Petite Messe Solennelle

This evening we started rehearsing Rossini's Petite Messe Solennelle for our concert at the end of September.

The Petite Messe Solennelle is the most substantial of the works written during Rossini’s Indian summer of composition. It was composed in 1863 for private performance and is scored for four soloists and chorus, with harmonium and piano accompaniment. It was not heard in public until 1869, the year after his death, when it was performed in the composer’s own orchestral version at the Théâtre Italien. The work’s title is misleading, since the Petite Messe Solennelle is neither petite nor particularly solemn. It lasts well over an hour, and despite the religious text is unmistakeably operatic in style, in common with the Stabat Mater of twenty years earlier. The music ranges from hushed intensity to boisterous high spirits, and abounds in the memorable tunes and rhythmic vitality for which Rossini became justly famous.









Performed by the Moscow Oratorio
Politechnical Museum, Moscow, May 2011
1. Kyrie (Choir).
2. Gloria (Soprano, Alto, Tenor, Bass and Choir).
3. Domine Deus (Tenor).
4. Quoniam tu solus sanctus (Bass).
5. Cum Sancto Spiritu (Choir).
6. Credo (Soprano, Alto, Tenor, Bass and Choir).
7. Sanctus (Soprano, Alto, Tenor, Bass and Choir).
8. O salutaris hostia (Soprano).
9. Agnus Dei (Alto, Choir).

Artistic Director and conductor: Alexander Tsaliuk
Accompanists: Alexander Velikovsky, Natalia Zlobina

Soloists: Ludmila Shilova - soprano, Leonid Bomshteyn - tenor, Evgeniy Liberman - bass, Gia Beshitaishvily - tenor, Alexandra Saulskaya-Shulyatieva – alto

Accomplished performance by orchestra, choir

The Dunedin Youth Orchestra and City of Dunedin Choir with conductor David Burchell gave a concert on Saturday evening, in a very well-filled Knox Church.

Dunedin Youth Orchestra and City of Dunedin Choir
Knox Church
Saturday, May 26
 
A youth orchestra it may be, with the youngest member still a 12-year-old, but Burchell drew the best from these musicians (apart from a few bars of wayward brass) and there was certainly nothing timid about their rousing overture, Rossini's The Thieving Magpie.
 
Melodic prominence of the well-known themes taken at a cracking pace, compelled the listener to sing along in their musical conscience throughout.

The orchestra's principal clarinet, Nicole Batchelar, soloed for two movements of Mozart's Concerto for Clarinet K622 with fluency, generally good resonance and impressive full-toned ornamentation.The more lyrical Adagio was well interpreted.

Karelia Suite (Sibelius) opened with a rather ponderous Intermezzo but the Ballade captured the beauty of melody with suitable passion and nuance, and the final Alla Marcia produced plenty of contrasts and attitude.

The 80-voice choir joined the orchestra after the interval. Schicksalslied (Song of Destiny) by Brahms opens in sombre mood, traversing beautiful passages of harmony and meaningful text, culminating in a final stanza of life and vibrancy.

An accomplished performance came from all, but Germanic diction was appalling resulting in a very beautiful harmonic sound-scape. (I'm sorry, but where were all the consonants?)

The final Polovetsian Dances (Borodin) was bright, forward moving and most enjoyable. Special mention must go to excellent woodwind passages, strong dynamics and good choral intonation, but again it took some time to discern the origin of the language being sung.

During the evening Alex Campbell-Hunt was awarded the Audrey Reid Composition Prize for 2012.

(Review by Elizabeth Bouman, Otago Daily Times, Monday 28 May 2012.)

Verdi Requiem

For your enjoyment, here is one of the world's greatest and most exquisite choral works, Verdi's Requiem.



Soloists:  Leontyne Price, Fiorenza Cossoto, Luciano Pavarotti, Nikolai Ghiaurov

Orchestra and Chorus of La Scala, Milan

Conductor:  Herbert von Karajan

1967

Magpie, Song and Dance

Magpie, Song & Dance concert on Saturday 26 May 2012, 7:30 pm at Knox Church.

We invite you to enjoy this performance!

The City of Dunedin Choir and the Dunedin Youth Orchestra, conducted by David Burchell, are pleased to present a concert of romantic music ranging from somewhat melancholy to excitingly vibrant moods and soaring melodies.

The programme will include Rossini's Thieving Magpie, Brahms' Song of Destiny, Borodin's Polovetsian Dances (from Prince Igor), Sibelius' Karelia Suite, and Mozart's Concerto in A for Clarinet with young soloist Nicole Batchelar, who is now in her third year of a B.Mus. focusing on conducting and composition.

Her performance instrument is the clarinet, which she has been playing for over ten years. In 2011 Nicole started teaching clarinet at Saturday Morning Music Classes, where she also assists with conducting the Junior Symphonia, with Aart Brusse. In the same year she had an opportunity to conduct her own composition, The Quake, with the Dunedin Youth Orchestra.

Rising to the Occasion

At the Sales Table on Tuesday, the challenge for the bakers was 'May is Music Month.'

Didn't they do well? Biscuits in the shape of quavers.

And, I suspect the hand of one of our native-born German speakers - in these Mozart Kuchen.
BRILLIANT!

We are a winner!

City of Dunedin Choir wins runner-up in the Arts and Culture category of the 2012 TrustPower Dunedin Community Awards!

We are so excited! We appreciate the recognition of almost 150 years of contributing to Dunedin's culture, providing a platform for young and old to perform, making the wider community all the richer for it.

Winner of this category was the Fringe Festival - congratulations to their intrepid band of volunteers.

The awards competition received a record 102 entries - the community spirit is alive and kicking in this southern city!

Song of Destiny

We are singing Brahms' Schicksalslied (Song of Destiny) with the Dunedin Youth Orchestra on Saturday 26 May at Knox Church. Do come along and enjoy our performance!

Enjoy this recording by Orchestre Revolutionairre et Romantique and the The Monteverdi Choir
Conductor: John Eliot Gardiner

Admission vouchers for our concert are now on sale!

Here's a translation of the German text:

You wander above in the light 

on soft ground, blessed genies! 

Blazing, divine breezes 

brush by you as lightly 

as the fingers of the player 

on her holy strings. 

Fateless, like sleeping 

infants, the divine beings breathe, 

chastely protected 

in modest buds, 

blooming eternally 

their spirits, 

and their blissful eyes 

gazing in mute, 

eternal clarity. 

Yet there is granted us 

no place to rest; 

we vanish, we fall - 

the suffering humans - 

blind from one 

hour to another, 

like water thrown from cliff to cliff, 

for years into the unknown depths.