Rossini Rave Reviews
10 July 2016
108 choir members combined with four soloists and two keyboard
players to lift the roof of St Matthew’s Church last night in a
performance of Rossini’s Petite messe solennelle, receiving
rave reviews from all who were there for the performance.
Applause
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The choir were delighted to welcome Northamptonians in the form
of Eleanor Minney, our Mezzo Soprano soloist, and a regular soloist
with Sir John Eliot Gardiner’s Monteverdi Choir, and the pianist,
composer, lecturer, and broadcaster, David Owen Norris. Both of our
keyboard instruments – an 1881 Mustel Harmonium and an 1887 Pleyel
Piano (owned by David Owen Norris himself) – were constructed around
the time of the composition of Rossini’s Mass (1863), and the
sonorities ranged from the intimacy of a song recital, up to full
blown, all-guns-blazing choruses.
Mustel Harmonium
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Pleyel Piano
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For what we think is the first time in the choir’s history, the
singers performed in a mixed-up arrangement on stage; in other
words, no-one in the choir was sat next to anyone else singing the
same vocal part as them. This had been tested in rehearsal, and the
whole choir committed to the brave step with great panache, and it
paid off. A number of audience members commented on the quality of
the tuning and the blend, and it was noticeable from the conductor’s
podium how much more powerful and alive the sound was.
Adrian on the Harmonium
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Quartet in Action
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Rossini’s Mass is, of course, neither small – running to around
80 minutes in length, nor solemn – texts which you might expect to
be the subject of awe-stricken reverence are treated with a spring
in the step which often veers towards the jauntiness of operetta.
And while it follows the form and Latin text of a mass (once our
Musical Director had ironed out Rossini’s mistake in the Credo!), it
is only occasionally that you discern any linkage to standard
liturgical music: this is unquestionably the output of an opera
composer sticking to what he does best.
Soprano Solo
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Soloists in Full Flow
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The soloists, keyboard players and choir, brought the work to
life in a vivid way, and our Musical Director was congratulated by
innumerable audience members after the concert for bringing the
standards of the choir up to their highest level in years. We cannot
wait until our next concert with him on 10 December, after our
recording sessions of Fauré’s Requiem on 21/22 October, and
Poulenc Gloria with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and
Jean-Luc Tingaud on 27 November.
Soloists Applause
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