In his programme notes Ruddington & District Choral
Society’s Music Director, Paul Hayward, explained that the programme for their
May 2022 concert had been carefully chosen as a response to the state of our
contemporary world. In the event, his comments could not have been more perceptive. Originally planned for the May 2020 concert, which had to be set aside as Covid first took hold, this evening of largely 20
th century English choral works seemed even more prescient given that
Covid and its effects have disrupted the life of the planet for two years and
this nightmare has been compounded by the events in Ukraine and their dreadful
consequences. We live, as Paul Hayward suggests, in uncertain times and to
underline this, there were in the audience for Saturday night’s concert at St
Peter’s Church in Ruddington a family of Ukrainian refugees who have found
sanctuary in Ruddington from the present horrors of their own land.
Like all other organisations, Ruddington Choral
Society has felt the impact of two years of Covid led interruptions – practise
and rehearsal time, singers’ illness, and simply getting a large group of
singers back together and in the swing of things has meant that Paul Hayward, organ
maestro accompanist Michael Overbury and most of all the singers themselves had
to pull out all stops – organ and otherwise – to get the concert to performance
standard. But pull out all stops they did – and especially so when one
considers that the programme was a musically taxing one; there were no works
in which the choir could “coast”, every bar and note had to be worked at……and
it would not, I think, be inappropriate to suggest that everyone was asking
themselves the question on Saturday morning, would it be alright on the night!
But all right it was! The choir, reduced in numbers
following the Covid effect, rose to the occasion magnificently from the very
first note. The concert began with the popular and haunting
Choral Suite from
Karl Jenkins’
The Armed Man – surely something to cause us to reflect
upon given the events in eastern Europe in recent weeks. Jenkins’ work,
subtitled
A Mass for Peace was originally commissioned for the
Millennium celebrations and dedicated to victims of the Kosovo crisis. The
work charts the growing menace of and a descent into war, interspersed with moments
of reflection; shows the horrors that war brings; and ends with the hope for
peace in a new millennium, when "sorrow, pain and death can be
overcome". On Saturday, the choir’s quiet and evocative rendering of the work
was not only a gentle, solemn and above all reverential opening to
the concert but one which, I’m sure, caused every member of the audience to reflect deeply upon how thin is the gossamer thread that holds us all from falling into the abyss in our 2022 world.
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Musical Director Paul Hayward |
To take us up to the interval we enjoyed the talents of
Michael Overbury playing a Bach organ solo the Kyrie
Gott Heiliger Geist
– a plea for God’s mercy upon us – Michael’s keyboard skills and sheer
musicality displaying all the intricacies, piety, magnificence and richness of Bach’s devotional
music to perfection. This was followed by three short choral works:
As
Torrents in Summer by Elgar, Parry's
Music, when soft voices die, and
The Long Day Closes by Arthur
Sullivan. These profound and deeply reflective works were given a lyrical
and poignant quality by the choir – perfect for a May evening and for a world
looking for solace and certainty as it recovers from a deadly pandemic and a
world tormented by other ills, mostly man made.
Five Spirituals from A Child of our Time by
Michael Tippett was a splendid opening to the second half of the evening.
Tippett’s famous and hugely popular oratorio written in the early years of the
Second World War was inspired by the events of Kristallnacht in Nazi Germany
and the subsequent violent Nazi pogrom against the Jewish population. As the programme notes rightly commented: “it is a work of profound sympathy
with oppressed people the world over”. The choir’s rendering of the spirituals
captured beautifully the essence, the humility and inner strength that we
recognise in all spirituals and within all oppressed people or whatever colour, creed or belief. The sheer musicality of Steal
Away Jesus, the humility of Nobody Knows the Trouble I See, the gentle
power of Go Down Moses, the sorrow and despair of By and By clearly
spoke to the audience and as the words
and the haunting music of the final spiritual Deep River gently
filled the St Peter’s evening air I doubt that there was anyone in the audience
not moved and humbled by the words and the music. The Five Spirituals was
a balm, a comfort, in these troubled times and a timely reminder to those of us
who sat in St Peter’s of how very fortunate we are to be able to sit quietly
and safely on such a spring evening to enjoy such music and ponder the power of the words.
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Organ Maestro Michael Overbury |
And so to the concert moved to its final works. Michael
Overbury gave a lovely ethereal rendering of his own arrangement of Lamento
di Tristan & La Rotta based upon 14th century Italian dance
music – a few minutes of innocence and beauty in an otherwise solemn evening, a
reminder perhaps, that in these times of dismay and disharmony our very souls need
the refreshment that goes with peace, beauty and gentleness. And finally, Michael’s work was
followed by Benjamin Britten’s Rejoice in the Lamb first performed in
1943 and commissioned for the 50th anniversary of the consecration
of St. Matthew’s Church in Northampton. It is based upon the poem Jubilate
Agno by Christopher Smart and
probably written between 1759 -1763. The poem, written while Smart was in an
asylum, depicts the idiosyncratic praise and worship of God by all created beings
and things, each in their own way. While in the
asylum Smart was left alone, except for his cat Jeoffry. He felt lost and homeless feeling that his life was in a "limbo… between public and
private space", lost in his introspective and deeply religious thoughts. He had nothing or no one to turn to and thus inwards devoting himself to God and his poetry. He was released from the asylum in1763, but his
poem was not published until 1939 under the title Rejoice in the Lamb: A
Song from Bedlam. This, became the focus of Britten's composition and as with many of Britten’s works, is taxing; the choir had to be at their best – and they were! Under Paul
Hayward’s baton and with Michael Overbury’s accompaniment they dealt superbly with
the sheer musical variety and ever changing demands of the work. After negotiating a
quiet beginning followed by a jubilant series of verses inviting man and beast to come
before the Lord, then a beautiful hymn of creation leading to a lament as Smart described in
his poem the difficulties he encounters in his life the choir responded perfectly to their
Director and Accompanist’s leadership.
The four soloists, Grace Bale, Sarah Atkinson, Simon Lumby and James Gaughan, too, were splendidly “on song” and perfectly at one with the choir.
The poem and Britten’s music speak of those who are in turmoil, who are struggling with their world and their own lives. It is a theme that Britten often returned to, most
notably in his great opera Peter Grimes; inner personal turmoil, mankind's potential for cruelty but also his capacity for goodness. Rejoice in the Lamb was a fitting work for this concert
concerned as it was with the uncertainty and turmoil of our current world and the famous line from Peter Grimes "I hear those voices that will not be drowned" would, perhaps, be a suitable subtext for not only this work but perhaps for the whole evening
Britten’s work is not and was not an easy listen – but that, surely is the point. Saturday night’s programme was music for our troubled times. It
was music to prick our consciences, to make us reflect upon our times and the trials of others, to encourage us to strive to create a world more attentive and faithful than our own present and to make us realise our own great good fortune. But at the same time – and
perhaps more importantly – to give us some certainty in this ever changing world by reminding us that we are all part of humanity and God’s
creation. There were no standing ovations or rousing cheers at the end of the
concert, just a subdued and reverent applause – and that is how it had to be - the message of the evening and the music had got home. And that message, if indeed there was one, was of our humanity, our dignity and love and respect for our fellow man and woman, and how we must respond to that and them. It was music to reflect on, to take away in our hearts and minds and ponder
as the next 24 hour news broadcast reports of some other tragedy – big or
small, personal or international, man made or natural - in our ever changing turbulent world.
It has been said that all art – be it painting, music,
literature, dance or any other art form - should, if it is to be considered
worthy or perhaps even great, “comfort the disturbed and disturb the
comfortable” – and on Saturday night The Ruddington & District Choral
Society choir members, the soloists, Michael Overbury and Paul Hayward fully acknowledged and
met this criteria. Paul Hayward wrote in his programme notes that he hoped it would be "an evening to to find solace" - and indeed it was. The final words of the spiritual Deep River perhaps summed up this desire for some comfort and consolation both eloquently and humbly: "O children, don't you want to go to that gospel feast, that promised land, That land where all is peace. Walk into heaven and take my seat, cast down my crown at Jesus' feet". Many thanks to all concerned for a wonderful night.