Choir’s St John Passion resurrected just in time for Easter

There was more than one resurrection when Sydney Philharmonia Choirs performed a “reimagined” St John Passion at a long-anticipated concert in Chatswood’s Concourse theatre.

Sydney Philharmonia Chamber Choir started their 2021 season with a postponed centenary performance of Bach’s St John Passion. Picture: Michael Bradfield

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There was more than one resurrection when Sydney Philharmonia Choirs performed a “reimagined” St John Passion at a long-anticipated concert in Chatswood’s Concourse theatre.

Conducted by VOX music director Elizabeth Scott, it featured two contemporary new works stitched into Johann Sebastian Bach’s original score and was originally intended for SPC’s 2020 season to celebrate the choirs’ centenary. Covid, of course, put a stop to that and choristers had to rehearse on digital platforms.

The concert got under way with a choral acknowledgment of country, Deborah Cheetham and Matthew Doyle’s Tarimi Nulay – Long time living here, one of three works on the program that were commissioned as part of SPC’s 100 Minutes of New Australian Music for their centenary season. Sung in Gadigal, it was first heard at the Dawn Chorus performance on the steps of the Opera House at the start of 2020.

The Passion itself, the shorter and more dramatic of the two Bach composed as cantor in Leipzig, included two postponed premieres – Joseph Twist’s Heaven, Tear Apart solo for baritone David Greco and chorus and Brooke Shelley’s Ein Bachlein im Bach.

INTERLUDE

Twist tapped into the anger, devastation and chaos of the 2019 Australian bushfires for his aria Himmel reisse – a powerful moment in the first part of the work. Greco earned a special ovation for his prodigious singing with superb support from the 30 voices of the Chamber Singers and concertmaster Fiona Ziegler and her colleagues.

Shelley’s work was no less impressive, a beautiful interlude near the end of the Passion, its underlying reflective sadness capturing the composer’s feelings over the death of a dear friend’s son.

Scott had a strong cast of soloists on hand. English-born tenor Richard Butler, a former King’s College, Cambridge, choral scholar, making for a perfect Apostle, never flagging in moving the action along. By contrast tenor Nicholas Jones showed his operatic talents in his solos while bass-baritone Andrew O’Connor brought power, compassion and gravitas to his portrayal of Christ.

Celeste Lazarenko’s bright soprano lit the stage in her few solo moments and mezzo Sian Sharp brought plenty of drama to her big aria, Es ist Vollbracht (It is accomplished), backed beautifully by Anthea Cottee’s viola da gamba solo. Other early instruments featured throughout, making for interesting contrasts and textures. Nicole Divall, formerly of the Australian Chamber Orchestra and shortly to leave for overseas, was joined by Stephen Freeman for a viola d’amore duet and Kirsten Barry and Neil Simpson varied the palette with some moments on oboe da caccia and oboe d’amore as well as conventional instruments.

The concert was dedicated to the memory of Australian soprano Taryn Fiebig, who died recently.

DETAILS

●CONCERT St John Passion Reimagined (Sydney Philharmonia Choirs)

●WHERE Century Venues, The Concourse, Chatswood, Sydney

●WHEN April 3, 2021