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This programme of operatic excerpts is not The Chiswick Choir's first excursion into this genre. There have been two concert performances of Purcell's Dido and Aeneas as well as programmes of excerpts similar to this evening's Gala. If opera is not the Choir's staple musical diet, you may wonder how a ``choral society" sets out to tackle what seems to be a totally different style of music. How different are the chorus parts to the Bach Passions or Handel's oratorios, or indeed Elgar's Gerontius to singing choruses by Verdi, Tchaikovsky or Wagner? If the music of one is performed on the concert platform (in or out of church) and in simple concert dress, it is no less dramatic than opera staged in the theatre in full costume. Consider the various roles the chorus has to sing in Bach, Handel, Mendelssohn and Elgar - various groups of priests, crowds, peasants, soldiers, demons and angelicals. If these are to be sung according to the composers' intentions, then each has to be approached in an individual, characteristic way to assist in the telling (without the aid of scenery or costume) of a drama. And which story is more dramatic than the Passion? In his oratorios Handel never ceased to be the greatest opera composer of his day and makes great demands upon the chorus.
In true opera, the demands on the chorus are no less great. Apart from having to act in costume and sing from memory, the approach to the music is identical. The chorus has to become a group musical entity - a group of soldiers, witches, slaves, courtiers, wedding guests, cigarette girls (known to one director as the ``fag bags!"), slaves and the inevitable a crowd of peasants! I would argue that the role of the chorus in both sacred and secular story telling is the same. Choral singers in whatever situation have to place themselves inside a character - and be no less convincing than a singer in a principal role.
This evening's programme sees the choir in just such operatic roles but in a church setting! So the task is two-fold - through our singing we have to be the characters in a short excerpt from an opera and also take you outside the ecclesiastical building and into new locations - a castle bed chamber, a square in Seville, a farm estate in Russia, a gypsy encampment and so on. The programme contains music by some of the greatest operatic composers - Wagner (the famous Bridal March as it should be heard), Bizet - scenes from Carmen, Tchaikovsky (a particularly fine peasant's chorus from Eugene Onegin,). There are scenes from Verdi including Macbeth, where the ladies of the choir become the best group of witches in W4. In contrast the tenors and basses sing one of Beethoven's most sublime pieces in the chorus of prisoners from Act One of Fidelio. The quiet way in which the composer (in his only opera) brings light to the eyes of prisoners so long kept in the dark is truly wonderful and one of the miracles of dramatic music.
Along side the choral music of course, there is a lovely selection of solo music for the fine voice of Sally Burgess. This includes scenes from Carmen, Il Trovatore (Azucena), and the two famous arias from Saint-Saens Samson et Dalilah - three of the finest solo roles in the mezzo repertoire.
So, we invite you to allow yourselves to be transported away beyond the walls of Saint Nicholas's church. Imagine yourselves in foreign lands, lands of exotic and romantic tales brought alive by some of the finest music from the world of opera.
Alistair Jones |
