Year: 2018

Christmas to Candlemas
Saturday, 1 December 2018, 8:00pm
Our Lady of Victories Basilica
Burke Road, Camberwell
Subscription Concert 3

This program features motets by Flemish and English composers from a variety of past Christmas to Candlemas performances. But it also includes the première of John O’Donnell’s new re-construction of the Sanctus, Benedictus and Agnus Dei of Tallis’ Missa Puer natus est nobis (only the Gloria of which has reached us intact).

Nativity/Christmas
Orlande de Lassus
Quem vidistis, pastores?
In principio erat Verbum

Circumcision
Jacob Handl
Mirabile mysterium

Epiphany
Jacob Handl
Omnes de Saba
Orlande de Lassus
Videntes stellam

Purification/Candlemas
William Byrd
Hodie beata virgo Maria
Senex puerum portabat
Thomas Tallis
Videte miraculum

Nativity/Christmas
Thomas Tallis
Missa Puer natus est nobis
Gloria – Sanctus – Benedictus – Agnus Dei

Soprano
Deborah Summerbell; Carol Veldhoven; Katherine Lieschke; Victoria Brown;
Kate McBride; Katharina Hochheiser; Claerwen Jones; Mandie Lee
Alto
Belinda Wong; Juliana Kay;
Yi Wen Chin; Niki Ebacioni
Tenor
Peter Campbell; Tim van Nooten;
Vaughan McAlley; Stuart Tennant; Michael Stephens;
Bass
Nicholas Tolhurst;  Michael Leighton Jones;
Mike Ormerod; Tom Reid

CHRISTMAS TO CANDLEMAS
Ensemble Gombert
Our Lady of Victories, Camberwell at 8 pm

Yet again, John O’Donnell and his excellent choir take patrons on a much-anticipated exceptional tour of Renaissance sacred music that covers the Christmas story from the stable at Bethlehem to Simeon’s prophecies in the Temple.  Proceedings open with two Lassus motets: Quem viditis, pastores? for the shepherds’ take on the whole business, and In principio erat Verbum, the first 14 verses of St John’s Gospel which used to conclude the Tridentine Mass ritual and which still give a stunningly visionary theological context for Christ’s birth.   Jacob Handl’s Mirabile mysterium also offers an appraisal of the birth’s significance, while his Omnes de Saba makes a jubilant welcome for the Three Kings’ arrival on the scene.   Lassus then contributes his Videntes stellam which gives more physical detail concerning the royal visitors and their gifts.   O’Donnell & Co. move to the Tudors with a Byrd brace: Hodie beata virgo Maria which comes from the Candlemas Vespers and depicts Mary giving Jesus to Simeon for his blessing; the antiphon Senex puerum portabat deals with a series of paradoxes in lucid polyphony that lasts about two minutes.   Videte miraculum by Tallis concentrates heavily on Mary’s virginity with ethereal detachment.  The program’s main work is the 7-voice Puer natus est nobis Mass by Tallis which has no Kyrie or Credo and is based on a plainchant, with which the Gomberts will kindly preface their performance.   This chant’s text derives from Isaiah and most of it will be familiar to Handel’s Messiah lovers who, at this event, will be transported far beyond the German/British composer’s visions of worldly pomp and circumstance.
Clive O’Connell/O’Connell the Music

Monday, 5 November 2018, 6pm
Melbourne Recital Centre – Salon
Bach & Barber
Melbourne Recital Centre Local Heroes Series 2018

Johann Sebastian Bach:
Der Geist hilft unser Schwachheit auf BWV 226
Lobet den Herrn, alle Heiden
Fürchte dich nicht BWV 228
Samuel Barber:
Reincarnations
Twelfth Night
To be Sung on the Water
Agnus Dei

Soprano
Carol Veldhoven; Deborah Summerbell; Katherine Lieschke;
Victoria Brown; Katharina Hochheiser; Kate McBride
Alto
Belinda Wong; Juliana Kay;
Yi Wen Chin; Mandie Lee
Tenor
Tim van Nooten; Peter Campbell;
Vaughan McAlley; Stuart Tennant; Michael Stephens
Bass
Nicholas Tolhurst; Mark Thawley
Mike Ormerod; Tom Reid

BACH & BARBER
Ensemble Gombert
Melbourne Recital Centre

Why this pairing?   It could be a demonstration of old and new counterpoint or an exploration of the contrast between masculinity and flaccidity.   However you read it, the night will test the Gomberts’ pitching and interpretative skills in the confined Salon space of the MRC.   For the Bach, we are confronted by three of the mighty motets: Der Geist hilft, Lobet den Herrn, and Furchte dich nicht.   Taking a bit longer to work through, the American composer’s group comprises the choral madrigal in three movements, Reincarnations; a setting of Laurie Lee’s Christmas poem Twelfth Night; its companion piece, To Be Sung on the Water; and the almost inevitable Agnus Dei arrangement of the Adagio for Strings which will probably make up the longest piece on the program.   The outer Bach pieces are for double choir, and they sound magnificently mobile in a fair-sized church but I think that here the dubious Lobet in 4 lines will come off best.
Clive O’Connell/O’Connell the Music

Homage to Gombert
Saturday, 22 September 2018, 8:00pm
Our Lady of Victories Basilica
Burke Road, Camberwell
Subscription Concert 2

This program is a celebration of two High Renaissance composers, Pierre de la Rue and Loyset Compère, both of whom died half a millennium ago, in 1518. The popular motet Absalon fili mi, generally attributed to Josquin, has been claimed by some as the work of La Rue, and the six-voice motet Pater de caelis Deus is a powerful demonstration of La Rue’s canonic technique. But La Rue is renowned above all as a composer of Masses, of which his six-voice Missa Ave sanctissima Maria, based on a motet by Verdelot, is a particularly fine example. Compère is represented by one of his so-called “substitution Masses”, a peculiarity of the Cathedral in Milan. The work is in fact a series of eight four-voice motets.

Josquin Desprez or Pierre de la Rue Absalon fili mi
Pierre de la Rue Pater de caelis Deus
Pierre de la Rue Ave sanctissima Maria
Pierre de la Rue Missa Ave sanctissima Maria
Loyset Compère Galeazescha

Soprano
Deborah Summerbell; Carol Veldhoven; Victoria Brown; Katharina Hochheiser;
Katherine Lieschke*; Claerwen Jones* (Alto 1 in Mass)
Alto
Belinda Wong; Helena Ekins-Daukes;
Niki Ebacioni; Peter Campbell
Tenor
Tim van Nooten; Michael Stephens;
Vaughan McAlley; Stuart Tennant
Bass
Andrew Murray;  Adrian Phillips;
Mike Ormerod; Chris Potter

A HIGH RENAISSANCE CELEBRATION
Ensemble Gombert
Our Lady of Victories Basilica, Camberwell at 8 pm

Concert No.2 out of three being given this year at the imposing Catholic church in Camberwell,  this endeavour by the Gomberts explores a rich mine of polyphony composed in the years before things got over-complicated.  The four composers programmed are Josquin, Pierre de la Rue, Verdelot and Compere – all contemporaries, imposing presences in the French and Franco-Flemish compositional worlds.   Josquin is represented by one work, the motet Absalon fili mi, which has been attributed to de la Rue – but never mind: it’s all in together for  this night’s family.   Verdelot also features with only one work: another six-voice motet, Ave sanctissima Maria which has also been attributed to that gadabout, de la Rue.   The real de la Rue compositions are the six-voice Pater de caelis Deus and the canon-crazy Missa Ave sanctissima Maria.   Compere’s Galeazescha, written for Duke Galeazzo Maria Sforza of Milan, is another form of mass, but one comprising Marian motets rather than following the usual Ordinary format.   Here is the sort of music-making in which this exemplary ensemble shines: scholarly and transporting.
Clive O’Connell/O’Connell the Music