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Church of St. John the Divine
April 11, 2017
The Victoria Baroque Players, now coming to the end of their seventh (!) season, are becoming increasing accomplished and ambitious. This evening they essayed one of the pinnacles of the baroque repertoire — and succeeded wonderfully. They did so in front of an absolutely packed Church of St. John the Divine — on a Tuesday evening!
Right from the beginning the tone was set. David Stratkauskas favoured relaxed tempi. These worked particularly well in the chorales such as "O grosse Lieb", which came off as lovely and heartfelt. The other essential element, Ben Butterfield as the Evangelist, was confident and his diction excellent. He judged the text perfectly, and was dramatic and dynamic when appropriate. He kept the action moving along nicely.
Nathan McDonald, in the role of Jesus, took a different approach. His Jesus was resigned and unworldly. He sang bolt upright and motionless. Questioned by the high priest about disciples and teaching, he sounded genuinely puzzled when he replied, "Why do you ask me about this?" At times, I would have liked a bit more drama from McDonald, even though he sang beautifully. But then it all fell into place. Having been so stoical all evening, at the climax of the piece, just before the Evangelist sings, "And He bowed his head and departed," McDonald touchingly sang, "It is finished." Then he bowed his head and left the stage. It was a quite magical moment.
The Pilate of Erasmus was a nice foil to McDonald's dispassionate Jesus. Possessed of a richly textured voice, his performance was dramatic and nuanced. He ranged from the exasperated to the angry as he struggled, trying to make sense of the crowd and the unworldly King of the Jews before him. The Ariosa, "Betrachte, meine Seel" was particularly heartfelt. It was effectively accompanied by solo violins, viola da gamba, and harpsichord. The choice of a brittle sounding harpsichord was particularly effective in this context.
The other high points are too numerous to list but I cannot forebear to mention a few of them. I was struck by the singing of Josh Lovell, perhaps the best of the young singers on display this evening, in the final aria of Part One, "Ach, mein Sinn". And on a couple of occasion Stratkauskas really whipped up the choir and had them give it some welly: for example, in No.21d when the crowd howls for Pilate to crucify Christ and in No.33, where the curtains in the temple are torn.
All in all, this was a fine, satisfying performance of one of Bach's masterpieces? The St. Matthew Passion next?
Deryk Barker has taken advantage of his contributions to this site to express his views on singing large scale Bach works one-to-a-part. So I cannot forbear to express my views. This evening, the St. John's Chamber Singers fielded thirty singers. In the chorales, I thought that they sounded great: this is music for the congregation. In the choruses, I missed the clean lines of a smaller ensemble. A choir of thirty is simply not as supple an instrument as a quartet of voices. Sometimes it was just obvious to me that we were listening to music intended to be sung one-to-a-part. As, for example, when the text tells us that four soldiers are quarreling over Christ's clothing and, instead of four voices, we hear thirty. In ideal conditions, I would take one-to-a-part or, at most, soloists and a few ripienists.
On the use of a variety of soloists: I'm agin it. In a student or semi-professional performance, you want to give everybody a turn in the spotlight. In a professional performance, you put your best singers in the solo roles and you use only as many as you need. The coach of a professional hockey team will not say, "I will give Bobby a turn on the power play. He's not the best player for the role, but he comes to all the practices and puts his heart into it". This evening, the best singers were not always on the ice for the power plays. As a professional organization, the VBP ought to reconsider its policy. Some of the soloists were apparently new to historically informed performance and made anachronistic use of vibrato.
A note on standing ovations in Victoria: Standing ovations are meant to recognize truly outstanding performances. They are not meant for good, professional performances. This evening we heard a good, professional performance. If every such performance receives a standing ovation, no distinction is conferred on the truly outstanding performance. The audience is merely being polite. Here is how to tell when to give a standing ovation: you spontaneously, without thinking about it, spring to your feet, deeply moved by what you have just heard and wildly applauding. Here is how not to give a standing ovation: slowly, tentatively, on reflection, over a period of about a minute, and after looking around and seeing what the rest of the audience is doing.
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