{"id":2103,"date":"2014-12-20T10:13:44","date_gmt":"2014-12-20T10:13:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.larkreviews.co.uk\/?p=2103"},"modified":"2014-12-20T10:15:17","modified_gmt":"2014-12-20T10:15:17","slug":"bbc-singers-messiah","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/?p=2103","title":{"rendered":"BBC Singers: Messiah"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"temple\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The Temple Festival<\/strong><\/span> ended a fine week with Messiah<\/i> but this was anything but a conventional performance. King George always complained about Handel having too many fiddles<\/i> so we can assume he would have enjoyed this arrangement by Stian Aareskjold for wind band and continuo.<\/p>\n

This was as a result of a link between the Norwegian Wind Ensemble<\/span> and the BBC Singers<\/span>, for which this Messiah<\/em> was a return visit.<\/p>\n

While much of the accompaniment sounded surprisingly close to the original there were many moments which suddenly came to life in a new way \u2013 the saxophone solo in O thou that tellest; <\/i>the Bach-like intensity of the solo flute and continuo in If God be for us<\/i> \u2013 and the use throughout of the variant versions of individual items, all kept us on our toes.<\/p>\n

A brisk overture led to an intense reading of Every valley<\/i> from tenor Samuel Boden and a crisp first chorus from the BBC Singers. Celebrating their 90th<\/sup> anniversary the BBC Singers were in excellent voice, the diction carrying easily across the Temple Church even at high speed.<\/p>\n

David Hill takes a strongly narrative approach to his performance, building from a fast moving but somewhat reserved start to an ecstatic outpouring at the Hallelujah<\/i> chorus which continues right up to the end. Adding in the organ during the Amen<\/i> chorus was a stroke of genius, giving that final lift \u2013 and gravitas from the pedal \u2013 which brought the evening to a triumphant close.<\/p>\n

Along the way there had been many splendid musical moments. Soprano Fflur Wyn was delicate for the angels at Christmas and radiant in I Know that my Redeemer liveth<\/i>. Counter-tenor Robin Blaze sang the solo version of He shall feed his flock<\/i> mellifluously, and the duet and chorus version of O Death, where is thy sting? <\/i>Samuel Boden\u2019s finely-focussed tenor brought us the alternative version of Their sound is gone out<\/i> and a spikey attack in All they that see him. <\/i>Mark Stone was a late replacement as Bass soloist and brought real authority to his arias. His commanding performance of The trumpet shall sound<\/i> really deserved applause for that one aria alone.<\/p>\n

There is no such thing as a definitive Messiah<\/i> but this was certainly among the most enjoyable I have encountered for some while.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Temple Festival ended a fine week with Messiah but this was anything but a conventional performance. King George always complained about Handel having too many fiddles so we can assume he would have enjoyed this arrangement by Stian Aareskjold … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2103"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2103"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2103\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2106,"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2103\/revisions\/2106"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2103"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2103"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2103"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}