Choir Cecilia

Nov 2017 Concert - Mt Barker

On the 26th of November, our end-of-year concert took place in Mt. Barker.

Again, we were favoured with a large audience. One ought never take an audience for granted. As soon as that happens, we start looking at empty halls. We need to, firstly, let prospective audiences know we exist, and secondly, provide good concerts, so that they want to come again. We need to maintain vigilance in the cultivation of our audience.

The program started with Viadana’s ‘Exsultate Justi’. This joyful work of praise projected its spirit well, although the central section had its moments (so to speak). However, as Sir Thomas Beecham once remarked, if we start together and finish together, who cares what happens in the middle? (Actually, the answer is – I do.) We retrieved the situation, however, with Beethoven’s beautifully-lyrical ‘Kyrie’ from his ‘Mass in C’. This expressive masterpiece was

sung with all the commitment and tenderness it requires, as well as highlighting its dramatic moments when they occurred. To finish our first bracket of choruses, that rousing final chorus from Vivaldi’s ‘Gloria’, ‘Cum Sancto Spiritu’, demonstrated the composer’s enviable skill in using his consummate compositional technique to write music of power and expression to uplift us all.

Our Guest Artist was the classical guitarist, Caleb Lavery-Brook. He played the four-movement Lute Suite in E minor of J.S. Bach. His professional skills and musicality were an impressive and fascinating addition to our concert.

For our second bracket, we performed ‘Ach Synku’, a Czech folk song, in the Czech language. According to those who know the language, we did quite well. It is a lovely tune, we sang it well, and the audience showed due appreciation at the end.

The closing words of Shakespeare’s ‘Twelfth Night’, sung to a traditional tune, was next. This was highlighted by a sterling tenor solo from the incomparable Phil Evans, Choir Cecilia’s very own Luciano Pavarotti. Well done, Phil – not an easy gig. Next was my arrangement of ‘All my trials’, a haunting and poignant spiritual. This, perhaps, was the evening’s highlight, raising tears in the audience and even from a few choristers, the way ‘Loch Lomond’ did earlier in the year. The choir excelled itself with this interpretation, and the reality of music’s effect on the emotions became clear to us all once again. Finally, we galloped through ‘Ching-A-Ring-Chaw’, a jolly American folk-song arranged by Aaron Copland and Irving Stone.

Caleb Lavery-Brook returned after the interval to astound us with his playing of the ‘Suite del Plata’ of Pujol. These five colourful, even exotic, pieces were a joy to hear.

Following that, Jill Brodie-Tyrrell, the Choir President and the Convenor of the Youth Encouragement Award, announced the recipient of the 2017 Award. We were delighted to see it presented to our accompanist, Brenna Mackay, who had done such a sterling job for us for the last two concerts. It was also a fine thing that Brenna’s sister, Zoe, and her parents, Neil and Hellen, were singing in the choir for this concert, and were given a wonderful surprise at this announcement.

And so we came to the last group of songs for this concert, and for the choir’s program for 2017.

One cannot let too many concerts go past without a Gilbert and Sullivan chorus. We opened this group of songs with the madrigal ‘When the buds are blossoming’, from one of the lesser-known G&S operas, ‘Ruddigore’. This delightful reflection, in rustic style, on the impending marriage of two young lovers, was sung with due charm and wide-eyed simplicity. Gilbert’s characterisation of bucolic innocence in his operas is so po-faced. The choir do it very well.

Next was my setting of ‘The Lamb’, by William Blake. It is poem both evocative and devotional, and I felt it called for a gentle, simple, minor-key melody. I thought the choir sang it very beautifully, capturing its mood, and reeling in the audience very convincingly. I thank the choir for their patient professionalism and goodwill once again.

‘A Gaelic Blessing’ of John Rutter was next. This short, sweetly-melodic, and well-loved piece was indeed sung sweetly and with love. The audience responded accordingly.

Our performances for the year finished with a rousing rendition of that old, old carol from ‘Piae Cantiones’, a publication from Finland and Sweden of devotional songs, published in 1582. It was a grand way to finish the year, and the audience gave the choir a rousing reception.