November was a potentially a busy month and my next outing a week later was a concert with Bristol Choral Society of (mostly) German Romantic music in Bristol Cathedral. Actually looking at the origins of the composers, they include two Austrians, a Hungarian, a Czech and someone from Liechtenstein, but it seems the most apt overall description.<\/p>\n
Most of the programme was rather slow and gentle, so we began with something zippier: Bach’s motet Lobet den Herrn<\/i>, familiar to me but less so to many others in the choir.<\/p>\n
Mendelssohn’s Verleih uns Frieden<\/i> was a piece I’d somehow missed. A straightforward soprano line but with some lovely moments for the other voices. It was followed by an Ave Regina<\/i> by Rheinberger (whom everyone seems to be performing at the moment) and the more familiar Geistliches Lied<\/i> by Brahms.<\/p>\n
The Bruckner anniversary reappeared, this time with his last motet Vexilla Regis<\/i>, which for me is the greatest of them all, with its shifting harmonies and the ambivalent mood of its ending. If I were a Cathedral director of music I’d make it a regular feature of music lists in Passiontide. This was followed by Liszt’s Ave maris stella<\/i>, which is rather more straightforward than other church music by him that I’ve done, apart from a chromatic middle section. We ended with Mendelssohn’s Hear my prayer<\/i>, which we will take on tour next year.<\/p>\n
The programme was broken up by some organ and solo soprano pieces. The whole concert had a very pleasant atmosphere, and I particularly liked the low lighting over the audience, so we saw rows of faces receding into darkness far back in the nave.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
November was a potentially a busy month and my next outing a week later was a concert with Bristol Choral Society of (mostly) German Romantic music in Bristol Cathedral. Actually looking at the origins of the composers, they include two … Continue reading