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University Centre Auditorium
February 11, 2018
"And there may be found critics so superficial as to assert that the theological sense of the sacred text was a matter of indifference to Beethoven!"
For Vincent d'Indy, the most important aspect of his own analysis of Beethoven's Missa Solemnis seemed to be to prove that its composer was not simply a believer, nor yet simply a Christian, but rather a devout Roman Catholic.
And yet the historical record would seem to argue against this. Much has been written about Beethoven's religious beliefs, or lack of same. Joseph Haydn, whose pupil he briefly was, considered Beethoven to be an atheist; Anton Schindler called him a "deist"; Goethe, whom Beethoven much admired, rejected Christianity in favour of pantheism; and when Beethoven's fellow composer Moscheles returned a manuscript to him with the words "With God's Help", his response was to write "Man, help thyself".
The composer himself wrote that "My chief aim was to awaken and permanently instill religious feelings not only into the singers but also into the listeners", but this does not resolve the question of what, precisely, Beethoven intended by the word "religious".
d'Indy's primary argument appears to be that Beethoven's setting of the Credo is so convincing as to preclude any notion that he did not mean every single word; yet this would ignore the Mass settings of, inter alia, Bach, who was a Lutheran, and Vaughan Williams, an atheist who became an agnostic.
Moreover, three of the very finest recorded performances of the Missa that I know, those conducted by Jascha Horenstein, Otto Klemperer and Leonard Bernstein, were all directed by Jewish conductors.
Beethoven's Mass, then, like all truly great music, goes far beyond anything which can be articulated in mere speech and allows the listener to take from it what they will. Furthermore, whether or not one is a believer, nobody is any doubt as to the spiritual concerns of Beethoven's late music.
Brian Wismath and the Victoria Choral Society gave a splendid performance of the Mass, its first hearing in Victoria in perhaps two decades. It was not perfect — but then perfection, artistically speaking, is surely a chimera which need detain us no further.
Throughout the work, the choir sang extremely well, producing a fine sound with some quite lovely a capella passages. Intonation was good, as was, insofar as I could tell (see below), diction. And I must, in particular, congratulate the sopranos for their opening entry in the fugal setting of "Et vitam venturi" in the Credo: the line is high and cruelly exposed, but they sounded confident and in tune; I can think of a few recordings by professional choirs which are less secure than they were.
The pickup orchestra, which included many familiar faces from the Victoria Symphony, Victoria Conservatory and elsewhere, were also splendid, producing some quite exquisite sonorities (and reminding us, if we need reminding, what a great orchestrator Beethoven was) and underlining the strength and depth of instrumental talent that this town can now muster.
As for the soloists, I cannot recall ever hearing a finer or more well-matched quartet on any stage in Victoria in my quarter-century of reviewing.
For the most part, Wismath directed with feeling and insight; however, if there is one place where he and I clearly do not see eye-to-eye it is in the matter of tempo for the opening Kyrie. Beethoven marks it "Assai sostenuto. Mit andacht"; the German means "with devotion", the Italian is harder to pin down precisely, but one thing it does not seem to mean is "slow".
Which was, for me, the problem: it was almost as if Wismath wanted to luxuriate in the gorgeous sounds his ensemble was producing, for which I have considerable sympathy, but not to the extent that the music almost seemed to drag.
The Gloria was taken at a steady, but much more appropriate tempo. Here the balance problems which inevitably seem to accompany this work became manifest: too often the choir is overcome by the accompaniment, hence my previous remark about diction. (This is no real problem in the Kyrie whose text consists of just six words.) In other places detail in the orchestra gets buried under the choir. As I have yet to hear a performance which successfully squared this particular circle, I'm inclined to place the blame with the composer, although he did not seem to have the same problems in the finale of the Ninth, which came very shortly after. Perhaps there is a PhD thesis to be had comparing the settings of the Mass, a purely religious text, and Schiller's Ode, which is, at best, deist in nature.
This movement also produced some glorious wind playing, meticulous control of dynamics and tremendous excitement in the final fugue.
The Credo was launched by a forceful chorus of trombones and horns and exhibited all of the qualities outlined above, the solo quartet at "et incarnatus" being particularly fine, ditto the a capella choral "et resurrexit".
The Sanctus was solemn, with a richly-textured introduction. "Pleni sunt coeli", sung by the chorus — the score is ambiguous and some conductors have it sung by the soloists — provided a joyful outburst before the adroitly-handled tempo change into "Osanna".
Concertmaster Simon McDonald stood to play the extensive violin solo of the Benedictus, blending superbly with the singers.
Finally, the Dona Nobis Pacem. Perhaps the martial episodes could have been a little more forceful, nevertheless the movement was appropriately supplicatory and capped a very moving performance of a very great work.
A most rewarding and enjoyable afternoon.
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