Berberis' World

Saturday, 6th July 2013, Cadogan Hall, London.

Leoš Janácek: Otce Náš
John Carmichael: Hommages
Eric Whitacre: Cloudburst
Eric Whitacre: When David Heard
Leonard Bernstein: Chichester Psalms

Tenor: Paul Austin Kelly
Countertenor: Roderick Morris
Harp: Alison Martin
Piano/Organ: Nico de Villiers
Percussion Leader: Matthew Turner

Conductor: Dan Ludford-Thomas

This was not my introduction to Eric Whitacre – that was Lux arumque back in 2008 – but it was my first hearing of the transcendent When David Heard. Go and listen.

I’ve listened to the Janácek piece a couple of times since this concert and still don’t like it. I can only put this down to having learned the Lord’s Prayer by rote as a child and, to my ears, anything other than a spoken version just sounds wrong. I would have preferred to sing it in Czech, but I suspect that was deemed too difficult. It’s not, but it wasn’t my decision.

An homage is an odd thing. If you don’t know the original piece, then all you see is other people nodding and making ‘oh, that’s so clever!’ faces. If you don’t, then just close your eyes and listen to the music. You’ll either like it or you won’t, but at least you don’t have to look at people being smug.

Cloudburst does exactly what it says on the tin, but it’s the sort of weather we rarely get in the UK. The rain is warm, and you inhale that smell from hot pavements, and the world afterwards seems lighter and fresher. I was even okay with the thigh-slapping and finger-clicking.

Chichester Psalms are lush and lovely, especially the final psalm. It’s film music, and in a good way. In my Boosey & Hawkes score, two bars before fig. 60, under where the C flat becomes a B natural, I wrote ‘it’s the same note, doofus’. Which it is. Only it isn’t. The sopranos (sorry, Maestro Bernstein) go from A flat to G natural at the same time, and this is also the same note. Only it also isn’t. It’s all in the accompaniment. Beautiful stuff.

And then there’s When David Heard. If only to do justice to three bars – 17, 18, and 19 – this needs a vaulted ceiling high enough to allow it to take flight, to rise, to soar, to ring around carved stone, to rattle stained glass windows. From the first chill of bereavement, to the anguish that – literally – stops you in your tracks with tears coursing down your face, to the unreasonable and incoherent rage that surges though you, to the intense sorrow that settles and, with time, becomes a shadow, When David Heard is months – sometimes years – of angst distilled into a few minutes of astonishing beauty.

“Above all, trust the silences.”

Saturday, 20th April 2013, St Mary’s Church, Lewisham.

Praise the Lord: Traditional, arr. K Burton
Even Such Is Time: Poem – Sir Walter Raleigh, Music – Bob Chilcott
Total Praise: Music – Richard Smallwood, arr. Dan Ludford-Thomas
For Once In My Life: Miller & Murden, arr. Jon Cohen
Lean On Me: Bill Withers, arr. Jon Cohen
And So It Goes: Words and music – Billy Joel, arr. Bob Chilcott
Accentuate the Positive: Arlen & Miller, arr. Jon Cohen
The Turtle Dove: Traditional, arr. Vaughan Williams
How Can I Keep From Singing?: Music  R Wadsworth Lowry, arr. Jon Cohen
She Moved Through The Fair: Traditional, arr. Peter Hunt
Bridge Over Troubled Water/Fix You:  Simon & Garfunkel/Coldplay, arr. Peter Mitchell
Like A Mighty Stream: Jacobson & Hogan
Come and Go With Me: Traditional, arr. K Burton

The Lewisham & Greenwich NHS Trust Choir

Sopranos: Suzanne Benett, Zoe Davies, Caroline Duffy, Sheena Joseph, Joan Mills, Elem Nnachi, Katie Rogerson, Christine Scarsbrook, Elizabeth Steele
Altos: Antonia Boyce, Caroline Harbord, Petrina Pottinger, Claire Roberts, Caroline Smith, Nora Smith, Sarah Wood
Tenors: Edmund Chaloner, Chidi Ejimofo, Derrick Kiteke, Errol Woodburn
Basses: Simon Fitzgerald, Malcolm Hancock, Aaron Hoyte, Emmet Masterson

The Liam Dunachie Trio

Piano: Liam Dunachie
Double Bass: Andy Robb
Drums: Dave Storey

Musical Director: Peter Mitchell
Artistic Director: Dan Ludford-Thomas

As I’m writing this nearly five years after the actual event, it’s fair to say that I don’t remember much about this concert. However, what I can say – without fear of contradiction – is that the Liam Dunachie Trio would have been amazing, Dan would have been full of energy and inspiration, and someone/several people, at some point, would have forgotten the words +/- the tune of one or more of the songs.

I don’t recall Praise the Lord, The Turtle Dove, or Like A Mighty Stream, probably because we don’t perfom them anymore. I do recall For Once In My Life, but we don’t perform that anymore, either. Come & Go With Me would have involved several key changes at the end (although not as many as I expect), and at least a dozen of the people at this gig have now moved on – including Dan and Pete.

Saturday, 23rd March 2013, Great Hall, Goldsmiths College.

Henryk Górecki: Totus Tuus
Igor Stravinsky: Ave Maria/Pater Noster
John Tavener: The Lamb/The Tyger/Song for Athene

Frédérick Chopin: Polonaise in E flat Minor Op. 26 No. 2
George Gershwin: Prelude No. 1 in B flat major
Piano: Andrew Dutson

Arvo Pärt: Sieben Magnificat-Antiphonen

Fratres
Piano: Nico de Villiers
Violin: Sebastian Müller

De Profundis
Magnificat
Nunc Dimittis

What I really loved about the music for this concert was its precision. The main problem with it was its precision. You have to be supremely confident to stay in tune whilst first one person, then those around them, then half a section, and finally the entire choir, sags half a tone, then another half, and finally into another key entirely. It’s also very melancholy, which – in my opinion – makes any deviation from the score not just inconsiderate, but insulting.

It’s not difficult to stay in tune. It just takes care and concentration. I get irritated with people who either can’t or won’t take the time to learn their parts. I get annoyed when they get phrases wrong despite having the tune played to them repeatedly. I get angry when they refuse to take any notice when they’re told they’re wrong. If you end a phrase a tone lower (and it’s always lower) than it should be, then you need to be paying more attention to what you are singing. You should also be paying attention to what your neighbour is singing. If they’re out of tune, they need to be told.

I have the word PITCH!! written like that in the last three systems of the Górecki. It matters. If you now can’t reach the notes you once could, consider moving to a lower voice part. Don’t think of it as a failure, think of it as a new adventure. These are the notes the composer wrote – please sing these, and not the notes you think they are.

Rant over. Don’t get me started on counting.

Transfixed utterly by the Fratres. Damn.

The Universal Edition scores we used for the Nunc Dimittis and the Antiphonen have the number of beats in the bar helpfully indicated by a big number above the bar, whereas the other pieces have the much more subtle time signature. Not sure why there’s a difference: if you can count, it doesn’t matter.

There are some really oddities in the Antiphonen. In the premiere, the sopranos and basses aren’t singing what is printed in the score. From bar 46, they sing what is not printed. This might explain why this is called the original version, although why Arvo Pärt would rewrite his own composition – or allow it to be changed – is strange. A cursory look online doesn’t reveal any clues, but I’m happy to be proved wrong.

There is a wealth of Pärt analysis online: in just one search, I found a bewildering doctoral dissertation by Allan J. Ballinger DM that I’ve set aside a day or so to read, and a more accessible Guardian piece by Tom Service. I can only comment as an amateur alto, and say that we got to explore the depths of our range with the first tenors in the O Adonia, as well as treating our vocal chords to a nice top E  in the O Schlüssel Davids.

All of this should really be hanging around a church vault for a few seconds after the singing has finished, not being stifled somewhat by the ceiling of Goldsmiths Great Hall, but the venue is what it is, and at least the sight lines are generally good so you can keep an eye on Dan.

Of the Pärt, I think my favourite was the Nunc dimittis. From the 2001: A Space Odyssey opening few bars, to the Gloria Patris, where the melody is passed seamlessly between voice parts, it’s gorgeous. Special mention goes to bar 93 – which is hair-on-the-back-of-the-neck-raising, spine-tinglingly beautiful – and bars 103-105; I have a version on my phone where these bars are the musical equivalent of having the best chocolate in the world melt in your mouth. Stunning.

This was Andrew Dutson’s last performance with the LCS, and he received a lengthy round of applause following his performance. I often wonder what the audience thinks of the foot stamping that’s become something of a feature at the end of a concert. It’s something I’ve only come across in choirs and, although it’s mentioned in passing here, it doesn’t appear on this lovely little pic…

…although it’s less ‘lightly stamp’ than trying to split the floor. If I was inclined, I’d do some more research.

What else? Nothing useful. Find it all on YouTube and immerse yourself.

Saturday, 15th December 2012, St Mary the Virgin, Lewisham.

Vaughan Williams: Fantasia on Christmas Carols

Carols for choir and audience: Make we joy now in the fest/A Boy is born in Bethlehem/Wither’s Rocking Hymn/O come, O come Emmanuel/Quem vidistis pastores dicite/Hodie Christus natus est/A great and mighty wonder/Infant holy, infant lowly/Ding dong! Merrily on high/Deck the hall/I wonder as I wander/There is a flower/See amid the winter’s snow/O come, all ye faithful

Piano: Nico de Villiers

Conductor: Dan Ludford-Thomas

Saturday, 17th November 2012, Great Hall, Goldsmiths College.

Mozart: Mass in C Minor
J S Bach: Jesu meine Freude
Beethoven: Choral Fantasia

Sopranos: Rachael Austen, Louise Kemeny, Helen Meyerhoff
Tenor: Thomas Herford
Bass: Philip Tebb

Forest Philharmonic Orchestra

Piano: Nico de Villiers

Conductor: Dan Ludford-Thomas

This was the first concert I did after I rejoined the Lewisham Choral Society. I’d briefly thought about going back after the debacle with the LPC but, whenever I did, I imagined returning would be a public admission of failure: I’d failed my re-audition with the LPC, and there were a number (albeit a small number) of people who would know that I’d failed. Also, I’d been part of a choir who’d failed to win a singing contest. I was going back because I just wasn’t very good.

I’d left LCS just before Stefan Reid departed. His successor – Dan – was one of the people who’d coached the hospital choir to our joint 2nd place at Llangollen, and it was Dan’s suggestion that I rejoin LCS. His enthusiasm was sufficient for me to think that it wasn’t out of pity, but a genuine belief that LCS was a very good choir and that I might enjoy it.

The bit of Beethoven’s Choral Fantasia we performed sounded remarkably like an early draft of the last movement of his Symphony No. 9. Bach’s ‘Jesu meine Freude‘ is much nicer. It’s not Nänie – what is? – but I preferred it to the Beethoven. It was written for a 5-voice choir (!) and I don’t know whether or not this was the reason for omitting bars 123-146 and 277-405. It surely couldn’t have been because it’s difficult to sing, because there are longer semiquaver runs in the B minor Mass. Perhaps it was for time, or the overall feel of the piece.

The Mass in C is not as instant as the Requiem, although that’s probably because I’ve sung the latter half a dozen times, and it’s used in dozens of films, documentaries, adverts, etc. However much I prefer the Requiem, I’m not on the committee so the Mass in C is what we got. My score has yellow highlighter all over the first half, and then – apart from a few scribbles in pencil – there’s nothing. This probably reveals more about my frame of mind than anything to do with the music. A safe, if unmemorable, return.