Church Times review

Festive rarities that spiced up the season

WITH his orchestra, the Vienna Concentus Musicus, Nikolaus Harnoncourt placed period-instrument performance practice at the heart of Baroque-music-making in Europe . He presented J. S. Bach’s cantatas in a distinctive manner that lent text and music a fresh clarity and impact. Others have followed his lead, and have had the courage to perform unusual Baroque-Classical programmes, eschewing the obvious, recording the unfamiliar, and displaying the verve to take their audiences with them. The Corelli Orchestra, based in Cheltenham Spa, is following in this great tradition, both in the bold programming by its conductor, the cellist and harpsichordist Warwick Cole, and, at its best, in performance quality.

Cole is both a superbly informed musician who researches his programmes thoroughly, and a fine motivator, whether conducting from the harpsichord or rising from the keyboard, like his contemporary Emmanuelle Haîm, to lend phrasing and expression to every carefully shaped bar.

For the Corelli Choir and Orchestra’s Christmas concert at St Matthew’s, Cheltenham, Cole chose to programme not just J. S. Bach’s seasonal cantata Sleepers, Wake and Corelli’s Christmas Concerto, both works that are heard reasonably often, but also two exciting rarities. The first was Wie schön leuchtet der Morgenstern by Bach’s great predecessor at St Thomas’s, Leipzig, Johann Kuhnau (1660-1722), a contemporary of Purcell and Buxtehude. This is one of half a dozen fine cantatas by Kuhnau that have been recorded by Robert King and The King’s Consort for Hyperion. This is a joyful Christmas work, which emerged here in only some of its gloriously varied hues. Indeed, in this first half of the concert, the chorus singing rarely matched the flair of Cole’s often searing, well-led orchestra.

The second half was given to the oratorio Die Kindheit Jesu (The Childhood of Jesus) by Bach’s youngest son Johann Christoph Friedrich, who was born in 1732, the year after his father, then cantor at Leipzig’s churches, first performed Sleepers, Wake. J. C. F. Bach penned another cantata also, for Easter, Die Entweckung Lazarus (The Raising of Lazarus), which like the present work, spans almost polystylistically the early and high Baroque and Classical eras. So far as we know, Die Kindheit Jesu (1773) has not been performed in England before. Written to a vivid and fanciful, picturesque text by the German poet Herder, it is styled “Biblisches Gemälde” — “Bible scenes, or pictures” — and has the colourful feel of some of the apocryphal Gospels. It might be dubbed, suggests the conductor, “a nativity play for grown-ups”.

Among the most vivid moments is the “himmlische Musik” (“heavenly music”) performed to marvellous effect in St Matthew’s by a choir and orchestra located in a high transept gallery, which counteracted the slight deadening of the carpeted nave. Another was the long — with repeats, possibly over-long — aria for the Virgin Mary. It was sung ravishingly by the rich-toned mezzo-soprano Louise Tucker, who, with the baritone Simon Birchall, proved the most memorable of the soloists.

Warwick Cole played a two-manual harpsichord built by his father, M. L. Cole of Cheltenham. A similar Cole instrument was in use on the same evening during the performance of Handel’s Messiah at Tewksbury Abbey, for which the Abbey Choir, directed by Ben Nicholas, was joined by the countertenor James Bowman.

		The Church Times 6.1.2005

		Festive rarities that spiced up the season WITH his orchestra, the Vienna Concentus Musicus, Nikolaus Harnoncourt placed period-instrument performance practice at the heart of Baroque-music-making in Europe . He presented J. S. Bach’s cantatas in a distinctive manner that lent text and music a fresh clarity and impact. Others have followed his lead, and have had the courage to perform unusual Baroque-Classical programmes, eschewing the obvious, recording the unfamiliar, and displaying the verve to take their audiences with them. The Corelli Orchestra, based in Cheltenham Spa, is following in this great tradition, both in the bold programming by its conductor, the cellist and harpsichordist Warwick Cole, and, at its best, in performance quality. Cole is both a superbly informed musician who researches his programmes thoroughly, and a fine motivator, whether conducting from the harpsichord or rising from the keyboard, like his contemporary Emmanuelle Haîm, to lend phrasing and expression to every carefully shaped bar. For the Corelli Choir and Orchestra’s Christmas concert at St Matthew’s, Cheltenham, Cole chose to programme not just J. S. Bach’s seasonal cantata Sleepers, Wake and Corelli’s Christmas Concerto, both works that are heard reasonably often, but also two exciting rarities. The first was Wie schön leuchtet der Morgenstern by Bach’s great predecessor at St Thomas’s, Leipzig, Johann Kuhnau (1660-1722), a contemporary of Purcell and Buxtehude. This is one of half a dozen fine cantatas by Kuhnau that have been recorded by Robert King and The King’s Consort for Hyperion. This is a joyful Christmas work, which emerged here in only some of its gloriously varied hues. Indeed, in this first half of the concert, the chorus singing rarely matched the flair of Cole’s often searing, well-led orchestra. The second half was given to the oratorio Die Kindheit Jesu (The Childhood of Jesus) by Bach’s youngest son Johann Christoph Friedrich, who was born in 1732, the year after his father, then cantor at Leipzig’s churches, first performed Sleepers, Wake. J. C. F. Bach penned another cantata also, for Easter, Die Entweckung Lazarus (The Raising of Lazarus), which like the present work, spans almost polystylistically the early and high Baroque and Classical eras. So far as we know, Die Kindheit Jesu (1773) has not been performed in England before. Written to a vivid and fanciful, picturesque text by the German poet Herder, it is styled “Biblisches Gemälde” — “Bible scenes, or pictures” — and has the colourful feel of some of the apocryphal Gospels. It might be dubbed, suggests the conductor, “a nativity play for grown-ups”. Among the most vivid moments is the “himmlische Musik” (“heavenly music”) performed to marvellous effect in St Matthew’s by a choir and orchestra located in a high transept gallery, which counteracted the slight deadening of the carpeted nave. Another was the long — with repeats, possibly over-long — aria for the Virgin Mary. It was sung ravishingly by the rich-toned mezzo-soprano Louise Tucker, who, with the baritone Simon Birchall, proved the most memorable of the soloists. Warwick Cole played a two-manual harpsichord built by his father, M. L. Cole of Cheltenham. A similar Cole instrument was in use on the same evening during the performance of Handel’s Messiah at Tewksbury Abbey, for which the Abbey Choir, directed by Ben Nicholas, was joined by the countertenor James Bowman.