Review for the Boston Musical Intelligencer
The Handel and Haydn Society kicked off its season this Friday at 7:30pm with two exuberant Bach concertos, played standing, in Boston’s Symphony Hall. Concertmaster Aislinn Nosky and Assistant Concertmaster Susanna Ogata led the fireworks with the Brandenburg Concerto No. 3 in G Major, BWV 1048 and the athletic Concerto for Two Violins in D Minor, BWV 1043, delightfully dueling for control of the ensemble. Conductor Harry Christophers directed the Brandenburg (in a collaborative presentation) and led three substantial Bach cantatas to produce one of the lightest, most energetic events I’ve heard in Symphony Hall for years.
Ms. Nosky plays a singing, bright 1746 Barcelona violin made by Salvator Bofill. This rare instrument is well known in the early music community, and Ms. Nosky has been continually praised for her focus, virtuosity, and enthusiasm since becoming H+H’s concertmaster in 2011. Susanna Ogata plays a 1772 Joseph Klotz violin from Mittenwald, Germany (the same maker as one of Mozart’s personal instruments). These instruments employ gut strings, narrower tailpieces, differently angled necks, and smaller bows than modern instruments, giving them both a warmer tone and the sweet, light voice of an earlier string instrument.
Bach’s music sparkles with wit in its freest moments, and H+H chose to contrast the full ensemble of strings and continuo (employing harpsichord in the concerti) with a smaller group for the opening Brandenburg No. 3. The smaller band included Ms. Nosky, Ms. Ogata and Johanna Novom on violin; Karina Schmitz, Anne Black, and Jenny Sterling on viola; the full cello section of Guy Fishman, Sarah Freiburg, and colleen McGary-Smith; and continuo players Heather Miller Lardin (bass) and Ian Watson (harpsichord). This was a dramatic opener, and the group dynamism and physical flexibility established orchestral virtuosity as the focus of the evening.
The professional chorus of H+H is internationally respected for its precision and ability to make complex polyphony speak in the most cavernous of halls. Director Harry Christophers pulled a wide range of vocal color from his singers, choosing tempi that would have stymied most choruses in the opening fugues from the fifth part of Bach’s Christmas Oratorio, BWV 248 (Ehre sei dir, Gott) and from Cantata 179 (Siehe zu, daß deine Gottesfurcht nicht Heuchelei sei, or See that your fear of God is not hypocrisy). Aaron Sheehan served as a charming, efficient Evangelist in the first half of the program, delivering his three complex recitatives with panache and clarity. Soloist Emily Marvosh, a dramatic contralto, lended heft and drama to the Christmas story. She outsung the rest of the ensemble, contributing elegant turns of phrase and grace to recitatives that often pass as filler. Baritone Woodrow Burnam shone in his aria “Erleucht auch meine finstre Sinnen” (from BWV 248) and extended recitative “Wer so von innen” (from BWV 179). Although tempi throughout the vocal solos for the lower voices seemed a bit rushed throughout the evening, the conclusion of Mr. Bynum’s recitative, a slower passage on the text “Bekenne Gott in Demut deine Sünden / Humbly acknowledge your sins to God” showed us Bach’s more sensitive side. This moment, and the more relaxed approaches Mr. Christophers encouraged for the vocal duets and trios, provided moving contrasts to the explosive vigor that framed most larger works. Sopranos Sarah Yanovitch and Sonja DuToit Tengblad stood out for their varied vocal tones, contrasting pure, straight-tone sustained notes with vibrato and ornamentation for color. Mezzo soprano Clare MacNamara’s rich timbre and expressive phrasing made her duet with Ms. Yanovitch the vocal highlight of the second half.
The concert concluded with a Lutheran mass, one of several Latin-language works still sung in the otherwise German-speaking churches of Bach’s later years. Setting the texts of the Kyrie and Gloria as a six-movement cantata supported by orchestra (with small portative organ and bassoon), Bach attempted to combine the Italian-sounding orchestral palette with the chorales and more restrained professional vocalism expected in the liturgical music of his time. His Mass in G Major, BWV 236 was an unusual choice to end an otherwise dynamic program, but it afforded the audience more chances to hear Aaron Sheehan (in two fast arias that featured his high range) and a spectacular contribution by baritone Peter Walker: his warm voice and excellent diction (employing staccato singing in some of the melismatic passages) sailed through Symphony Hall.
H+H turned professional in 1967 after being founded as one of Boston’s first large mixed choruses. The first concert on Christmas of 1815, contrasted solo and choral movements in a diverse program, and the chorus became well-known for its large ensemble and subsequent re-orchestrations of eighteenth-century masterworks. As today, early seasons featured Handel’s Messiah, and the choir presented the American premiere of the full work in 1818. Link: https://handelandhaydn.org/beyond-messiah
The ensemble nurtures its historical roots, maintaining scrapbooks, press clippings, programs, business records, and other archival materials that shed light on Boston’s early music history. Link: https://handelandhaydn.org/archives/
Several musicians from the professional orchestra (and their instruments) are featured on the H+H website in short videos. This pair of Symphony Hall concerts was preceded by a pre-concert lecture by Teresa Neff (who also contributed the excellent program notes and historical timelines) and three period-instrument demonstrations (cello, oboe, and violin). Notable additions to this concert were pairs of oboes d’amore and oboes da caccia, highlighted in the program and heard in the vocal music. The muted, warm tones of the oboes da caccia paired perfectly with soprano voice and continuo in the soprano aria “Liebster Gott, erbarme dich” from BWV 179, sometimes overpowering the singer to create an equal three-voice texture that demonstrated Bach’s spectacular gift for evoking quiet pathos and sadness.
It’s appropriate that H+H returns to the late classical period each year, since the group tried to commission an oratorio from Beethoven, but the ensemble’s strength focuses on the florid, powerful polyphony demanded by Baroque masters such a J.S. Bach. Following the lead of Boston Baroque, America’s first period-instrument ensemble and contemporaneous developments in Europe, Christopher Hogwood re-focused H+H’s already professional orchestra into a professional period-instrument band in 1986. Link: https://handelandhaydn.org/about/historically-informed-performance/
The program repeats Sunday, September 30, 2018 at 3:00pm, and upcoming Fall events include “Every Voice” combining students in H+H’s Vocal Arts Program with professional members of the ensemble at First Church in Roxbury (Saturday, Nov. 3), Link: https://handelandhaydn.org/concerts/EVERY-VOICE
a virtuosic Schubert/Beethoven pairing with Robert Levin on fortepiano (Nov. 9/11 in Symphony Hall), Link: https://handelandhaydn.org/concerts/beethoven-emperor-concerto
and Baroque Christmas concertos featuring Ms. Nosky on violin in NEC’s Jordan Hall (Dec. 13/16).
