Verdi's Requiem - Saturday
19th June 2004
York Musical Society /
Philharmonischer Chor, Münster
IT IS always a good sign when a
performance ends with a prolonged silence: nobody wants to break the spell.
Verdi's Requiem, once dubbed
his "finest opera", generated an immense aura that in some ways
surpassed the sum of its parts.
The occasion drew added lustre
from the presence on the platform of 56 members of the Philharmonischer Chor, Münster,
with their conductor Martin Henning.
But it was Philip Moore who
took the podium.
Never demonstrative, on this
occasion he shook off the shackles of restraint in a display of rare intensity.
Verdi leans heavily on his
soloists, and here Moore had chosen wisely.
Jane Irwin's sturdy mezzo set
the tone early with her dramatic contribution to the Dies Irae. Sally Johnson's
soprano took slightly longer to find focus, but her courage in the stratosphere
consistently set the hairs on end, notably in the Libera Me.
Joshua Ellicott's tenor was
especially fluent in the Ingemisco, while Daniel Jordan's bass was never less
than a reliable underpinning to a determined quartet.
The choir, always on its toes,
reached its apogee in an excited and exciting Sanctus, and built up its various
utterances of Dies Irae into considerable anger by the end. The sopranos shone
throughout.
The orchestral brass, perhaps
inevitably in York Minster's lustrous acoustic, delivered a gleaming, majestic
Tuba Mirum. If the strings were never quite as dashing, the overall effect was
stunning nevertheless, a memorable experience.
Source:
www.thisisyork.co.uk
Reprinted by kind permission of the York
& County Press
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