Wisconsin
Chamber Choir
Reviews
 
St. John Passion - A Resounding Success: Review in Isthmus Daily Page
by John W. Barker - Saturday 04/03/2010
Wisconsin Chamber Choir performs superbly disciplined 'St. John Passion'
Artistic director Robert Gehrenbeck pulled together a remarkably consistent, coherent, and artistically splendid achievement.Are we developing an historic, and "historically informed" tradition each Easter now?
Last year, Trevor Stephenson's Madison Bach Musicians, et al., gave us the first period-style performance ever here of Bach's monumental "St. Matthew Passion". Now, this year, Robert Gehrenbeck, leading his Wisconsin Chamber Choir, has given us Madison's first period-style presentation of Bach's "St. John Passion". St. John Passion 2010
Shorter, more concise and intense that the "Matthew Passion", the "John" setting has a complex history of recurrent revisions by the composer through his Leipzig career. Perhaps never finished to his satisfaction, it comes down to us nevertheless as a compelling Christian drama.
Gehrenbeck's choir numbered 32 mixed voices -- perhaps a tad larger than Bach might have used, but superbly disciplined, of beautifully balanced sonority, and with notably clear German diction. A group of 17 period-instrument players contributed a pungent accompaniment that a modern orchestra could not have matched, with fine obbligato work by individual members, and ever-solid continuo foundation provided by cellist Anton Ten Wolde and organist John Chappell Stowe. It was a pity, though, that a lutenist could not have been mustered for the curious lute obbligato part in the bass arioso "Betrachte, meine Seel".
In any Passion performance, the narrative role of the Evangelist is pivotal, and clear-voiced James Doing (who also took one of the tenor arias) has this music in his blood. Likewise a veteran of this idiom is Paul Rowe, who sang the words of Christ. The four soloists in the arias were all admirable: I particularly liked the familiar tenor Ryan McEldowney, and contralto Julie Cross was quite moving in the great aria, "Es ist vollbracht!" Of the three members of the choir who took the small "character" roles, I was most impressed by baritone's William Rosholt's vivid and vocally rich portrayal of Pilate.
The performance was given, like last year's "Matthew Passion" in the new Atrium Auditorium of the First Unitarian Society. Considerable support effort was in evidence. The handsomely produced printed program was remarkably thorough and detailed, with full text and translation. As a backup to that, large-print supertitles were projected on a side screen, to encourage close following of the text.
Ventures like these can be a down-to-the-wire scramble, but Gehrenbeck managed to pull together a remarkably consistent, coherent, and artistically splendid achievement. He and his choir should be proud of establishing for themselves a more glowing status than ever in Madison's musical life.
And, like the two performances of the "Matthew Passion", the one presentation this time was sold out, with people turned away. Clearly, Madison audiences have come to welcome period-style recreations of literature once held captive to "modern" treatments. Food for thought here.

Haydn's Creation April 2, 2011

 Wisconsin Chamber Choir's performance of Haydn's Creation [April 2, 2011] a resounding success!
Review by John W. Barker for Isthmus:
 Haydn's oratorio The Creation is a glorious, exhilarating work, one of the triumphs of the choral literature. I can think of at least two earlier performances in Madison in my time, as done by the Madison Symphony Orchestra and its chorus. One was in 2002 under John DeMain. The prior one was in the spring of 1974. Led by Roland Johnson, it had special meaning for me. I sang (joyously) in the chorus for it, and then, a few weeks later, I was in Vienna and visited Haydn's house, now a museum -- the very house where Haydn composed this wonderful music. It was still in my ears, and it vibrated through the place for me as I walked its rooms. Unforgettable!
So I looked forward with high expectations to the April 2 performance of The Creation by the Wisconsin Chamber Choir. And I was not disappointed. (Disclosure: I gave a pre-concert lecture.) The setting itself, the Masonic Center auditorium, was meaningful to begin with, for Haydn himself was briefly a Freemason in Vienna, and Masonic imagery and ideas peek out as a subtext in this and others of his works. (Over the center's entrance reads the Masonic motto: "Let there be Light", words that Haydn actually set in his score, with dazzling effect.)
Fortunately, too, the music-making was simply splendid. Having brought off Bach's St. John Passion last season, conductor Robert Gehrenbeck once more showed bold enterprise in tackling this new and major project. With great directorial skill and with thorough understanding of the music, he brought it off triumphantly. His choir of 42 singers was augmented with 18 members of the Stoughton Chamber Singers, all singing (in English) with lusty sonority. A chamber orchestra of 31 players was made up of local instrumentalists: there were a few blemishes in tricky passages, but the playing was remarkably crisp and compelling, with some particularly beautiful wind work. That these players and Gehrenbeck could manage this with only two orchestral rehearsals is a great tribute to the professionalism involved.
For the solo assignments, there were five singers in all. Of those who portrayed the three archangels in Parts I and II, tenor J. Adam Shelton (Uriel) and bass Brian Leeper (Raphael) sang their parts with strength and style, but soprano Deanna Horjus-Lang (Gabriel) brought a special beauty to her work, soaring over everyone else with radiant clarity. For Part III we were given two new soloists, Madeline Olsen (a member of the choir) as Eve and bass Michael Roemer as Adam. Their glowingly beautiful, fresh young voices captured perfectly the charming innocence of the Primal Pair.
Solos and choruses, tumbled forth one after the other, each with new melodic beauties, nature evocations, and rich majesty, to express the beauties of our world and the optimism of faith. At a time now so full of anger, ugliness, and hostilities, we need all the uplift we can get. Thanks to Gehrenbeck and Haydn, that was what we came away with in grateful abundance.
Review by Jay Rath:
04/03/2011
Joseph Haydn’s self-proclaimed masterpiece, The Creation, met with an instant and enthusiastic standing ovation in Madison on Saturday evening. Around 440 attended the performance by the Wisconsin Chamber Choir and Stoughton Chamber Singers at the Madison Masonic Center.
The Creation is properly termed an oratorio, but in many ways it resembles an opera staged concert-style, complete with characters Adam, Eve and three angels. As we head into the Easter season it would be a fine salute to this year’s 400th anniversary of the King James Bible, from which the text is drawn (along with Milton’s Paradise Lost). Or it would be, except the English libretto was translated into German for Haydn, and then translated back into English several times.
The work tells the story of Biblical creation and the early days of Eden, foreshadowing the fall from grace. The performance overall was rich, lush and satisfying, presenting great caramel-flavored swirls of sound. The choir was always precise in phrasing, and stunning in its presentation of big, wide-open chords.
Soprano Deanna Horjus-Lang was bold and athletic; bass Brian Leeper presented a fine anchor throughout. Madeline Olson, as Eve, performed with bright ease. J. Adam Shelton was a stand-out as the angel Uriel, with his fine, clear tenor.
Many of the soloists were drawn from the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater, as was conductor Robert Gehrenbeck, who led the choirs and fine orchestra in a spare, effective manner.
The auditorium of the Masonic Center revealed itself as an excellent space for live classical presentation, with little or no amplification evident or even necessary. The center is too seldom-used, despite its history as a home for the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra’s annual presentation of Handel’s Messiah in the 1980s.
Let’s hope for many more concerts there from the outstanding Wisconsin Chamber Choir and Stoughton Chamber Singers.

The concert was made possible in part by support from the Dane County Cultural Affairs Commission and the Overture Foundation.
Jake Stockinger The Well-Tempered Ear
04/05/2011 By one local critic’s count, Haydn’s “The Creation” has been performed only three times in the past 35 years or so in Madison.
That is too bad for one of the all-time great masterpieces of oratorio writing.  But at least, it seems, when it performed it is generally performed well.  Certainly such was the case with last Saturday’s outstanding performance of “The Creation” by the 45-member Wisconsin Chamber Choir and the 18-member Stoughton Chamber Singers with soloists and a 31-piece pick-up orchestra form local groups.

These are not high-profile groups in a city filled with so many fine classical music ensembles. But perhaps this kind of performance could bring them a bit more publicity and profile. It certainly should.  As Isthmus critic and retire UW history professor John W. Barker (below) pointed out during his crowded pre-concert lecture (below), Haydn’s oratorio was the prolific composer’s single most worked by the great composer of 104 symphonies. And it stands squarely in the middle of the oratorio tradition, looking backward to Handel and forward to Mendelssohn and others.
Everything about the performance, which just got better and better as the singers and instrumentalists progressed and warmed up, seemed appropriate.
Even the venue fitted the piece. It was performed in the Masonic auditorium (below), on Wisconsin Avenue, near the Capitol, and Haydn was a Mason in Vienna for two years. The concert hall itself seems an intimate space with good acoustics, and one wishes it were used more often.
True, the performance was not sold-out. But it was a very good size crowd and an enthusiastic one.  I found the instrumentalists particularly good at the many moments of sound painting used in the score: the bright voices bringing light to chaos; the strings portraying the first dawn of the first day; the flute-made bird calls; the trombone hoof beats of galloping animals; and the double-bass lumbering of great whales.
All sections performed well, but I was particularly struck by the brass (hard instruments to play), the winds and by the constant but never flagging fortepiano continuo provided by Theodore Reinke.  At times the orchestra seemed a bit loud for the chorus, but the balance improved as the performance progressed.
But of course, it was the vocalists – soloists and choirs alike – who rightfully reigned over this creation of “The Creation.”
Some standouts included soprano Deanna Horjus-Lang as the angel Gabriel, who voice often soared effortlessly. Both tenor J. Adam Shelton as Uriel and bass Brian Leeper (below, second from left) as Raphael proved excellent narrators, whose excellent diction allowed us to hear the English text and who sang with both lyricism and an assertive seriousness.
As the newly created Adam and Eve, bass Michael Roemer (below, right) and soprano Madeline Olson (below, second from right) somehow embodied innocence through their young and lighter voices. The seemed perfected matched to my ears. 
All of this is a great compliment to Robert Gehrenbeck, the Wisconsin Chamber Choir’s artistic director since 2008, who held the performance together with the appropriate tightness that deserved the standing ovation it got.
If the work itself seemed less expressive than one might imagine, well that is one of the great contrasts between Haydn and the emotionally deeper Mozart, to whom he is so often – and so unjustly — compared. The underlying belief was the religion of Reason and the Enlightenment, not the profundity of a personal statement, even though Haydn was a devout a Roman Catholic.
In any case, Haydn (below) considered “The Creation” his best work. And to sing it with comparable conviction is not an easy task. But it is one that was fulfilled by this performance, which brought a lot of light of its own to this often-neglected masterwork and to a dark time.
This project is supported by the Dane County Cultural Affairs Commission with additional funds from the Overture Foundation and the Pleasant T. Rowland Foundation.