David Denton
The debut of a large chorus is a rare event anywhere in the world, and with almost three hundred voices on stage, Yorkshire Voices exceeded our hopes and expectations in a performance of Verdi’s Requiem.
Drawn from three local choral groups, the hushed opening told of scrupulous preparation; the sheer weight of tone in the Dies Irae was awesome, while the intervening dynamics pointed to the rounded quality and exact intonation. Indeed it is a sheer luxury today to find such a large male contingent that avoid loud passages that err towards shouting, a feature becoming all too common in local choirs.
The spacious view of the conductor, Andrew Padmore, was a valid and devotional approach that had the virtue of unravelling textures in the Town Hall’s unhelpful acoustic, his more virile moments finding his singers alert and agile.
Sadly we had that anachronism of yesteryear with an interval that both broke up the continuity for the audience, and robbed Padmore of the overall shape and pace of the score that was a very personal view and one that he was so assiduously and impressively fashioning.
Understaffed and undernourished in the lower strings, the modest forces of the Manchester Camerata gave spirted support, weighing in with forceful brass in the dramatic passages, but were too easily overpowered.
As a last minute replacement, the soprano, Naomi Harvey, has a most beautiful voice, saving up sufficient vocal stamina for a final desperate plea to the Lord. The much-experienced tenor, Bonaventura Bottone, brought a touch of Italy into the evening, the solo quartet completed by Gaynor Keeble and Ben Davies.
Drawn from three local choral groups, the hushed opening told of scrupulous preparation; the sheer weight of tone in the Dies Irae was awesome, while the intervening dynamics pointed to the rounded quality and exact intonation. Indeed it is a sheer luxury today to find such a large male contingent that avoid loud passages that err towards shouting, a feature becoming all too common in local choirs.
The spacious view of the conductor, Andrew Padmore, was a valid and devotional approach that had the virtue of unravelling textures in the Town Hall’s unhelpful acoustic, his more virile moments finding his singers alert and agile.
Sadly we had that anachronism of yesteryear with an interval that both broke up the continuity for the audience, and robbed Padmore of the overall shape and pace of the score that was a very personal view and one that he was so assiduously and impressively fashioning.
Understaffed and undernourished in the lower strings, the modest forces of the Manchester Camerata gave spirted support, weighing in with forceful brass in the dramatic passages, but were too easily overpowered.
As a last minute replacement, the soprano, Naomi Harvey, has a most beautiful voice, saving up sufficient vocal stamina for a final desperate plea to the Lord. The much-experienced tenor, Bonaventura Bottone, brought a touch of Italy into the evening, the solo quartet completed by Gaynor Keeble and Ben Davies.
