Royal Philharmonic Orchestra
City of London Choir
Daniel Hyde (conductor)
Rachel Nicholls (soprano), Marta Fontanals-Simmons (mezzo), Michael Lafferty (tenor), Thomas Humphreys (baritone)
With Mozart’s Requiem as its post-interval centre piece, this was an imaginatively programmed concert. The first half comprised two takes on Goethe’s Calm Sea and Prosperous Voyage poems: first the familiar Mendelssohn overture and then the much less familiar Beethoven cantata which inspired the young Mendelssohn. Tucked in between them was Mozart’s Exultate, jubilate so there was plenty for the choir to do.
Mendelssohn’s overture is a challenging concert opener because the first section is so understated and exposed but it was played here with attractive sweetness and a lot of control while still sounding fluid. And when the ship really set sail, Hyde delivered all those cheerful Mendelssohn-ian melodies with plenty of joie de vivre. Full marks to timps and trumpets.
Exultate, jubilate is effectively a concerto for voice and it’s a treat to hear all three movements because so often we just get the third movement extracted. Rachel Nicholls, who is also City of London Choir’s voice coach, sang it with operatic warmth although the orchestra was sometimes too loud so that some of her lower notes were drowned out. She is a richly communicative singer and the musical rapport between her, Hyde and the choir was palpable.
City of London Choir is a fine ensemble – with seating in Cadogan Hall’s fairly limited space, spread onto the side balconies as well as behind the orchestra which helped to create a rounded sound. The singing in both Beethoven’s movements was enjoyably incisive.
And so the glories of Mozart’s Requiem. This was quite a large orchestra for a Mozart piece and, arguably, Sussmayr’s orchestration is too thick for the text in places. Nonetheless it was a real joy to hear the usually unnoticed trombone work cutting though the fugal Kyrie. And in general Hyde balanced choir and orchestra so that it felt coherent.
High spots included lots of pointed-up loving detail in the off-beat string passages in Tuba Mirum and nicely blended quartet singing. Thomas Humphreys and Marta Fontanals-Simmons work particularly well together especially in Recordare which also shone for the cello solo. Hyde found appealing choral colour in Confutatis too particularly from the sopranos whose gentle vulnerability was a good dramatic contrast to the men’s opening.
All in all it was pleasing performance of a well known and much loved piece. And does it matter that the dying Mozart didn’t write most of it? No, I’m just thankful someone did.
photograph of Rachel Nicholls by David Shoukry
