St John’s, Smith Square used to be a venue with a questionable future, with occasionally fewer people in the audience than on the platform. But a new regime has turned the place around (quite literally in that there are plans to shift the platform from one end to the other). And the innovations include a Holy Week Festival 2017 of choral music, drawing on the success of a similar fixture that runs there at Christmas.
As a former church that feels in many ways as though it still were, Smith Square suits collective singing. The acoustic is supportive without being over-resonant. The ambience is excellent. Running from Palm Sunday to Holy Saturday with contributions from Polyphony, Tenebrae and a host of others, it was if nothing else an opportunity to hear in quick succession some of the best choral groups around, comparing and contrasting. And one group that I fear suffered from the comparison was the BBC Singers, who delivered a programme of English Tudor polyphony and Poulenc with their usual deadening combination of professionalism and reserve. They typify self-conscious excellence: it’s very proper singing, by the book, but never catching fire. And rarely heartfelt.
There were problems too with Voces8, a consort who invest much effort in their image – they’re extremely well turned-out, their snappy wardrobe sponsored by shirtmakers TM Lewin – and produce a polished sound to match. But peel away the presentation and there’s not the core, substantial quality you hear from other top-end groups.
At Smith Square they began well with a sequence of Gibbons, Tallis and Mendels-sohn, and flourished in some new music of a spatial, holy minimalist kind by Alexander Levine. But their attempt to do justice with eight voices to an oratorio-like piece conceived for several hundred – Jonathan Dove’s The Passing of the Year – felt thin. That they looked so pleased with themselves when it was over didn’t help.
Nathan Williamson is a pianist-composer who doesn’t make headlines but ought to, because he does fine work. And a good example is Great American Sonatas, the CD of keyboard music he’s just launched with a concert at London’s chic little 1901 Arts Club, featuring works by Charles Ives and Lou Harrison, and a brilliant, early, style-searching sonata by Bernstein that you might dismiss as too beguiled by self-important grandeur but nevertheless demands a hearing. As does Williamson’s decisive playing.
The disc is released on the SOMM label. For anyone interested in American repertoire, it’s a must.
Areas of Catholic Herald business are still recovering post-pandemic.
However, we are reaching out to the Catholic community and readership, that has been so loyal to the Catholic Herald. Please join us on our 135 year mission by supporting us.
We are raising £250,000 to safeguard the Herald as a world-leading voice in Catholic journalism and teaching.
We have been a bold and influential voice in the church since 1888, standing up for traditional Catholic culture and values. Please consider donating.