The Sixteen's Blog

The choir has moved on to Melbourne; the orchestra has a day off in Sydney; I am still in Hong Kong for another day of meetings; and our offices and colleagues in London and Oxford are helping keep the show on the road.

Tonight’s concert is at the Melbourne Recital Centre at 7.30, with a programme including Allegri’s Miserere and works by Palestrina, Anerio and Marenzio.

The South China Morning Posts arts critics are notorious for finding fault with nearly every event they review (apparently even the Concertgebouw Orchestra got short shrift recently), so maybe today’s review of our Messiah last Saturday isn’t so bad, although it starts with the usual (and here rather tedious, as well as inaccurate) numerological debate: ‘Directed by Harry Christophers, The Sixteen Choir seems a misnomer: on Saturday it was sporting 18 singers on stage, 16 in the programme notes and around 30 on the posters.

Christophers was once one of  the 18  boy choristers at Britain’s Canterbury Cathedral, traditionally known as The Sixteen in deference to ancient statutes. If the point seems laboured, it at least offers a frame for asking whether size matter’s in Handel’s Messiah, which has a greater role for the chorus than his other oratorios.

The work’s unsinkable popularity was confirmed in this highly enjoyable Arts Festival performance, by turns zingy and introspective, and sporting every colour bar grey. Christophers kept the action moving slickly, regularly tweaking details in the instrumental ensemble’s rock-solid support. The chorus delivered faultlessly from a technical standpoint but often sounded once-removed from the emotions, not simply by being small in number but also by being consciously restrained by Christophers in volume and edge.

The four soloists commanded an impressive narrative flair, sometimes captivating more by a sense of theatricality, however, than the quality of voice that Handel puts so roundly to the test.  The exception was countertenor Robin Blaze, whose beguiling shifts in tone and responsiveness to textual shading were exemplary throughout. You would have to go a long way before hearing a more telling performance of ‘He was despised’.

Tenor James Gilchrist led the pack in terms of projection; bass Matthew Brook hooked us with dramatic presence; soprano Gillian Keith trod a middle path. And did the local audience oblige tradition by rising for the ‘Hallelujah’ chorus? Yes, in a bemused, Mexican wave sort of way.’

It’s that time of year, when journalists start encapsulating the past 12 months in lists. I guess it’s OK when you get included in a positive list, so we weren’t displeased when Fiona Maddocks in last Sunday’s Observer included our Choral Pilgrimage project in her list of the Top Ten classical music highlights in 2011:

Lucerne Festival Orchestra Royal Festival Hall, London

Die Walküre St Endellion Church, Cornwall

Missa Solemnis LSO/Davis, BBC Prom, Royal Albert Hall, London

The Sixteen: Victoria Choral Pilgrimage (various venues)

Il trittico Royal Opera House, London

Greek Music Theatre Wales (various venues)

A Midsummer Night’s Dream Coliseum, London

Gabrieli Consort: Byrd’s Great Service Spitalfields Festival, London

Diotima Quartet: Ferneyhough Total Immersion Barbican, London

Daniel Barenboim’s Schubert Wigmore Hall, London

And here is another list of our own, for people planning their Christmas and New Year viewing.  Sky Arts 2 has programmed multiple showings of our new documentaries produced in association with Decca.

You can see the main documentary on the following dates:
16/12 at 22.25
17/12 at 04.25
28/12 at 10.05
30/12 at 19.30
03/01 at 19.00

And then performances of music by indivudual composers:

Allegri
16/12 at 23.10
17/12 at 05.10
20/12 at 05.45

Lotti
16/12 at 23.00
17/12 at 05.00
21/12 at 09.25
28/12 at 10.40

Sheppard
16/12 at 22.55
17/12 at 04.55
21/12 at 09.20
28/12 at 10.35

Tomkins
16/12 at 23.05
17/12 at 05.05
19/12 at 21.05
24/12 at 18.50

These documentaries are timed to co-incide with the release on 26 December 2011 by Decca Records of Renaissance – Music for Inner Peace. To quote the press release: ‘a landmark recording with Harry Christophers and The Sixteen, with a luxury edition including a newly filmed documentary, introducing some of the most beloved and beautiful works of vocal music ever written.’

God's Composer on BBC Four

BBC FOUR’s Sacred Music journey continues with this special celebration marking the 400th anniversary of the death of the Spanish composer Tomás Luis de Victoria. Interwoven with Victoria’s music, this documentary follows Simon Russell Beale as he takes us through the life and times of Victoria. the music was recorded in the glorious setting of the Church of San Antonio de los Alemanes in Madrid, founded in 1606 by Philip II in Victoria’s lifetime.

This is an opportunity to celebrate Victoria’s life and his creations, some of the greatest work of the late renaissance and the Spanish Golden Age.

It brings to an end the tremendous year we have had singing this wondrous music, with over 30 concert performances in the UK and 6 in Spain, and the release of our latest Victoria CD: Hail, Mother of the Redeemer.

You can see it tonight on BBC Four at 20.00 or tomorrow morning at 02.30. Both transmissions are preceded by our programme about Allegri’s Miserere.

Tonight’s programme will be released on CORO as a DVD in March, and can be pre-ordered now.

A BBC/Sixteen/TVE/Arte co-production.

Sofie Gråbøl

There had to be a way – eventually – to mention Sofie Gråbøl in The Sixteen’s blog, so I am happy to report the first known sighting of the on-screen trailer for the next programme in our Sacred Music series. Shown last night between episodes 3 and 4 of the second series of Forbrydelsen (known in English as The Killing), it announced the transmission times of God’s Composer, which explores the extraordinary world of Victoria, the 400th anniversary of whose death we have been marking throughout the year. Presented by Simon Russell Beale, you can see it on BBC Four at 20.00 on Friday 2 December or at 02.30 on Saturday 3 December: both showings are preceded by our half-hour programme about Allegri.

A successful visit to Utrecht over the weekend, with a sold-out Domkerk for our concert of Roman repertoire.  Thanks, Emily, for some great photos, a selection of which are below: a rainbow over the Domkerk; proof that the singers make the most of their time when touring, cycling being added to our growing list of energetic activities (they managed to cycle into the country and stopped at a farm-shop for refreshment); and a shot of the Allegri Miserere solo quartet rehearsing (they always get placed in interesting parts of the building, although that often means being behind a pillar).  I listened to the concert at home via France Musique’s relay (link still in the previous post), but unfortunately my listening to the Miserere was interrupted by the incredible noise of two RAF Typhoons circling Cambridge, having escorted a Nigerian Airforce Hercules, which had radio failure, into  Cambridge Airport.  So, Nigeria makes our blog twice in a week!

Rainbow over the Domkerk

Fruit!

Allegri Miserere: the quartet rehearsing