine complete with a boat and a tree. The Rhine itself just a huge void towards the rear of the stage. The encounter between them and Siegfried was staged simply but effectively with the sole strangeness being that Siegfried did not walk on but revealed himself lying in the boat.

The Gibichung's hunt included the killing of an animal in a rather stylised manner that seemed unnecessary. Siegfried's death was most effective with John Tomlinson's Hagen coming over as threatening and not in the least bumptious. Treleaven sounded tired but his narration was effective and Treleaven is to be commended for his pacing throughout the opera.

With Siegfried's funeral march, things started to turn very odd. There was not funeral procession., Siegfried was left lying in the bank alone and then gradually, slowly made his way across the 'Rhine' over a plank as the lights dimmed.

With Gutrune's entrance, Brunnhilde came too. Gutrune stayed upstage but Brunnhilde stood on the river bank, which slowly, noisily made its way to the rear of the stage, revealing a huge stretch of water bounded by walkways and with 4 large ventilator shafts coming out, for all the world like a suburban swimming pool. All this movement of the scenery rather upstaged Emily Magee's rather fine scene.

When the 'vassals' brough on Siegfried's body, the mumified body was carried not by the vassals from Act 2 but by a motely group of young people who had lurked on the stage to no apparent purpose at various times. Initially Siegfried was put in the boat, now at the back of the stage. Then he was brought to the front.

On Brunnhilde's call for sturdy branches the young people brought on the gilt statues of the gods from Act 2 and layed them on the ground. When Brunnhilde addressed Wotan, she addressed his statue and appeared to put him to sleep or smother him. Siegfried's body was then transferred back to the rear of the stage and disappeared.

Then the conflagration happened, the young people hung the statues by their necks above the aire vents and then Brunnhilde lit fires under them, gradually the tree at the rear of the stage burned with flame, along with much else. The result was undoubtedly spectacular if a little puzzling.

Then a white line made its way up the rear of the stage; this might have had greater significance if you had been lower down in the house. When the Rhine overflowed its banks, the Rhine maidens cavorted naked and then sat at the front of the stage with the Rhine gold. The young people cavorted in the Rhine and the curling metal structure from the first opera was lowered down. and a young person climbed on. This was the final image. Rather confusingly a figure who was, I think Mime from Rhinegold, joined in.

If I have seemed to dwell on the action it is because at the end of the opera, the action rather overshadowere the music. Gasteen's Brunnhilde was frequently lyrical and she knew when to sing softly. perhaps she did not always ride over the orchestra as easily as I would have liked but though tired towards the end she kept her wonderful gleaming tone. She encompasses far more of the role than some sopranos I've heard recently.

Pappano and the orchestra were on superb form. As I have said, Pappano's speeds were on the swifter side buy the performance never seemed rushed or hectic. Additionally, Pappano had good control of Wagner's long breathed paragraphs; the performance described a clearly defined and rather gripping arc.

Tuesday's lunchtime recital at the London Festival of Contemporary Church music presented 10 pieces by 10 different living composers, all written for soprano and keyboard. Soprano Nathalie Reybould and accompanist Paul Ayres did full justice to the variety of styles. Paul played on 3 different keyboards - piano, chamber organ and computer organ (the church's main organ is currently poorly and the choir organ is still in the process of installation). The music ranged from Timothy Salter's piece which was premiered in 1971 (and received its London premiere in 1974 in the same church as Tuesday's concert, St. Pancras) to a piece written especially for the concert. A number of composers were present at the recital, including myself. Nathalie and Paul performed my Faith, Hope and Charity, the first time the piece has been sung by someone other than the soprano for whom it was written, Rowena Wells.

The Festival runs until Sunday and on Saturday night you can hear the premiere of a new oratorio by Francis Potts, who also had a piece performed at Tuesday's concert.

Review of Götterdämmerung - Part 2

2nd part of my review of Götterdämmerung at Covent Garden

Act 2 opens with Hagen's dream. Hagen was in front of the act drop, but just before Alberich's entry, Hagen turns round an 'lifts' the act drop up to reveal a set decorated completely in the swirly equations from the act drop. Alberich was suspended, mid-air in a small boat. The scene between Tomlinson's Hagen and Peter Sidhom's Alberich was very strong, despite the peculiarity of Alberich's placing.

For the remainder of Act 2 were were back in the glitzy Gibichung hall, this time with the addition of 4 rather kitsch, life-sized gold statues of the gods. Kitsch was a strong element in this staging, with the male chorus putting on black horned helmets, even though their costumes were 20th century. Presumably it was all to point up the meretriciousness of the Gibichung's existence. But I'm not sure this needed so much emphasis. This kitsch, combined with Hagen's showy bumptiousness seemed too over the top and verged on the camp.

Still, it did go a long way towards emphasising Brünnhilde's alienation. Dressed just in a sleevless shift, Gasteen's demeanour and her robust frame made her stand out from the effete court. Gasteen's performance in this act was wonderfully strong and went a long way towards palliating my annoyance with the production.

Treleaven succeeded in making Siegfried seem naive without being idiotic, which was a help. The act closed with a terrific account of the trio, quite a musical highlight.

Recital

Today I'm hoping to be at Nathalie Raybould and Paul Ayres's Lunchtime recital at St. Pancras Parish church which includes my solo motet, Faith, Hope and Charity.

Review of Yvonne Kenny recital

My review of Sunday's recital by Yvonne Kenny and Iain Burnside is here on Music and Vision.

Review of Götterdämmerung - Part 1

A new production of Götterdämmerung is always eagerly awaited, particularly when it comes as the completion of a Ring Cycle. You always hope that it will help make sense of the iconography of the previous parts of the cycle. With a Ring as stuffed full of symbols as that of Keith Warner and Stefanos Lazaridis at Covent Garden, this was especially true. As it turned out, Saturday’s performance (the last in the current run), did not quite provide the magnificent summation that we might have hoped for, but for most of the evening Warner displayed admirably clarity in his narrative.

The prologue opened with the Norns (Catherine Wyn-Rogers, Yvonne Howard and Marina Poplavskaya) in front of a drop curtain covered with swirling equations. This curtain was first seen at the opening of Siegfried. The Norns were weaving the red-rope that has been a linking theme throughout the cycle. All 3 were excellent.

As before in the cycle, the Valkyrie rock was simply an acting space. Neither Lisa Gasteen nor John Treleaven seemed entirely on form, their duet lacked the vocal freedom that is desirable.

Act 1 took place in a glossy atrium with a huge glass wall with Gunter (Peter Coleman-Wright) and Gutrune (Emily Magee) on along white sofa, servants brought in a drinks trolly. Magee and Coleman-Wright were excellent as the Gibichungs and Warner introduced an element of incest that is familiar from other Rings, but this time John Tomlinson’s Hagen also participated (perhaps we could have a Ring where the incest is implied between Hagen and Gunter for a change).

Tomlinson’s Hagen was puzzling. He is a great theatrical performer and Hagen has been one of his best roles, notably in Götz Friedrich’s 2nd Ring at Covent Garden. There, there were elements of that controlled, controlling, threatening Hagen but overlaid with an odd bumptiousness. In fact there were moments when Tomlinson’s Hagen verged on the downright comic.

When Hagen drugs Siegfried’s drink, the wall of the atrium changed shape and suddenly we are in the cuboid tarnhelm, a neat effect. Throughout the cycle there have been imaginative visual references of all sizes to the cube-lattice structure which represents the tarnhelm.

For the scene between Br&uum;nnhilde and Waltraute, the set remained the same and Hagen was on stage, as if this was his vision. And when Siegfried as Gunter captures Brunnhilde, both Siegfried and Gunter were on stage, with Siegfried wearning the tarnhelm – another rather neat solution to a perennial problem. Mihoko Fujimura's Waltraute was one of the highlights of the production. Her tone never forced, she sang with a wonderful suppleness of line.

So far so good: the first act was presented with remarkable clarity and the Royal Opera House have assembled a strong group of singers. I will come to Act II tomorrow.

CD Review

This isn't a recent CD review, but I've only just discovered it. Its the surviving excerpts from Beecham's 1936 Götterdäerung from Covent Garden, truly fascinating. The review is here on Music Web International

We were at Götterdämmerung last night at Covent Garden, the final performance of the run. Musically it was pretty good and surprisingly engrossing considering it started at 4pm and finished at 10.15pm, though thankfully Pappano's speeds were pretty quick (Prologue and Act1 came in at 2hours 5 minutes). I'll write more on it anon.

I went through the programme for this summer's Proms and found very little to drool over. There are normally a handful of items which we can't wait to see but this summer, with the concentration on Mozart, the number of really desirable concerts is running pretty low. Not sure whether that's a statement about the Proms programming or our tastes in music.

Recent CD Review

My review of the recording of John Jenkins's 6-part viol concerts by Phantasm is here on Music Web International.

Sit back and revel in the brilliant conversation of a group of old friends,
familiar enough to take liberties but always balanced and civilised. ...

Faith, Hope and Charity performance

My solo motet, Faith, Hope and Charity is being performed by Natalie Raybould (soprano) and Paul Ayres (Organ) on Tuesday 9th May at 1.15pm at St. Pancras Parish Church, Euston Road, London as part of the London Festival for Contemporary Church Music. The full programme for the recital, all contemporary pieces with sacred texts, is as follows:-

Timothy Salter - The Emissaries
Mark Levesley - Lord of Grace
Paul Ayres - Wedding Anthem
PerMagnus Lindborg - Set me as a seal upon your heart (Solomon Songs no 2)
John Hawkins - Gospel and Collect
Ian Coleman - O Adonai
Nicholas Ansdell-Evans - Hosanna to the Son of David
Robert Hugill - Faith, Hope and Charity
Francis Pott - On the Morning of Christ's Nativity

Faith, Hope and Charity was written for a friend's wedding and sets the familiar text from Corinthians. Writing for specific performers in mind, the soprano part uses a lot of rather high, cantilena.

Whit Sunday

St. George's Church, Hanover Square, London, will be performing my Missa Veni Sancte Spiritus at the 11.00am service on Sunday June 4th. The mass is based on the plainchant sequence Veni Sancte Spiritus which is always sung on Whit Sunday, so the mass is entirely appropriate. The mass was originally written for 2-part choir (women and men) and organ, but St. George's will be using the version for 4-part choir and organ. June 4th will, I think, be the 1st performance of this version.

Tonight is my first rehearsal for London Concord Singers' new term as I missed last week's rehearsal owing to family problems. This term is quite a busy one as we are preparing a programme for our concert on July 13th and then taking it to Tallinn, Estonia 2 weeks later; I'm currently organising the logistics of the choir trip (hotel rooms etc.).

At the same time, we are planning our concert for our 40th anniversary, this will be at St. Giles Cripplegate on November 18th. Having fixed the concert, venue and programme (so far we're doing Handel, Mozart and me) I now have to start contacting all of our old members so that they can be invited to the concert and post-concert bash - we always have one item of the programme sung by a mixture of current choir and old members

Canterbury

We travelled to Canterbury on Saturday for the opera, King but then stayed over so that we could attend Sung Eucharist in the cathedral on the Sunday. Because of the stage for the opera in the nave, 11.00am Eucharist was held in the quire; possibly the first time I've experienced a cathedral high altar being used for Sung Eucharist rather than the nave.

The mass was supposed to be Haydn's Missa Sancti Joanne de Deo, also known as his Little Organ Mass; its one that we sing at St. Mary's. The Benedictus consists of a sublime soprano solo with an elaborate organ accompaniment/solo, though as it is rather long we cut it. At Canterbury we go a rather more varied selection of movements from Haydn Masses; the Sanctus and the Agnus Dei came from the specified mass, the Gloria and the Benedictus came from other masses. These latter 2 movements were obviously chosen for the extreme brevity. That said, the performances with organ were some of the most successful that I have ever heard; I always think that church performances of Haydn and Mozart masses are difficult to bring off but Canterbury succeeded.

The highlight, however, was a luminous performance of Durufle's motet Ubi Caritas with a finely shaped opening alto line from the men of the choir.

Review of King

My review of King, Stephen Barlow's new opera which was performed in Canterbury Cathedral on Saturday is here, here at Mvdaily.com.

Plans

Tomorrow we're off to Canterbury to see the opera King at Canterbury Cathedral. Written by Stephen Barlow (who is also conducting), the opera deals with the relationship of Beckett and Henry II. The libretto is by the performance poet, Philip Wells who is also performing in the piece, along with Philip Joll as Beckett. Performers include the cathedral choir and a sitar player. It sounds fascinating.

This Month's Opera Magazine

Opera magazine has just come winging its way through may letter box. There's an interesting article about Peter Gelb's new regime at the New York Met; it makes it sound very promising and hardly the bugbear that people threatened.

One the newsdesk page there is a report about a proposed critical discography of Heddle Nash; it seems the compilers are looking for information about recordings. I hardly imagine they'd be interested in hearing about my Mother's reminiscences of hearing the aged singer appearing very late in his career as Faust in a amateur/semi-pro. production in Cleethorpes. Mum was very scathing about his ability to play the young hero and preferred his records.

There is a rather short obituary for soprano Anna Moffo; we really only came across her late on in her career whilst we were students in Manchester in the early 1970's. Her recording of Massenet's Thais was a bitter disappointment.

Andrew Clements's review of Sir John in Love was a little disappointing, though its obvious he was trying very hard to be fair. It would have been interesting to have had 2 different views in parallel. I'm interested to read Rodney Milnes's bad reaction to Hercules at the Barbican; I had to miss it but David went and was not very thrilled.

Sarah Connolly's appearance as Octavian in the Scottish Opera Rosenkavalier in October is almost worth making the trip up there for. But I don't think I'll be pining to hear Placido Domingo sing Tamerlano at the 2008 Salzburg Festival - I presume he's singing the role of Bajazet, which would be no draw. I wonder if this entry could be right. Rosalind Plowright is singing Mother in a Chandos recording of Hansel and Gretel, presumably this will be in English.

We've just had an order for a set of copies for my Missa Veni Sancte Spiritus, a work which was originally written for 2-part choir and organ (though there is now a 4-part version as well), based on the Veni Sancte Spiritus plainchant. Its funny re-visiting old pieces; the Agnus Dei from the mass remains one of my favourite movements, despite its simplicity. There's a PDF of is here. Further details about the mass from the Spherical Editions website here

Another correspondent has posted Comments about Luc Arbogast, it is remarkable how much interest this fine performer has generated on the web. Lets hope that that translates into people buying his record (more details here).

A couple of friends braved the early morning start last week and attended the University of Oxford's service which uses the 1670 Book of Common Prayer in Latin. During the Elizabethan period Oxford, Cambridge, Eton and Winchester were licensed to use a Latin version of the prayerbook on the basis that their inhabitants would know enough Latin to follow the service. Oxford continues this tradition with one service per term. My friends, one Anglican and one Catholic, found the service fascinating. Though another acquaintaince did comment that he found the idea of the service a little disturbing as Cranmer had fought against the use of Latin. I suppose the issue comes down to one of comprehensibility.

At the BCP service (in English) which we attended at Hampton Court (in March) I was struck by the wonderfully musicality of the administering of communion, the 3 priests recited the rather long rubric in a sort of rhythmical canon that was entrancing and hypnotic. I'd love to be able to reproduce the effect in a piece of music, but feel it would be difficult to get the exact combination of spontaneity and formal construction that seems to have happened naturally with all the priests falling into reciting the text in the same rhythm but at different times.

Recent CD Review

My review of Stokowski conducting excerpts from Saint-Saens's opera, Samson et Dalila is here on Music and Vision; the review includes sound-bites from the recording.

Review of Orfeo

My review of Saturday's performance of Orfeo is here at Music and Vision; its complete with photographs of the production.

Review of La Belle Helene

Laurent Pelly’s production of Offenbach’s La Belle Helene has already been seen in Paris (at the Chatelet Theatre) and in Santa Fe, it has also made it to CD and to DVD. Now the production has come to the London Coliseum under the auspices of English National Opera. The problem with much travelled productions is that a degree of coarseness can creep in with each revival. But Laurent Pelly is a fine director who, together with his regular associate director Agathe Melinand, oversees not only the production but the actual edition of the spoken text. For the original Chatelet production of La Belle Helene Agathe Melinand produced her own edition of the dialogue, as she did for her and Pelly’s subsequent collaborations on La Grande Duchesse de Gerolstein (again Chatelet Theatre) and Le Roi Malgre Lui (Lyons Opera). So obviously Melinand and Pelly take careful note of the tone of the spoken word.

Inevitably, whilst listening to Kit Hesketh Harvey’s English translation at ENO last night, this lead to me wonder how good Melinand and Pelly’s English was and how much control they had over the intensely jokey tone of Harvey’s translation. Full of puns and modern references, it rather tipped the production a little too far in the direction of Gilbert and Sullivan, which is not what you want when trying to produce Offenbach in the UK.

But Pelly (and Harvey’s) problem with this operetta is that when originally produced it satirised the moeurs of the court of Napoleon III in terms of classical mythology. It was written for an audience who could be presumed to know classical mythology well. If you take away the Napoleon III satire and have to apply an extremely broad brush to the classical mythology then what you are left with is a romp.

Most of the critics complained that this incarnation of Pelly’s production was too end of the pier, to English romp. But it IS a romp and you can hardly expect ENO to acquire the sort of French chic style which was presumably in evidence at the original production (We did not see La Belle Helene in France but we did see La Grande Duchesse).

It does not help that Pelly seems to be applying three different treatments to the opera rather than one consistent attitude. The overture starts in the Spartan Royal Bedroom and all of Act1 remains there, with Helene and Menelaus in bed for much of the time. Costumes are an endearing mixture of Greek and nightwear. The bed makes an appearance in each act. For Act 2 we still have the bed, after all it is Helene’s boudoir. But we have a selection of ruins which are being conserved by modern archaeologists, cue a ballet for the archaeologists at the opening of the act. The chorus are modern day tourists, complete with tour guide. When Helene addresses her parents she looks at the conserved remains of a mosaic of Leda and the Swan. For the final act everything takes place at the modern Greek seaside and Paris appears from the flies, using the bed as a boat!

Pelly treats each number to its own routine and though there is an overall coherence of tone, there was a sense of a sequence of fascinating production numbers. The dancing sheep during Paris and Helene’s duet were notable, but I also liked the swimming ballet which opened Act 3.

As Helene, Dame Felicity Lott looked fabulous and had a secure feel for the requisite style and delivered her dialogue to the manner born. Unfortunately the role is slightly low for her so she sounded underpowered to the vast cave of the Coliseum. Still, she incarnated the most beautiful woman in the world with consummate ease. As Paris, Toby Spence proved to have a nice line in comedy, treating the role with due seriousness (as is appropriate) and never having to resort to sending himself up. He was generous with giving us views of his well developed, shirtless torso and at one point stripped down to his underpants, to no very good reason but I shan’t complain! His voice was noticeable more powerful than Lott’s but they made a handsome couple and did convince as a pair of lovers.

As Helene’s put upon husband Menelaus, Bonaventura Bottone impressed; it was funny to see him as a middle aged man (complete with his own naturally grey hair and bald patch) rather than a young lover. But he made Menelaus a sympathetic butt for the jokes. Steven Page impressed as Calchas, though he was lumbered with an awful hairy wig.

The 4 Kings similarly suffered so it was tricky to tell them apart. I feel that Pelly the director and Pelly the costume designer could have done more to characterise the 4 of them differently. As it was you felt that singers as talented as David Kempster (Agamemmnon), Leigh Melrose (Achilles) and John Graham-Hall (Ajax I) were a little wasted. Leah Martin Jones made a fine, laddish Orestes constantly with a pair of courtesans on his arms.

The orchestra was relatively small in size and, under Emmanuel Joel’s direction, delivered up a sparkling account of the score. All in all this was an enjoyable evening, and if we did not always appreciate Kit Hesketh Harvey’s jokes, the audience around us did.

Recent CD Review

My review of settings of Elizabethan poetry sung by the Clerks of Christchurch is here on MusicWeb International.

Deserves to be heard for Pantcheff's settings of Elizabethan lyrics; the
accompanying items are attractively done even if you might question
their necessity in the programme. ...

My new PC (just over a year old) is still in at the menders, though they have told me that they have not found anything. Rather worrying, looks as if I'll have to live with a PC which keeps switching itself off at random intervals. I can't face paying yet another person to look at it.

So, currently I'm using my old PC (a venerable Windows 98 machine). This means, of course, that the new pieces I'm doing existing in fragmented form split between the old and the new pc's. So, as and when I manage to get the new one back I will have the delightful task of re-integrating the music.

I've finished the first major draft of the new piece for London Concord Singers 40th anniversary concert in November, 3 lighthearted movements setting secular Latin. I'm rather please with it and can't wait to have it all in one place to try out properly. I've even managed to come up with a half decent tonal scheme for the 3 movements; yes, I've actually managed to write a piece that stays in recognisable keys rather than wandering about and there's no polytonality.

The other piece is a new orchestral piece, something to try just to see if I can. Its a tone poem based on a Sylvia Townsend Warner short story about Welsh fairies, so the piece is currently loosely titled either Fairies and Faith or Of Fairies, Faith and Mountains. I've got the Welsh bit started, using David of the White Rock and have some Tippett-y Midsummer Marriage like bits for the Fairies. I'm just finishing drafting this section and am about to move onto the Faith bit, where St. Patrick gives them a sermon about Faith moving Mountains. I've sketched out a section using the Hymn tune, St. Patrick's Breastplate, though I've yet to work out if I can make sense of my sketches as they are all in manuscript. I've not yet got far enough to see if the thing makes sense, I'll report back.

My new PC (just over a year old) is still in at the menders, though they have told me that they have not found anything. Rather worrying, looks as if I'll have to live with a PC which keeps switching itself off at random intervals. I can't face paying yet another person to look at it.

So, currently I'm using my old PC (a venerable Windows 98 machine). This means, of course, that the new pieces I'm doing existing in fragmented form split between the old and the new pc's. So, as and when I manage to get the new one back I will have the delightful task of re-integrating the music.

I've finished the first major draft of the new piece for London Concord Singers 40th anniversary concert in November, 3 lighthearted movements setting secular Latin. I'm rather please with it and can't wait to have it all in one place to try out properly. I've even managed to come up with a half decent tonal scheme for the 3 movements; yes, I've actually managed to write a piece that stays in recognisable keys rather than wandering about and there's no polytonality.

The other piece is a new orchestral piece, something to try just to see if I can. Its a tone poem based on a Sylvia Townsend Warner short story about Welsh fairies, so the piece is currently loosely titled either Fairies and Faith or Of Fairies, Faith and Mountains. I've got the Welsh bit started, using David of the White Rock and have some Tippett-y Midsummer Marriage like bits for the Fairies. I'm just finishing drafting this section and am about to move onto the Faith bit, where St. Patrick gives them a sermon about Faith moving Mountains. I've sketched out a section using the Hymn tune, St. Patrick's Breastplate, though I've yet to work out if I can make sense of my sketches as they are all in manuscript. I've not yet got far enough to see if the thing makes sense, I'll report back.

My new PC (just over a year old) is still in at the menders, though they have told me that they have not found anything. Rather worrying, looks as if I'll have to live with a PC which keeps switching itself off at random intervals. I can't face paying yet another person to look at it.

So, currently I'm using my old PC (a venerable Windows 98 machine). This means, of course, that the new pieces I'm doing existing in fragmented form split between the old and the new pc's. So, as and when I manage to get the new one back I will have the delightful task of re-integrating the music.

I've finished the first major draft of the new piece for London Concord Singers 40th anniversary concert in November, 3 lighthearted movements setting secular Latin. I'm rather please with it and can't wait to have it all in one place to try out properly. I've even managed to come up with a half decent tonal scheme for the 3 movements; yes, I've actually managed to write a piece that stays in recognisable keys rather than wandering about and there's no polytonality.

The other piece is a new orchestral piece, something to try just to see if I can. Its a tone poem based on a Sylvia Townsend Warner short story about Welsh fairies, so the piece is currently loosely titled either Fairies and Faith or Of Fairies, Faith and Mountains. I've got the Welsh bit started, using David of the White Rock and have some Tippett-y Midsummer Marriage like bits for the Fairies. I'm just finishing drafting this section and am about to move onto the Faith bit, where St. Patrick gives them a sermon about Faith moving Mountains. I've sketched out a section using the Hymn tune, St. Patrick's Breastplate, though I've yet to work out if I can make sense of my sketches as they are all in manuscript. I've not yet got far enough to see if the thing makes sense, I'll report back.

Recent CD review

My review of the recent disc devoted to the choral music of Carl Orff and his contemporaries is here on MusicWeb International.

A fascinating recital that enables us to explore Carl Orff’s world. ...

Solomon again

I have been taken to task, in an anonymous comment added to my posting about my review of Solomon, here. The commentator seems to misunderstand why I brought in comparisons between David Daniels, Andreas Scholl and David Hansen (who sang the title role in the concert). I don't think it is adequate, in a review, to simply write counter-tenor against someone's voice type and leave the reader to work things out further. The counter-tenor voice is so varied that you need to be able to characterise the singer further, just as I would say if someone was a lyric, dramatic soprano etc. So my mentioning of Daniels and Scholl was not intended to be a stick with which to beat Hansen, a singer of fine artistry whose performance stood up for itself; I was merely trying to describe Hansen's voice.

And the reason that I harp on about voice types with the role of Solomon (rather than the entire cast) is that Handel did not write the role for a counter-tenor or a castrato, but for a woman. (And I have actually heard Scholl sing the role live, quite, quite beautifully).

Don Carlos (again)

My discs of Don Carlos have come! This morning, we listened to the first disc of the Opera Rara re-issue of the BBC recording. The sound quality is not superb, because the acoustic of the original recording does leave something to be desired. But the singers all give the piece a wonderful French feel, it certainly does not sound like standard mainstream European Italian Verdi, which is a good thing. More anon. when I've listened to the whole set properly.

My computer is in dock again, despite last week's work it still keeps switching itself off. I get nervous about losing work and have been furiously copying new music to a flash drive. It's rather annoying that I don't have access to Finale as I've been motoring through a new piece for London Concord Singer's 40th anniversary concert in November. I've done settings of 3 light-hearted Latin lyrics and have tried to deliver something which is faster and more up-beat than my usual style; after all it is a celebration! The pieces came out rather quickly and I have got them written out in a mixture of Finale printouts and manuscript. I'm now desperate to finalise the pieces, but I'm going to have to wait aren't I!

Tonight I'm singing at the Maundy Thursday Service at St. Mary's Cadogan Street. Its a fascinating service which starts with the celebrant washing the feet of a dozen men and women; then ending with translation of the consecrated host from the altar to a side altar so that the high altar is empty for Good Friday.

Review of Solomon

My review of Handels' Solomon at the Barbican with Rene Jacobs conducting the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment is here on Music and Vision.

Critical Choice

You go to a concert, which you enjoy greatly and then the next day read the reviews and find that the critics seem to have been at a different concert. Or even worse, you have tickets for the opera and the reviews come out; do you believe the critics and abandon your trip, or risk it.

Quite often, I find myself at odds with one critic or another. It is truly amazing that people can have such a varied response to the same event. It happens, of course, because we all have different bug-bears and this comes out in the reviews. What to one person is a slight annoyance or even a positive virtue, is something horrible to another. My own bug-bear is the question of authenticity and editions, so going to something like Verdi's Don Carlo I can get rather hung up on exactly what we are hearing, and get positively livid if the programme book does not tell you in great detail. Similarly with Handelian Opera Seria the edition used and the attitude to da capo arias is very important. I realise that productions of baroque opera which appeal to me quite often seem unreservedly boring to others. And vice versa, David McVicar's production of Guilio Cesare, which received a degree of critical acclaim, seemed to David and I to be full of awful crowd-pleasing moments which destroyed Handel's drama. So you can't please everyone.

A fascinating example of this was the recent performance of Henry and Daniel Purcell's music for The Indian Queen which Philip Pickett and the New London Consort gave at the South Bank the other day. Richard Morrison's review in the Times caught my eye because his turn of phrase was so memorable; so when I spotted Tim Ashley in the Guardian having exactly the opposite view, then I was transfixed.

Tim Ashley in The Guardian said: The playing was fabulous, the singing faultless, and the whole thing revealed The Indian Queen to be, if not quite a masterpiece, then a work of great brilliance, wit and emotional power..

Richard Morrison in The Times said: I would run barefoot through nettles to hear Purcell’s music, but even I was bored rigid by this interminably dreary presentation of his final theatre score.

The problem seems to be that Pickett chose to link the music with his own adaptation of Dryden's verse, so how you reacted to the project depended on how you liked yards and yards of 17th century verse, not all of good quality.

I'm going to keep my eyes open for further reviews!

Recent CD Review

My review of the new record from Corpus Christ College (Cambridge) Choir is here, on MusicWeb International.

A live snapshot ... the young singers bring freshness and vitality ...

Nymph Errant

On Sunday afternoon we went to see Lost Musicals doing Cole Porter's Nymph Errant at Sadlers Wells Theatre. They do concert/semi-staged performances of unusual musicals, usually with piano accompaniment. Nymph Errant was commissioned by C.B. Cochrane as a vehicle for Gertrude Lawrence, it was premiered in London and tailored to English Taste, as such it never had a Broadway premiere and was not revived after the original run. A recent revival in Chichester substantially re-wrote the book which has as a strong element of non-PC xenophobia.

Lost Musicals produced it in its original version with a cast of 15 playing some 29 named roles. The show concerns the adventures of Evangeline, the Nymph Errant of the title who, after leaving finishing school, tries to sleep her way around Europe but completely fails and returns home after a year still a virgin and promptly falls in love with her aunts gardner. During the course of her travels she bumps into various school friends who have ended up hooking up with a variety of dubious men.

Issy van Randwyck was wonderfully charismatic as Evangeline. She gets the lions share of the songs and Randwyck put them over beautifully. She was perhaps not quite as over the top in The Physician as Gertie Lawrence herself was, but van Randwyck was a pleasure to listen to.

Gay Soper played a number of roles and got 2 songs. One a lovely little number for an ageing cocotte, being put out of business by the modern, racy young women. And as the Chemstry Mistress at the Finishing School she sang Experiment to very great effect. This is one of the show's best known numbers and Soper put it over well.

The original show starred Elisabeth Welch (as a member of the Emir's harem) who sang Solomon during the original run. Even in her 70's Welch retained this number in her repertoire. At Sadlers Wells, Thelma Ruby showed that age (she's over 80 I believe) and experience counted for a lot in putting over a song, even with limited vocal equipment; her account of Solomon quite rightly brought the house down.

The remained of the cast, playing multiple roles and singing the choruses, worked hard and many displayed a wonderful variety of accents (French, German, Italian, American, Greek, Turkish, English etc.). The musical was succinctly and effectively staged, with much amusingly suitable business to go with Cole Porter's underscoring.

Cole Porter and his librettist, Rodney Brent, retained one joke until the last parft of the 2nd Act. They signalled a big romantic number from far off, Evangeline and Ben (a plumber who'd rescued her from the Emir's Harem) alone together in the romantic desert. Cue one of Porter's big tunes and Ben sings a romance to plumbing.

One of the advantages of Lost Musicals presentations is that they are done unamplified, so you are given the chance to hear actors and singers performing directly without the benefit/hindrance of amplification. They are doing Flower Drum Song next, but its probably booked up already!

Sunday was Palm Sunday so it was a busy day at church where the usual sung Latin mass (Byrd's 4-part mass and Vittoria's Pueri Hebraeorum) was prefixed by a procession and blessing of palms. I managed to pull a muscle whilst rushing to get to the opening of proceedings, so had to hobble my way round in a truly undignified manner.

Thursday night was the London Concord Singers concert at St. Michael's Church, Chester Square, London. The programme was interesting, including Lobo's Requiem and music by Gabriel Jackson, Vagn Holmboe and Mary Jane Leach. But, unfortunately, it clashed with the launch party for the Chelsea Festival and FifteenB are performing a programme at the festival, so as their Artistic Director I went along to the Festival Launch. There was quite a bit of interest in our concert which was good news and there was lots of champagne to drink, so a good time was had by all. The remainder of the festival looks interesting, very much something for everyone. We've booked for a concert by the Orlando Consort at Chelsea Old Church, but I'm not sure we'll be able to fit anything else in, because of rehearsals for our concert. Which is annoying.

At the moment we're in the middle of the London Lesbian and Gay Film Festival, so have been busy seeing films. But last night we managed to fit in Handel's Solomon given by the Orchestral of the Age of Enlightenment at the Barbican. A review will follow in due course. Then tomorrow we're off to see the Lost Musicals doing Nymph Errant which should be fun.

Recent CD Review

My review of Siegfried Wagner's opera Sonnenflamen is here on MusicWeb International.

A committed performance ... anyone interested in Siegfried Wagner’s
music can be certain of hearing a performance which makes as strong a
case as possible for the work. ...

Recent CD Review

My review of Weigl's singspiel, Die Schweizer Familie is here on MusicWeb International.

Opera Magazine - April issue

Opera Magazine's April issue had one or two interesting items.

The on-going controversy surrounding outgoing Chairman Martin Smith, is somewhat reminiscent of the parting of the ways between Vivian Duffield and the Royal Opera House. Both Smith and Duffield were highly involved in the restoration of their chosen venue, giving much of their own money and raising much more. Their efforts were highly successful but neither Smith nor Duffield seems to have been able to develop a working relationship with their company once the restoration was over. It just shows that we have a lot to learn about projects involving lots of private money, the Americans seem to do this sort of thing in rather a more satisfactory way.

There is a rather worrying interview with John Berry, ENO's new artistic director. Nothing in his plans for 2006/07 is worrying per se, but there is nothing about any committment to English opera following on from their performances of Vaughan Williams's Sir John in Love. Let us hope that the many other deserving English operas do not get swept aside again. After all 2008 will be the 50th anniversary of RVW's death.

It is heartening to read that the Conservative Party chairman, Lord Laidlaw, is giving ENO 2 million pounds, for specific productios. These were not specified, but Laidlaw has already sponsored the new Madama Butterfly and La Belle Helene.

On a more worrying note, a school teacher in Colorado has been chided (chidden?) for playing extracts from Faust to primary school children as the subject matter was considered Satanic.

Back to England, I note that Grange Park Opera has appointed a chorus master (Nicholas Jenkins). The chorus standards have sometimes seemed in need of polishing (talent and enthusiasm have never been lacking), so I look forward to hearing the results of Jenkins's efforts in Thais and L'Elisir d'Amore.

Another link with the past has gone, Eric Shilling died in February aged 85. I remember seeing him in such things as Orpheus in the Underworld and Iolanthe. It was intersting to read in the obituary that he was a conscientious objector during the War, was a Quaker and a keen supporter of War on Want and Amnesty.

Crash bang wallop,again

I came home from our weekend away to find my PC making strange noises and after letting me back things up (luckily!), it promptly switched itself off. The PC engineer came today muttering about corrupted hard drives and the PC failed to boot properly. So I'm now without a PC for a few days and must resort to pencil and paper to write with. I've started on my new orchestral piece and so have been busy working out the details of the Tippett-like welsh fairies. It's probably good for me to do things manually once in a while. I now need to bring St. Patrick into the picture, to give the fairies a sermon on Faith moving Mountains; I think I need to dig of the hymn tune St. Patrick's Breast Plate.

Hampton Court

We spent the weekend staying in Hampton Court Palace thanks to the wonderful Landmark Trust who make available an appartment in the building, just off Fish Court in the Kitchens complex. So we availed ourselves of the facilities and attended 2 services in the chapel on Sunday morning. The choir of the Chapel Royal at Hampton Court is directed by Carl Jackson, who played organ solos for me at a Chelsea Festival concert in 2000 (we interspersed my Requiem Mass with early English organ music).

For both the Sunday morning choral Eucharist and the afternoon Evensong we were lucky enough to be able to sit in the choir stalls, thus getting a good view of the service. The morning service was boys voices only, the mass setting was by Arthur Wills and was not a piece that I had come across before but proved rather effective in its use of the combination of boys and organ. It was accessible but with some rather interesting moments.

In the evening the men of the choir were joined by 4 women and sang Byrd's canticles, from his second service, plus the Tomkins responses. Wonderful music making in a venue which could have heard the music when it was new. The anthem was the stunning Blow Salvator Mundi, so contemporary in its dissonances and angular vocal line.

Recent CD Review

My review of the new recording of Handel's Fireworks and Water Musics is Here, on MusicWeb International.