{"id":32613,"date":"2016-03-05T12:19:08","date_gmt":"2016-03-05T18:19:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/?p=32613"},"modified":"2016-03-08T00:15:49","modified_gmt":"2016-03-08T06:15:49","slug":"utah-chamber-artists-performs-music-from-masses-old-and-new","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/utah-chamber-artists-performs-music-from-masses-old-and-new\/","title":{"rendered":"Utah Chamber Artists Performs Music from Masses, Old and New"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"UCA\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Swiss composer Frank Martin (1890-1974) is one of the most enigmatic composers in that nation’s musical pantheon.\u00a0The integrity, rigor, and honesty of his music, in multiple genres, are perhaps unmatched, even in comparison to other\u00a0exceptional 20th-century composers. Martin\u2019s \u201cMass for Unaccompanied Double Choir\u201d fits this template especially well. It was completed in1926, but only premiered in\u00a01963 because it was, in the composer’s words,\u00a0an \u201caffair between God and me.”<\/p>\n

Utah Chamber Artists (UCA)\u00a0performed Martin\u2019s \u201cMass\u201d on Feb. 29 in Libby Gardner Concert Hall at the University of Utah. The title of the evening’s proceedings was “Music of the Masses,” and indeed, this concert should have been heard by even more than the several hundred of\u00a0those who found their way to it on a winter Monday that was ending with more than a breeze of the advancing seasons to it. Music\u00a0director Barlow Bradford and the choir are to be vociferously commended for\u00a0selecting and pursuing\u00a0Martin\u2019s \u201cMass\u201d for the centerpiece of one of their concerts.\u00a0It is a challenging piece, not far from a half hour in length.<\/p>\n

The choir presented a performance that met the demands the \u201cMass\u201d places on the singers and conductor, and the choir excelled with an unabashed honesty, especially in the interior movements.\u00a0The Kyrie<\/em>\u2019s textures were lithe and dense.\u00a0The Gloria<\/em> was clear in its enunciation and thoroughly invigorating. There was ethereal fervor at \u201cRex coelestis<\/em>,\u201d \u201cDomine Deus<\/em>\u201d had superbly sustained basses, and the choir emoted a gently powerful solidity at \u201cAmen.\u201d\u00a0The Credo<\/em> gained in color and texture as it proceeded, with a burst of beauty at \u201csecula<\/em>,\u201d \u201cgenitum<\/em>\u201d wrapped itself in velvet vibrancy, and then the last few lines danced with their textures.\u00a0The Sanctus<\/em> veered off just shy of lushly colored and lively, with a seeping urgency at \u201cgloria<\/em> tua<\/em>.\u201d\u00a0In the Benedictus<\/em>, the play of high and low lines and then harmonies was pointed with budding wonder.\u00a0With the Agnus Dei<\/em>, the lean textures were engaged and conquered.\u00a0There was a sense of searching for and finding\u00a0a formal yet exquisitely engaged precision,\u00a0and this\u00a0contributed decisively\u00a0to the meaning of the text.\u00a0\u201cAgnus Dei, qui tollis peccate mundi<\/em>\u201d was earnest and gently so, and \u201cpassem<\/em>,\u201d the last word, was superbly surrendered into its colors. The Sanctus<\/em> and Benedictus<\/em> were indeed\u00a0a locus around which the other movements rotated.<\/p>\n

This was a meticulously committed performance, one that confronted and embraced the composer\u2019s deep faith in no uncertain terms, yet at times enabled and even embroidered the text with a loving ardor the composer surely believed possible and even desired.\u00a0In a performance and interpretation that was both ethereal and rugged, often simultaneously, the choir sought unity in this division and frequently achieved it with some poignancy that resounded in unrepentant fashion.<\/p>\n

The second half of the program presented a unique perspective on the Mass as a choral genre, with well-chosen excerpts from four popular Masses that the choir has presented previously in its 25 years.\u00a0The excerpts were arranged in a progression which, more or less, created its own hybrid Mass.<\/p>\n

Maurice Durufl\u00e9’s (1902-86)\u00a0Requiem<\/em> is his most performed composition, and its comfortingly rich lyricism is exceedingly accessible.\u00a0The choir performed the first two sections, \u201cIntroit<\/em>\u201d and \u201cKyrie<\/em>.\u201d\u00a0The \u201cIntroit<\/em>\u201d was sumptuous and refined, notably in the sopranos and altos, and the\u00a0\u201cKyrie<\/em>\u201d saw suave textures enhance the lyricism.\u00a0Organist Gabriele Terrone established and maintained attentive balances with the choir and small orchestra, along with the UCA’s\u00a0music director, Barlow Bradford, as conductor.<\/p>\n

\u201cDies Irae<\/em>\u201d and \u201cLacrymosa<\/em>,\u201d the third and sixth movements from Mozart’s \u201cRequiem Mass\u201d followed the Durufl\u00e9\u2019s excerpts. \u201cRequiem Mass\u201d was Mozart\u2019s final work, and is notably more continually infused with pulsating dynamic extremes than the other\u00a0Masses\u00a0on the program.\u00a0 In the \u201cDies Irae<\/em>,\u201d vehement highlighting of colors and fiercely refined tempos unerringly matched the passion of the score.\u00a0The \u201cLacrymosa<\/em>\u201d exhibited elegant phrasing, pulsing with life, joined with a more deliberate Larghetto<\/em> tempo and even more lucid textures.<\/p>\n

With its heavy tinge of lullaby-like consolation, Gabrile Faur\u00e9’s (1845-1924)\u00a0\u201cRequiem\u201d is also his most popular work.\u00a0The \u201cSanctus<\/em>\u201d and \u201cAgnus Dei<\/em>\u201d\u00a0in the version for choir, orchestra, and organ, were presented.\u00a0 The \u201cSanctus<\/em>\u201d featured colors vibrant with cherished desire, piquant organ, fine-grained strings, and then shifted into an \u201cAgnus Dei<\/em>\u201d that was firmly phrased.<\/p>\n

Soprano Melinda Kirigin-Voss\u00a0was the forthright soloist in the excerpted \u201cLux aeterna<\/em>\u201d from John Rutter’s \u201cRequiem.\u201d\u00a0 This is the seventh and final movement of that composition, the most elaborately direct of the five Masses performed. With its almost unrelenting mixture of colors and textures, this movement found the choir emerging into an even more heartfelt ardor.\u00a0The lullaby-like freedom in phrasing at the end\u00a0dovetailed\u00a0with glinting timbres in the violins, and the orchestra, composed of many members of the Utah Symphony and other superb local musicians, played with vigor and ineluctable passion.<\/p>\n

This \u201cLux aeterna<\/em>,\u201d along with Durufl\u00e9\u2019s \u201cIntroit<\/em>\u201d and \u201cKyrie<\/em>,\u201d enchanted most in the second half. They suited the choir’s tonal blend with almost intuitive abundance.\u00a0The interpretation of the Mozart was elegantly dynamic, and emphasized the limber lyricism with precision.\u00a0The performance of the\u00a0Faur\u00e9 \u201cSanctus<\/em>\u201d and \u201cAgnus Dei<\/em>\u201d\u00a0embraced\u00a0their warm-hearted gentleness and never let them unfurl into any blunt edges.\u00a0In\u00a0both parts of the concert,\u00a0Barlow Bradford conducted with his customary smoothly invigorating, direct, and gracefully-deliberate style, and the choir sung with tempered elation, the details an omnipresent part of the whole.<\/p>\n

Yet the performance and interpretation of Frank Martin’s \u201cMass\u201d lingered in the memory.\u00a0Utah Chamber Artists delved\u00a0into it\u00a0with more than mere hints of elan<\/em>.\u00a0It is far more of an interior world than those found in the Durufl\u00e9, Mozart, Faur\u00e9, and Rutter Masses.\u00a0It\u00a0<\/em>is never an impenetrable and shattering\u00a0fortress, and in the end the choir was undeniably triumphant both in and through it.\u00a0In this tumbling unfurling of Masses, Martin’s floated just above, tethered as it is to a profound humility towards life’s vicissitudes.\u00a0Its sheer directness of utterance is difficult to deflect, and can be\u00a0irresistibly embraced.\u00a0Its spiritual grace derives from its arc of forthright and intimate majesty in belief.\u00a0Powerfully poignant, yet never truly sentimental, it enlivens the soul with fixed and tender traceries of love.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Swiss composer Frank Martin (1890-1974) is one of the most enigmatic composers in that nation’s musical pantheon.\u00a0The integrity, rigor, and honesty of his music, in multiple genres, are perhaps unmatched, even in comparison to other\u00a0exceptional 20th-century composers. Martin\u2019s \u201cMass for Unaccompanied Double Choir\u201d fits this template especially well. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1519,"featured_media":32614,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_piecal_is_event":false,"_piecal_start_date":"","_piecal_end_date":"","_piecal_is_allday":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[58],"tags":[558],"class_list":["post-32613","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-music","tag-utah-chamber-artists"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/UCA.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-07-09 11:12:16","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32613","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1519"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32613"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32613\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32616,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32613\/revisions\/32616"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32614"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32613"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32613"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32613"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}