Saturday, 7 September 2002, 8pm
Xavier College Chapel, Barkers Road, Kew
Subscription Concert 4
Two of these Roberts were certainly Scottish, while the birth place of Wylkynson is not known. The latter’s resplendent nine-voice Salve regina is one of the glories of the Eton Choirbook, while Carver’s brilliant ten-voice
Mass was almost certainly composed for the accession of James V of Scotland on the Feast of Michaelmas 1513. Though Scottish by birth, Johnson spent most of his working life in England. Our program includes the four most popular of his ten extant motets.
PROGRAM
Robert Wylkynson Salve regina
Robert Johnson Ave Dei patris filia
Robert Johnson Dum transisset Sabbatum
Robert Johnson Gaude Maria virgo
Robert Johnson Deus misereatur nostri
Robert Carver Missa Dum sacrum mysterium
| SOPRANO | ALTO | TENOR | BASS |
| Deborah Summerbell | JennyGeorge | Peter Campbell | Jonathan Wallis |
| Carol Veldhoven | Jennifer Mathers | Tim Van Nooten | Ross Abraham |
| Margaret Pearce | Margaret Arnold | Vaughan McAlley | Thomas Drent |
| Claerwen Jones | Susie Furphy | Stuart Tennant | Andrew Fysh |
| Maria Pisani | Frank Prain | Jerzy Kozlowski | |
| Fiona Seers |
–
REVIEW
Monday, 9 September 2002, The Age [Melbourne], page 5, The Culture.
Voices that take your breath away
Clive O’Connell
[…] No such troubles on the following night for the Ensemble Gombert, singing under the high dome of the
Xavier Chapel.
John O’Donnell directed the program of three Renaissance composers called Robert, all English or Scots.
As both the opening motet and the program’s main work called for nine and 10 voices, we heard from a
slightly expanded group of expert singers, with alto Margaret Arnold and bass Jerzy Kozlowski back in
harness, tenors Frank Prain and Tim van Nooten appearing again after their previous night’s exertions for
Gloriana.
Complicated constructs like Wylkynson’s Salve Regina hold no fears for these singers who have more mature
voices than are found in most other Melbourne choirs.
O’Donnell leaves these works to make their own statements, avoiding any over-dramatising of music that is often astoundingly powerful, the top lines soaring over a boiling, energetic maelstrom of tenors and basses.
The use that Wylkynson makes of his nine layers results in organ-rich mixtures, mirrored in the
near-contemporaneous Mass Dum sacrum mysterium by Carver, which also heaps up strand upon strand and
suddenly cuts away to reveal various strata, like a passage for three basses in the work’s Sanctus.
Also programmed were four motets by Johnson, climaxing in a joyous set of praises to the Virgin, Ave Dei
patris.
True, not all the singing was free from trouble; some of the bass notes in the Mass were suspect and the
opening to the Agnus Dei sounded hesitant.
But when operating at full power, this choir makes you hold your breath in admiration at the vital richness of
their sound world, a never-failing pleasure in the year’s musical round.
Clive O’Connell/Courtesy of The Age