David Geffen Hall at Lincoln Center. Orchestra (Seat R103, $90.25).
End of concert. At 9:30 pm. Note the two trumpeters on the left.
Program
Messiah (1741) by Handel (1685-1759).
Artists
Hera Hyesang Park, soprano; Hannah Ludwig, alto; John Matthew Myers, tenor; Joshua Conyers, baritone.
Handel and Haydn Society Chorus
Let me start off by saying this was an enjoyable concert. A group of highly competent musicians put together a traditional program to celebrate the holiday season; and one could argue a lot of good will was in the air as a near-capacity audience listened to great music, or got reminded what the Messiah was about by Handel's masterpiece.
Having said that, there are some aspects of this performance I wanted to record for future reference.
One can start with the conductor, who evidently is also a concert violinist. The best way to describe the result of Biondi's direction is Handel was brought forward by 100 years, to the romantic period. Different, but not necessarily better. The orchestra by-and-large responded very well to his style. I don't remember any prior performance of the oratorio where the conductor did his job with so much gusto.
The chorus didn't miss a beat either. Although it seemed to put in more of a buffer when it came to following the conductor's cues. Which worked out okay. And they did the quarter note runs very well.
Both the male voices did quite well. Handel's music (and baroque in general, I believe) calls for many runs of quarter notes, there was a tendency for both men to slur their notes rather than to enunciate each note clearly. Not okay with a chorus - things would have sounded very sloppy - and not ideal with soloists, in my opinion.
The women soloists were somewhat of a disappointment. They approached the arias as if they were from an opera rather than an oratorio. So things got over dramatic (remember, they brought the music up by a century?), and sometimes diction and clarity suffered as a result.
That was particularly true of the soprano Park. I remarked to myself that I hoped she would redeem herself when she was to sing "I know that my redeemer liveth." Which to her credit she did somewhat. Also, she didn't do any singing during Part II. The recitative "He was cut off" and the aria "But Thou didst not leave His soul in hell" are marked for the soprano, but were sung by the tenor. I wonder if that was planned, or a last minute decision. It seemed the quality of the performance improved after the intermission, so perhaps the latter happened. Similarly remarks can be made of Ludwig's singing.
If one compares the movements in tonight's performance with what we heard in Boston back in November, there are some noticeable differences. One example was the first movement in Part II tonight it was the air "He was despised" while in Boston it was the chorus "Behold the Lamb of God." And in Part III both the Alto recitative "Then shall be brought to pass" and Alto and Tenor duet "O Death, Where is Thy Sting" are missing in the Boston production. I wonder if there are standard variations to Messiah, or the conductor makes the decisions on how a particular performance is put together. The Wikipedia article on the oratorio has a complete listing of all the movements.
Intermission at 7:55 pm. For tonight's performance it happened after completion of Part I, about 50 minutes in duraction. Parts II and III add up to about 75 minutes. Most programs have breaks in the middle of Part II. Better continuity with the earlier intermission.
The poinsettias are in the middle of the stage.
The H+H Society Chorus members must be credited on how versatile they are both in terms of the texts, and interpretations thereof, are modified from location to location.
I was surprised at the small number of chorus members at the Boston performance: 31 of them. For tonight there were 36. 10 each for the high voices, and 8 each for the low ones. Three of the alto voices were countertenors. Wondering how these things work, I looked at the H+H website and the programs for the Boston and New York listings of participants. Well, I looked at the listings for sopranos. On the H+H website there are 15 sopranos. Five of them were at tonight's concert, 2 were not present in Boston, and 3 were not on the roster (making them temps?); and 6 who sang in Boston didn't show up. It makes one wonder if there are not multiple (as many as three) H+H choruses touring the world. I also found out Jonathan Cohen conducted the oratorio with the New York Phil, with the Westminster Choir as the chorus.
The NY Phil doesn't bother with being "period" correct, and the trumpet passages in Part III were done with a modern instrument. That didn't bother me. Actually I enjoyed the sound of the trumpet. I wonder where one draws the line. Messiah was first performed at the Fishamble Street Music Hall in Dublin, with a capacity of 700. It is not practical to use an orchestra or a chorus that approximate the size at premiere is not practical in a hall with close to four times (2600) the seating capacity, in my opinion.
There was a pause after the first few movements, presumably to let late comers to be seated. Probably due to miscommunication with the usher staff, no one did. Quite a few came in after the next number, while the musicians were playing and singing. So logistics issues are not limited to NJ Symphony.
It was a cold evening (by the mild NJ standards), appropriate for the season.
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