Johannes-Passion - Bach
Bach is not a composer one immediately associates with either Our Lady's Choral Society or its music director, Proinnsias O Duinn. It was interesting, then, and laudable, for them to have chosen to present the St John Passion, given at St Patrick's Cathedral last night in aid of the Carmichael Centre, in the original German.
The decision to place the Evangelist (tenor David Field send) in the elevation of the pulpit proved thoroughly viable, and the forward location of the other solo singers had the audible benefit of bringing them clearly into the same acoustic space as the bulk of the audience.
Yet, in truth, this was not a really satisfying performance. The choral contributions tended to be dominated by the sopranos. The better-balanced exceptions, among them Lasset uns den nicht zerteilen, and the closing chorus and chorale, served to point up the limitations elsewhere. The playing of the National Sinfonia was frequently ragged, and the solo singing uneven.
Fieldsend certainly has the vocal character to make a fine Evangelist, but not the ease of delivery, security of intonation, sensitivity to style, or narrative skills in German for such a heavy undertaking. In the arias, Robin Tritschler's lighter tenor proved on this occasion more rewarding.
What Tritschler and some of his colleagues lacked was an easy balance of light and shade, of short notes and long ones, within a flexible line. Soprano Orla Boylan and mezzo Doreen Curran were fine in their own way, but as Wanda Landowska might have said, it was not Bach's. Owen Gilhooly (Jesus) and Desmond Caplis (Pilate) both forced their presence. It was left to bass Philip O'Reilly, especially in the delicacy of his Betrachte, meine Seel, to show that emphatic projection is not the only way to win listeners' interest and involvement.
