Tag Archives: Matthew Brook

Dunedin Consort: Leipzig 300

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Perth Concert Hall

During his pre-concert remarks, Dunedin Consort director John Butt implied that this early 2024 recreation of what Johann Sebastian Bach was composing exactly 300 years ago in Leipzig may be the beginning of a longer exploration of his cycles of weekly-composed cantatas. If so, the first one was perhaps undersold as an excellent start to the project, bringing together the University of Glasgow professor’s universally-admired scholarship, a quartet of fine singers and an expanding ensemble of versatile instrumentalists.

As is well known, Bach was third choice for the Leipzig composer and choirmaster job, and Butt presented three of his cantatas performed at the start of 1724 alongside works by the other two, Christoph Graupner’s eight-movement Ouverture in E flat major preceding Telemann’s Viola Concerto in G, with Telemann’s setting of a German paraphrase of Psalm 100 between two of the Bachs in the second half.

Of the singers, bass Matthew Brook had the best of the night, with the Telemann cantata, a “voice of God” aria accompanied by oboes d’amore in Bach’s Jeus schlaft, was soll ich hoffen (BWV 81), the opening Recitative in Gleichwie der Regen und Schnee von Himmel fallt (BWV 18), and the opening Aria of Leightgesinnte Flattergeister (BWV 181), which he attacked with articulate verve. (If there was some numerological significance to the coincident recurrence of the digits in the catalogue numbers, Professor Butt was silent on that point.)

The other voices – soprano Julia Doyle, mezzo Helen Charlston, and tenor Nicholas Mulroy – each had their own solo high spots, including Doyle’s aria Mein Seelenschatz ist Gottes Wort, Charlston’s Wohl mir, mein Jesus spricht ein Wort and Mulroy’s Der schadlichen Dornen unendliche Zahl, where his duet partner was leader Huw Daniel’s expressive violin.

The four also combined expertly in the chorales, led by Doyle, and the tempi Butt found for those were always revealing – rarely do the chorus hymns sound so much part of the shape of the cantatas as they did here.

That rhythmic assurance was just as impressive among the instrumentalists, from the opening Graupner suite with its pizzicato passage and finale full of changes of pace, through violist John Crockatt’s solo turn on the Telemann concerto, to the superb continuo playing in the closing Bach, cellist Jonathan Manson on crisp, precise form as usual.

As well as playing the oboes, Oonagh Lee and Frances Norbury provided the recorders Bach added to the score of BWV18 for its Leipzig outing, where second violins Anna Curzon and Emilia Benjamin switched to violas, the only cantata Bach wrote requiring four of them, and no fiddles.

With the natural trumpet of Paul Sharp joining the ensemble later, the sonic palette was constantly finding new colours in a programme that showed exactly how music was developing three centuries ago. As is the practice of this ensemble, that lesson was always as entertaining as it was educational.

Keith Bruce

Picture: Julia Doyle by Louise O’Dwyer

Dunedin Consort: Messiah

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St Aloysius, Glasgow

As the instrumentalists set off on the first steps of the marvellous journey that is Handel’s Messiah, it seemed that the opening “Sinfony” was even speedier than conductor’s John Butt’s brisk tempo of memory. And so it proved, with Part One – over which some versions dawdle for more than an hour – coming in at an incredibly brief 50 minutes or so.

Small wonder that tenor Anthony Gregory – most recently seen in Scotland as a memorably-characterised Count Almaviva in Scottish Opera’s Barber of Seville – added a little extravagant ornamentation to his “Comfort ye” while that was feasible. The topography of the “Every valley” that followed was exalted at pace, and that was characteristic of Butt’s direction to the end.

With the soloists stepping out from a chorus of three singers per section, in the Dunedin fashion, his Messiah is always light on its feet, but this performance, in the relatively unfamiliar resonance of the ornate church in Garnethill, was often quite startling. Despite that acoustic, the chorus “For unto us a Child is born” was as clear as it was fast, “His yoke is easy” rarely sounds quite so airy, and “All we, like sheep” gambolled more like Spring lambs.

That chorus ends what was the only sustained passage of more contemplative music – including a deeply moving “He was despised” from Bethany Horak-Hallett – and Part Two approached its conclusion with a fearsomely fast “Why do the nations?”, negotiated with enormous skill by both the string players and bass Matthew Brook.

This was a very fine line-up of soloists, bringing opera performances to the music and Charles Jennens’ inspired selection of Biblical texts. Horak-Hallett was billed as a mezzo but displayed a rich, full contralto range, and soprano Anna Dennis was on sensational form from her virtuosic turn in the Nativity story of Part One through a masterclass of vowel sounds in “How beautiful are the feet”, to technically masterful phrasing in “I know that my Redeemer liveth”, another aria that breathed afresh for being brisker. 

Butt included some music often omitted – not just the mezzo/tenor duet “O death, where is thy sting” in Part Three but also the rarely-heard chorus “Let all the angels of God worship him” and its preceding tenor recitative in Part Two – but the whole concert was still over in two and three-quarter hours, including an interval. Most importantly, the conductor’s tempi meant the narrative bowled along in an exhilarating fashion, and the work of the players and singers, whose diction was exemplary, was always precise and full of expression.

Keith Bruce

Portrait of Bethany Horak-Hallett by Emma Jane Photography

SCO / Emelyanychev

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City Halls, Glasgow

With the Edinburgh Royal Choral Union giving its annual performance of the work in Edinburgh’s Usher Hall on Sunday, re-scheduled from the early days of the New Year because of pandemic restrictions then, there has been ample opportunity for Central-belt Scots to hear Handel’s oratorio masterpiece, Messiah, in the run-up to Easter.

Unarguably, the work sits better at that point in the Christian calendar in terms of its libretto – the Nativity actually gets pretty short shrift after the “Pastoral Symphony” in the middle of Part 1 – but Messiah is much less a narrative of the life of Christ than an expression of some of the knottier philosophical issues presented by the faith, as outlined in the scriptures of the Old and New Testament. It is not to diminish the achievement of Charles Jennens, who supplied the composer with the clever text, to note that Handel himself was as well-versed in these arguments and highly Biblically literate. That is why he was able to set the words so successfully.

Led by Stephanie Gonley, who contributed some fine solo playing of her own, this edition of the Scottish Chamber Orchestra included some old friends, some early music specialists, and the keyboard talents of both the Edinburgh Choral’s director Michael Bawtree and the newly-announced director of the RSNO Chorus Stephen Doughty, alongside the harpsichord of SCO Principal Conductor Maxim Emelyanychev.

If the bouncy excitability of Emelyanychev seemed a little over-exuberant in the instrumental opening bars, there were some inspired touches in the conductor’s interpretation later on, notably the bagpipe-like drone with which he began the aforementioned “Pifa”, which here became more a stately dance. His ornamentation at the keyboard was a sparkling foil to the extra grace-notes the soloists added to their recitatives and arias.

They were a stellar quartet too. Tenor Hugo Hymas brought something of the personality of Bach’s Evangelist to his role, while Matthew Brook was as terrifically dramatic as only he can be on some of the most theatrical music of the work – and, of course, Why Do The Nations So Furiously Rage Together? seemed especially pertinent.

But there was magnificent animation in the performance of counter-tenor Xavier Sabata as well, with a memorably huge “Shame” in the middle of He Was Despised, and Anna Dennis revelled in some of Emelyanychev’s brisk tempos. The soprano was in spectacular voice, very possibly the best I have heard her, with Part 1’s Rejoice Greatly as precise as it was speedy and Part 3’s I Know That My Redeemer Liveth devastating.

Chorus director Gregory Batsleer has the SCO singers – at 50 voices a large chamber choir as much as a chorus – drilled to perfection. There were some startling moments from them throughout the performance, including a very gentle start to All We Like Sheep, a wonderfully crisp “Let us break” from the nine tenors after Brook’s furious “Nations”, and the pinpoint dynamics and pitch of the unaccompanied Since by man came death in the final section.

Keith Bruce

Pictured: Anna Dennis

RSNO / Curnyn

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Glasgow Royal Concert Hall

Even without the vicissitudes of the pandemic, the RSNO’s annual Messiah has been very much a moveable feast in recent seasons, and this one came to rest in an unaccustomed pre-Christmas slot that is currently more often associated with chamber choir concerts of the work by The Sixteen and Dunedin Consort (who perform it in Perth, Edinburgh and London next week).

At the same time, the gap between the performance styles of a big orchestra-and-chorus Messiah and the historical recreation of its Dublin premiere has also narrowed. With early music man Christian Curnyn on the podium, a compact version of the RSNO – still mostly of regulars – was joined by Mark Hindley at the harpsichord and Chris Nickol on chamber organ for a brisk version of the oratorio using what is probably the briefest permissible version of the score.

Led by Sharon Roffman, the strings and few reeds played their period part in crisp style thoughout, joined at the zenith of Parts 2 and 3 by the trumpets of Chris Hart and Marcus Pope and timpanist Paul Philbert.

The unique selling point of an RSNO Messiah is, of course, its Chorus and this live appearance by the amateur singers of the choir followed many a long month of inactivity thanks to coronavirus. So it was perhaps to be expected that there was something a little tentative about their first chorus And the glory of the Lord and some slightly ragged entries early on. It was not long, however, before they settled into their stride, and by the sequence of choruses in Part 2, culminating in a sparkling All we like sheep, all was well. More than that, here was often some exemplary ensemble singing, with a warmth of tone and balance across the sections – and a sense of unforced effortlessness at any pace or pitch.

All of which provided the ideal context for a very fine quartet of soloists indeed. Soprano Jeni Bern, countertenor Tim Mead, tenor Benjamin Hulett and bass-baritone Matthew Brook were superbly well-matched. All four have fascinatingly varied CVs and shared an expressiveness in their arias that served the narrative drive of the work, and Curnyn’s approach to the music. Mead and Hulett are both pure-toned with power across their ranges – especially impressive in the music for the alto – while Brook and Bern brought a more dramatic edge to their contributions. Brook’s Why do the nations? sounded especially pertinent, while Bern’s I know that my Redeemer liveth was fresh and tastefully ornamented.

Keith Bruce

Pictured: Tim Mead by Andy Staples