Choral Scholars and Choral Union
Holy Week and Easter is the busiest time of the church year for choirs and church musicians. As well as singing at five services during the week, on Wednesday 16 April the members of the Choral Union gave a memorable performance of the Via Crucis, a reflective work on the theme of the Passion, by Hungarian composer Franz Liszt. I’m grateful to the members of the choir for the stellar work they did in putting this performance together, and I was pleased that it was so well received by those who attended.
With Easter late this year, we have a very short summer term before our end-of-year choir concert (Thursday 29 May) and our end-of-year service, on the day of Pentecost (Sunday 8 June). We are working on a mixture of familiar and new music for these events, and look forward to a well-earned summer break.
Lunchtime recitals
This year’s Summer Music at Sandford series kicked off on Friday 16 May, with performances from a number of young pianists from the TU Dublin Conservatoire. In this year’s series the piano features prominently—appropriately enough, since it is ten years since the parish purchased our wonderful piano. With all the wonderful performances that have been given on the piano over these years, it has been a most worthwhile investment. Our organ also features in a number of recitals this year. I’m delighted to welcome back Siobhán Kilkelly, who has performed many times in Sandford (including in the first series of recitals in 2012), and I’m also pleased that the collaboration with the Pipeworks Festival continues this June. Finally, I look forward particularly to the final recital in the series, by the very talented Nathan Whitley, who grew up in the parish and attended the school, and is now organist of Tullow Parish Church in Carrickmines.
Choral Compline
Our weekly services of Choral Compline on Friday evenings will also take a break for the summer months. I am very grateful to the small and very dedicated group of choir members that come week by week to sing this service, and I look forward to recommencing in September.
Holy Week Recital
From the audience perspective
On the Wednesday of Holy Week, a chance encounter at lunchtime with a member of the Sandford and St Philip’s Choral Union led to my attendance, in Sandford Parish Church that evening, at a performance of Franz Liszt’s “Via Crucis” (The Way of the Cross).
His fame as a stunning virtuoso pianist overshadowed his reputation as a composer of daring imagination, whose use – or even abuse – of tonality anticipated Arnold Schönberg by over twenty years! This situation led to the neglect of a good number of his compositions, including “Via Crucis”. Completed in February 1878, it had to wait forty-three years after the composer’s death in 1886 before it was first heard in Budapest on Good Friday, 19 March 1929.
The performance in Sandford Parish Church was sublime – wonderful choral singing, fine male soloists and a lovely female vocal trio. David O’Shea’s direction was very impressive – clear and unfussy, allowing the music to speak for itself. His playing of Liszt’s piano arrangement of the original organ version was all that could have been desired. Incidentally, a harmonium can be used if preferred. David also supplied splendid programme notes, along with texts and translations. I was deeply moved by this performance: the silences between sections and at the conclusion focused the mind on a journey that changed the world! John Hughes
From the choir’s perspective
Franz Liszt’s Via Crucis was never performed in his lifetime. Written towards the end of his life, with words in Latin and German, it is a solemn and unusual piece which follows the Stations of the Cross, with piano/organ music, choral pieces and a number of solo interludes.
There is something deeply moving about this piece of music that is difficult to convey with words. When we first started rehearsing it, it often seemed a bit disjointed; it is quite an odd composition, containing, as it does, so many different textures, passing discordant harmonies and unpredictable cadences. At times the music feels medieval and at other times it feels quite modern, almost experimental in places.
As we began to get used to it, it was a bit like putting a jigsaw together and finally seeing the full picture emerge as you fit the pieces together. As the choir became more confident about singing something a little out of our comfort zone, the full mesmerising effect of the music began to emerge from the strange combination of pieces, as a whole, greater than the sum of its parts.
Judging from the response when we performed it in Sandford Church – a long moment of eerie silence followed by rapturous applause – I would say that the assembled congregation also felt the effect.
That’s about all I can say about it; if you want to know more, you have to hear it to experience it for yourself or, better still, join the choir and sing it with us next time. Nóra Geraghty
Bach Recital: A 340 year Birthday Celebration, attended by a Curious Cat.
On Friday 21 March I attended a Bach recital in Sandford Church mainly because I was a curious cat and despite the warnings for such cats my curiosity was richly rewarded. The recital followed Choral Compline and those wishing to stay remained seated or moved closer to the piano. Newcomers for the recital joined the small audience.
David O’Shea welcomed the audience and set about explaining how this recital was to be a birthday celebration. This was in fact Bach’s 340th birthday! – according to the Julian Calendar. Bach, David told us, has two birthdays, celebrated on 21 and 31 March respectively. This conundrum, he explained, was created when the Gregorian calendar replaced the Julian Calendar and 10 days were lost.
The Julian calendar from Roman times had fallen out of sync with the seasons and important dates like Easter did not fall when they ought to any more. Pope Gregory therefore brought in a new revised calendar which we now follow but it took a long time for everyone to adopt it, not least in Bach’s deeply Lutheran part of Germany. Thus, when Bach was born, people in his area of Germany still followed the old Julian calendar making his birthday 21 March 1685 instead of 31 March. It’s worth looking up. I learned a lot! David then proceeded to introduce Partita No.6 in E minor BWV 830.
David explained how he had strived for many years, 20 perhaps, to play this complicated work. He felt he had reached a point where he could play the work in public and he hoped we would be forgiving.
Firstly let me explain, Bach is not Elevator music. Bach makes it hard, the music is complicated and interwoven so much extra is added but no frilly stuff. He is very serious. This work was not religious music but secular, with many different parts. These pieces were exercises and practices, some were dances, however I did not find the dances necessarily joyful. Should dance be joyful? The music was astounding to me, it was astonishing, it intruded, it made itself heard, I felt disrupted, there was no space for idle thought. Bach demands full attention.
Bach makes the listener listen and he certainly made David work. This music was powerful and physical even in the more reflective pieces. Apart from being physical in nature, the complicated patterns and the extra additions are mentally exhausting, even for the listener. Bach has a way of catching you out even when you think you are following!
We listened to seven parts in all, moving at different rates and tempos, each following seamlessly it seemed to me from one to the next. i Toccataii, ii Allemanda, iii Corrente, iv Air, v Sarabande, vi Tempo di Gavotta, vii. Gigue. I was amazed at the speed and endurance of David’s fingers. I marveled at the music and the endurance it required. In a little over half an hour it was all over. We clapped in appreciation and awe. I don’t think David O’Shea has any need to worry about his skill in playing this work. As for me, my curiosity was more than satisfied. Natasha Evans