Mary and more

We caught L'Enfance du Christ at Wesley, performed by the Llewellyn Choir. It's one of Megan's favourites, although she knows it in the original French. This was in English. I could understand some more, of course, but it's never easy to catch lyrics. Reading some, I'm not sure it mattered. What I read was a strangely domestic thing, just a passage of St Matthew's gospel, in Berlioz's own words, in three parts, telling of Herod's and his massacre of the innocents and the flight into Egypt by Mary and Joseph with the baby Jesus and the arrival at Sais. It lasted a little over 90 minutes, with a shorter middle section, apparently written first and expanded for the final work, comprising the most famous tune, the Shepherd's farewell. In addition to the large choir of 80 SATB singers, conductor Rowan Harvey-Martin led five singers (one woman as Mary and four men) and the Llewellyn Sinfonia of 19, mostly made up of CSO players. The work was very attractive and admirably performed so the time went easily and we were treated to three final carols for Christmas, including Silent night where our sing-along was invited. So, a lovely work that I'm very glad I caught, well presented in an intimate venue. Even from the back, we could see enough to be involved even if the choir was offside in the stalls for some of the time. Wonderful.

The Llewellyn Choir and Sinfonia performed L'Enfance du Christ at Welsey under Rowan Harvey-Martin (conductor) with soloists Rebecca Collins, Rohan Thatcher, Andrew Fysh, Michael Wilson and Michael Martin (vocals).

No complaints

I’ll never complain about the cost of double bass strings again. We saw harpist Tegan Peemoeller with baritone Rohan Thatcher at the Artists Shed at Queanbeyan on Sunday. After the gig, she gave a Harp 101 lecture with harp lore, an introduction to the instrument and a few Q&As. As for the strings, a full set costs $1,000 to $2,000. They are the work of an afternoon to change (masters may get it down to 1 hour). The upper strings are changed every 3 months; the middle strings, every 6 months; the bass strings, every year. This is for a well maintained, professional player. Then there’s the set of tools to go in the purse (most harpists seem to be female) and the annual services. It’s an investment and not for the faint-hearted. Bass strings at $200 a set changed annually seems a doodle; as for guitar strings at $15 a set, baby-food.

But what of the sound? I hear classical guitar from the nylon strings, and techniques like damping and harmonics and finger plucking versus arm sweeps. Also the sound of piano in the lower registers. But something unique in the harp is enharmonics, which allows those wonderful sweeping glissandi that define the instrument. Tegan explained it’s possible given pedals setting multiple strings to the same pitch, eg, D flattened to Db on one string and C sharpened to C# on the next. This is a playing technique on harp, not just a tuning possibility. Genuinely interesting.

Tegan played a first set solo: various arrangements and compositions for the harp. Robert Maxwell's arrangement of Rimsky-Korsakov; was it another Respighi; an original tune by Jim Cotter for Leonard Rice called Kasuri, the Japanese dyed and woven fabric; two by Salzedo. I was fascinated by the technique: Tegan's high elbows and flowing style, her plucking that was sometimes sharp but richly varied to draw a range of tones. I noticed her sing finger seemed to play the tonic and she confirmed later that it's a key finger. Strange, because the little finger is at the lowest pitch, on both hands. Also, the thumb that swipes or plucks. I though I could see a common chordal shape in the hands, but Tegan said that's not really the case. Certainly, they create a range of forms to play scales and intervals.

Rohan came on for the second set and the first piece was my favourite for the concert: 4 of 9 English songs by Hindemith, modern with consonance and dissonance interspersed and Rohan's voice singing in English. The songs were On hearing the last rays of sunshine, Echo, Envoy and The wild flower song. Voice and harp are such beautiful instruments and so unusual to hear together. This was truly lovely and strangely out of time, or perhaps out of our time. Then some choices by Rohan, all poems put to music: John Ireland's The vagabond and George Butterworth's settings for two poems by AE Hausman. Then a final solo harp piece, an arrangements of favourite bits from several version of Robert Maxwell's Ebb tide. Here I noticed several lines that spoke of jazz: the first notes of Misty and other hints I heard but not couldn't name.

But what a wonderful, tuneful, soft and intimate sound is the harp. And it was just enhanced by the humanness of the voice. Small and intimate and dreamy. Lovely. Tegan Peemoeller (harp) performed with Rohan Thatcher (baritone) at the Artists Shed, Queanbeyan.

UC Bach

This was a combination I jumped at: UC Chorale and JS Bach. Everyone loves Bach; enough said. But the UC (University of Canberra) College of Music has intrigued me since I was singing in a few local choirs a few years back and heard something of them. The website suggests training and performance with a strong community orientation that caters for all levels. Some performing groups are auditioned, others not, but they perform significant works. This performance was of two Bach Cantatas (BWV105, BWV39) and the G Major mass (BWV236) by the UC Chorale. It’s an unauditioned choir, has a strong training component and it performs at least two major performances each year.

The works required a chamber orchestra with choir and solo singers. The soloists had considerable training: these singers were not just off the street. The instrumentalists were paid, so professional. I recognised a few faces from the ANU School of Music and this was no surprise. The choir was 38 voices: surprisingly strong on sopranos and weak on tenors and basses. Unfortunate but not uncommon. The chamber orchestra was interesting, with a few strings (2 x violin, cello, bass) and continuo keys, but I found the other members interesting: bassoon, 2 x oboe, occasional trumpet, 2 x recorders. It made for an interesting sound that was obviously pre-modern and may be standard for the period. Certainly the square baroque lines of crotchets and quavers were true to style - lively and dancing, but with its own dignified, stilted formality – sometimes moving with the voices, sometimes working lines at counterpoint, but always attractive and reasoned. I say nothing by admiring the master. Bassist Justin seemed a key to all this – strongly present and steady and seemingly the loudest in this space. Maybe it was the space, but I found the choral vocal parts not too well defined, but what bliss when they opened up! Choirs are like that. The arias and recicatives made up the middle parts of each work, with choral passages at start and finish, and they were lovely and personal rather than outspoken and exciting. I particularly enjoyed one duet of sopranos that had voices playing against each other. But I felt for the singers (was it soprano Misako and bass Rohan?) who had those caddish baroque semiquaver lines to sing. It just looked and sounded so difficult. And tenor Dominic had some notes that reached like spires to the Heavens in his aria during the Mass. But I enjoyed it immensely. It’s not professional, but it’s a wonderfully capable choir. It’s a pleasure to me that a community group (admittedly with some perfectly well-trained soloists and professional instrumentalists) can do justice to these major works. I’ll be looking out for more.

The UC Chorale performed two Bach cantatas, BWV105 and BWV39 and the Mass in G major BWV236. It was led by Andrew Koll (conductor) with concert master Timothy Wickham (violin) and soloists Felicity Moran (soprano), Misako Piper (soprano), Sarahlouise Owens (soprano), Dominic Popperwell (tenor) and Mark Popperwell (tenor) and Rohan Thatcher (bass).

Closest to Bach

It felt like the closest that I’ve got to JS Bach when we heard the St Matthew Passion last night. It was performed by the Llewellyn Choir accompanied by the Llewellyn Sinfonia and conducted by Rowan Harvey-Martin at the Canberra Girls’Grammar School hall. Why the closest? I think because it’s storytelling in German. The music remains glorious, but the essence is the story, recited in German by the Evangelist and sung in person by several solo singers and the choir as the People. The words are the essence. It was likely first performed in Thomaskirke, where Bach worked at providing music each week, on Good Friday in 1727. This was work for Bach but it was work of a believer for presentation to other believers. It’s a Passion, a reciting of Christ’s suffering on the cross, the essence of the Christian story. And from my reading of dictionary.com and the Shorter Oxford, this is the origin, from Middle English and mediaeval Latin, of our common word, passion.

It’s a long work, written for soloists, double choir and double orchestra. It was to be performed in two halves, before and after the sermon on Good Friday. The score is further divided into three parts: a narrative using biblical text; various recicatives, arias and choruses; and the chorales. It’s music that is subject to the story and the demands of the people, the claps of thunder, sadness or fear or rejections of the apostles are all expressed clearly. I revelled in the big chorale sections and loved the several returns of the main choral theme, sometimes slower, sometimes livelier, usually with varying words. I enjoyed the dignified Evangelist as he told his story that I wished I could understand without looking at a projected translation, I loved the instrumental accompaniments with the solo singers: violin, cello, organ (I think this is the same chamber organ used by Igitur Nos last week), harpsichord, flutes or oboes. I enjoyed the autal and contrapuntal movements left to right of the choirs and also the orchestras. And it’s an impressive theatre. It looks to be carefully set up for sound, although perhaps for a bigger rather than a precise sound. And it’s pleasantly human in dimensions; it has a massive stage but you still feel close. (Too bad about the noisy aircon). From the orchestra, I particularly noticed the clarity of the two single basses, and that glorious little but persistent organ sound. This music is dignified and ordered, but more than instrumental Bach, it is subordinate to words. A stunning piece of beauty well performed. Congratulations to all involved.

The Llewellyn Choir and Llewellyn Sinfonia performed JS Bach’s St Matthew Passion at the Canberra Girls’Grammar School hall. Key performers were Rowan Harvey-Martin (conductor), Michael Martin (Evangelist, tenor), Stephen Barnett (Jesus, bass), Rebecca Collins (soprano), Christina Wilson (contralto), Rohan Thatcher (bass).