Recent reviews
Dated: 27/04/2010
Carmina Burana, 3rd April The Sage Gateshead.
David Denton, The Yorkshire Post
Having spent a lifetime hearing concerts in Leeds Town Hall, listening to music in the ideal acoustics of Gateshead's The Sage was as if we had arrived on another planet. It is only an hour's drive up the motorway, and this sonic experience is worth every single mile.
From the beautifully transparent sounds to the spine-tingling impact that thrilled in a high-octane and superb performance of Carl Orff's Carmina Burana, the Huddersfield Choral Society have never sounded in finer voice and revelled in their wonderful surroundings.
It was conducted by Bramwell Tovey, who dragged every last drop of bawdy humour from the score, aided and abetted by the acting of the tenor, John Graham-Hall, and a familiar face at Opera North, the powerful baritone of William Dazeley.
Though I often write of the outstanding qualities of the Opera North Orchestra, hearing them here was a whole new experience, and had started out with the delicacy of Grainger's arrangement of Ravel's La vallée des cloches.
Susan Gritton, who sang the small but taxing part in Carmina, was also the soloist in Ravel's song cycle, Sheherazade, her hushed singing of exquisite quality, opening out with a perfectly rounded voice that easily dominated the orchestra.
http://www.yorkshirepost.co.uk/music/Review-Orchestra-of-Opera-North.6215932.jp
Gavin Engelbrecht, The Northern Echo
THE Orchestra of Opera North is more often hidden from view in the pit, providing backing to a range of operatic productions.
But it remains the only ensemble in the country to have a year-round dual role in the concert hall.
In a rare foray into the open in the North-East, it gave a spectacular concert at The Sage.
The orchestra, under the baton of Bramwell Tovey, began with sensitive take on Ravel’s La Vallee des Cloches, arranged by Percy Grainger.
Asie, the second song in Ravel’s Sheherazade, was billed as being “definitely on the list of things to hear before you die”. Soprano Susan Gritton gave a performance to die for; her voice sensuously entwined with the flute in her delivery of La flute Enchantee.
The evening was rounded off with Orff’s Carmina Burana, a work more commonly known by the opening lines of Fortuna Imperatix Mundi, which has been filched by countless advertisers.
The mighty forces of the Huddersfield Choral Society – all 200 members – hurled out the introduction with unbridled gusto and at a volume that blew one’s socks off.
Baritone William Dazeley gave a robust peformance, his powerful voice adding an earthy gravitas to Omnia Sol Temperat. Tenor John Graham- Hall stole the show with his performance of Olim Lacus Colueram – the pain in his voice exquisite as he took on role of the beautiful swan “black and roasted to a turn”.
A further highlight was provided by Gritton’s flawless tripping up and down the highest of scales in Dulcissime.
Throughout, Tovey had a dynamic grip on the rhythms of the work. A tour de force.
http://www.thenorthernecho.co.uk/leisure/8090207.print/
Judas Maccabaeus, 16th April Huddersfield Town Hall
William Marshall, The Huddersfield Examiner
THE Choral Society combined thrillingly with a large contingent of singers from the Osaka Symphonic Chorus for this performance of Judas Maccabaeus, one of Handel’s best-known oratorios.
Obviously, this artistically interesting exercise in international co-operation added greatly to the vocal power available. But the success of the venture did not stem purely from the augmentation of the choir and the scope for extra-formidable fortissimos.
It seemed to me that the Japanese singers – while blending perfectly well with their Huddersfield colleagues and seeming to have excellent command of the English text – added something distinctive to the overall vocal timbre.
It is quite true that some of the most exciting moments in the performance were a result of the extra-large body of voices.
For example, there were several musical climaxes in which the unleashed sound of the high sopranos was enough to pin members of the audience back in their seats. But a paradox of large choirs is that they are often most powerful when singing with controlled emotional intensity at fairly low volumes.
For example, one of the most beautiful and moving moments in this Judas Maccabaeus was in the air and chorus “Ah! Wretched, wretched Israel!”.
Scored by Handel with a string accompaniment that lent an almost Purcellian melancholy, this section produced a deeply felt performance from all of the singers and the instrumentalists of the Manchester Camerata, coaxed beautifully by conductor Takuo Yuasa.
The solo singer in this air was the soprano Ruby Hughes, who was, I think, the pick of the guest soloists. She skipped lightly over the Handelian rhythms and gave a delightful performance in the delicate air “O liberty, thy choicest treasure”, accompanied by just harpsichord and cello – a nice contrast to the rather contrabass-heavy scorings used almost everywhere else.
Purists might object that such large massive forces bear little relation to those that Handel himself would have mustered.
But in the context of the Town Hall and its long, unbroken tradition of oratorio singing, it was actually highly authentic.