Review of our performance of Bach's B Minor Mass

[Cunctator]

We did two performances of the B Minor Mass last Thursday and Friday nights. The review in today’s paper is positive overall, but makes some telling comments about tempi:

Sydney Philharmonia Choirs
City Recital Hall, 26 June
Reviewed by Harriet Cunningham
This was a performance, as they say, of two halves. The first was a rich mixture of promise and prangs. The second was far more consistent, building to a triumphant finish.

Music director Brett Weymark wins the lion’s share of praise and blame. It was he who catapulted the choir into the opening *Kyrie * of Bach’s Mass in B Minor with the kind of attack that gives consonants a bad name. It was also he who took the *Cum Sancto Spiritu * at – for me – a dangerously fast pace, and the fugue of the *Kyrie * dangerously slow, with over-phrasing turning Bach’s infinitely long lines into a choppy plod.

But it was also Weymark who, ultimately, was responsible for preparing a choir which, at its best, for example in the stately six part *Sanctus * or the wonderfully atmospheric Et incarnatus, was absolutely outstanding.

The biggest challenge of the night was perhaps the Gloria, with its ecstatic trumpet and oboe parts, and here the fault was not with the conductor: a trumpet trying to be discreet is like an elephant trying to blend in at a mouse convention. It will not work. Their best bet was to be loud and proud but instead we got tentative and patchy. By contrast, bass soloist Andrew Collis and horn player Michael Dixon demonstrated, in the Quoniam, how to make a very hard solo sound (almost) effortless.

Indeed, it was the many high points of the performance that made tricky moments forgivable, such as ever-consistent Sara Macliver who, with Toby Cole, brought a measured polish and pace to the *Christe Eleison * duet, and the delicate phrasing of concertmaster Alice Evans and flute soloist Melissa Farrow.

[Duck_Duck_Goose]

…I had to google “prangs”, and I still don’t know what that sentence means. Was the concert a mixture of plane crashes, car crashes, airborne bombing, and Thai temples, because if so, I’m damn depressed that I missed what must have been the Bach halftime show of the century, if not the millenium?

What, no lasers?

[Duck_Duck_Goose]

Clearly, Harriet was having a bad night.

By contrast, bass soloist Andrew Collis and horn player Michael Dixon demonstrated, in the Quoniam, how to make a very hard solo sound (almost) effortless.

Snide much? F you, Harriet. Like to see you get up there and play that thing. Get up in front of–literally–God and everybody and play the Quoniam. On a horn. Pressure? Talk about Nadia Comaneci in front of the judges for her second event.

[Cunctator]

@Duck Duck Goose

…I had to google “prangs”, and I still don’t know what that sentence means.

In this context a prang is just a noticeable problem on the performers’ part I think. I’m assuming that what she considers prangs are then detailed in the next paragraph.

[Duck_Duck_Goose]

This makes no sense, either:

with the kind of attack that gives consonants a bad name.

I mean, what? Is she saying he took it so fast they couldn’t get the consonants out? Then why doesn’t she just come right out and say so, instead of being all cutesy about “prangs” and whatnot.

I hate self-consciously cutesy reviewers anyway. Always looking over their shoulders for the person who’s going to collect all their reviews into a critically acclaimed book. Bleagh.

[Kythereia]

@Duck Duck Goose

I mean, what? Is she saying he took it so fast they couldn’t get the consonants out? Then why doesn’t she just come right out and say so, instead of being all cutesy about “prangs” and whatnot.

When you’re singing in a big hall in front of a big audience–especially in a group–you’re encouraged to enunciate as much as humanly possible, or else “Kyrie eleison” ends up sounding like “eer-ee-ay eh-ayyyy-oooon”. Maybe the reviewer thought they took the diction too far?

I still have no idea what the frak ‘prangs’ is supposed to mean, though.

[Cunctator]

@Kythereia

When you’re singing in a big hall in front of a big audience–especially in a group–you’re encouraged to enunciate as much as humanly possible, or else “Kyrie eleison” ends up sounding like “eer-ee-ay eh-ayyyy-oooon”. Maybe the reviewer thought they took the diction too far?

Yes that’s what she means. All of us choristers agree with her. Our musical director insisted that we blow away the audience with the K of Kyrie. It was absurdly overdone.

@Kythereia

I still have no idea what the frak ‘prangs’ is supposed to mean, though.

It’s just slang for a mistake…along the lines of “well the fugue in that chorus ended up being a bit of a train wreck”.

[Richard_Pearse]

@Cunctator

Yes that’s what she means. All of us choristers agree with her. Our musical director insisted that we blow away the audience with the K of Kyrie.

Did you know this was a bad point before the review? If so, do you often disagree with the musical director’s interpretation, and how do you deal with it? Keep quite, speak your mind, etc.

[Cunctator]

@1920s Style "Death Ray"

Did you know this was a bad point before the review? If so, do you often disagree with the musical director’s interpretation, and how do you deal with it? Keep quite, speak your mind, etc.

Yes, we knew. And yes, we questioned it. But the conductor always has the final say and his interpretation rules. If the reviewer doesn’t like the interpretation, it will be the conductor who gets criticised, not the performers.