Review Details
MUSIC IN THE UNIVERSITY THE CHAPEL CHOIR OF KING’S COLLEGE KING’S COLLEGE CHAPEL
Alan Cooper
26 March 2009
King's College Chapel
I do not really know why this should be, but somehow, the nine o’clock start for the Chapel Choir’s celebration of Easter added something magical to the atmosphere surrounding the music. It engendered that tranquil, pensive ambiance that chimed in perfectly with the service of Tenebrae for which the opening music was originally composed. This was Allegri’s Miserere, one of the most otherworldly gems of the choral repertoire. Sung as it was from the anti-chapel transforming the choir into a nebula of disembodied vocal textures it was all the more effective. The plainchant episodes sung by the male voices alternating with melting polyphonies and a solo soprano voice that soars heavenwards, all were nicely done with a particularly fine contribution in this performance from the altos.
The choir moved to the area of the original choir stalls for their second piece, Haydn’s anthem Insane et vane curae. For this piece, conductor Roger Williams handed over direction of the chorus to Christopher Barr while he provided the organ accompaniment. A rich mixture of stops played with a bit of a lilt alternated with fresh yet tender passages for flutes. The choir chimed in with admirable enthusiasm and vigour singing their hearts out in this central piece which provided a gloriously extrovert interlude as only Haydn can do between two pieces of much more thoughtful music.
This second section of more deeply emotional music consisted of the Five Spirituals by Michael Tippet originally composed for his most celebrated work A Child of our Time but rearranged by him for performance on their own. For these the choir moved to the front of the Chapel and Roger Williams once more took over direction of the chorus. Groups of soloists from the choir changed around for the various spirituals culminating in a splendid small sub chorus in Deep River. These spirituals were most movingly sung with careful attention to dynamics from rich fortes to the most delicate pianissimos sometimes at the very start of the piece which is most difficult to do. Nobody Knows was particularly impressive sung with a kind of pizzicato texture which, at the opening, made the voices sound like the pitter-patter of gentle rain. The choral writing in these works is actually very sophisticated but Tippet never loses sight of the basic simplicity that lies at the heart of the melodies and the Chapel Choir put this across really well making this a wonderfully moving performance in some ways even outshining the Allegri Miserere.