The Choral Pilgrimage 2023
Greyfriars Kirk - 14/10/23
The Sixteen | Harry Christophers, conductor
The vocal ensemble, The Sixteen, was founded by Harry Christophers in 1979, and it has gone from strength to strength over the decades. It is extraordinary that The Sixteen and the even older group, The Tallis Scholars, founded in 1973 by Peter Phillips, are still at the top of the tree after all these years. It says a lot for both Peter and Harry that, despite all the changes of personnel, the basic core sounds of the two groups have stayed largely the same throughout. The Sixteen are essentially slightly bigger, four to a part or divisions thereof, and in this concert at Greyfriars Kirk, they offered us a group of 18 singers, in various combinations. This was the antepenultimate concert of a marathon tour which started in March in Oxford and has criss-crossed the country ever since. A full house turned up on a cold autumnal evening for a marvellous performance of choral music by William Byrd, in his 400th anniversary year, and by European composers who influenced him. This has been a sublime year for Byrd Lovers, and, for this reviewer, this concert was one of the very best.
He was an amazing man, born around 1540 and dying in 1623, starting his career at Lincoln Cathedral, and outliving four kings and three queens (if you count Jane Grey, the nine day queen). He remained a Catholic all his life, despite the twists and turns of the English Reformation, but managed through friends in high places to avoid the fate of many who proclaimed the old faith. Since he lived so long, he was able to assimilate many new trends in music over his life, both from the English tradition and from the Continent, and that assimilation was the basis of this excellent concert.
One of the most important ways The Sixteen differs from other contemporary groups is the look. Apart from a few of the singers, this, and I mean it in an entirely good way, is a mature ensemble, with beautifully modulated but older voices, and with a sound which has depth and breadth. Immaculately dressed in white tie and tails for the men, and long dresses for the women, this is an unashamedly imposing group. Now, I am well-known for disliking seeing orchestras dressed like this, but, somehow, The Sixteen just looks right, and the sound matches the look. It’s a question, I think, of sonority, and even the bright forward sound of the singers has a quality that younger, smaller groups lack. We have become very used to one or two to a part groups, like Voces 8, the Gesualdo 6 (by the way, what is it with random numbers for vocal groups?) and the King’s Singers, but the sound of 16 (or 18) voices together in this music is very exciting, especially voices as good as these.
As I have written before when reviewing a capella groups, I tend to look for particular excellence from the sopranos and basses, forming as they do, the bookends of the sound. Here The Sixteen have a huge advantage, with a gorgeous soprano section, led by the wonderful Julie Cooper, and a rich duo of superb basses in Stuart Young and Rob Macdonald. The inner parts are similarly beautifully cast, with a mixture of counter tenors and altos, alongside fine tenors and a couple of creamy baritones. It’s also clear that many of these singers are used to performing together, as can be seen from their easy rapport when singing, and their relaxed smiles at the end of a section. There was no sense of internal tension, and they looked like they were having a jolly good time. For a group which has been singing the same programme since March over 27 concerts, this can only be a good thing!
What of the programme?
Frankly, it was one of the most interesting of the year. Focusing on Byrd, it allowed us to see some of his direct influences, and in several cases, juxtaposed settings of the same text by the English master and continental contemporaries with whom he corresponded. In addition The Sixteen has commissioned two English motets by the 43 year old Bulgarian-born composer, Dobrinka Tabakova. These had also been set by Byrd, and we heard the two versions in each half of the programme. Ms Tabakova’s compositions were quite superb, beautifully using the sonorities of The Sixteen to stunning effect. In the first piece, ‘Arise Lord’, she builds up from the power of an ascending fifth motive through rich homophonic choral chords to release a glorious floating soprano solo line, deliciously sung by Julie Cooper, who, by the way, is also a fully qualified Nutritional Therapist. Ms Tabakova’s second motet, ‘Turn, O Lord’, highlights an eerily beautiful unison soprano line based on Orthodox chant, adding a strong taste of oriental mysticism to the whole sound world. These were impressive new pieces which revealed a keen compositional style and announced the arrival of a major player in contemporary music.
One of the highlights for me from the rest of a superb programme was the Motet, ‘O suavitas et dulcedo’ by the Fleming, Philippe de Monte (1521-1603, another long-lived composer). He travelled all over Europe, visiting England in 1554 as a singer in the chapel choir of Prince Philip of Spain for his marriage to Mary Tudor. It is entirely possible that both Byrd and Tallis met de Monte when the combined royal chapels sang at the royal wedding in Winchester Cathedral. Many years later, when de Monte was Kapellmeister to the Holy Roman Emperor in Vienna, he sent a deeply moving eight part motet, ‘Super Flumina Babylonis’, to Byrd in England. This version of the lament, ‘By the waters of Babylon’, was beautifully sung by The Sixteen, as was the companion piece written in answer by Byrd, ‘Quomodo cantabimus’ (How shall we sing the Lord’s song in a foreign land?) De Monte’s piece was a none too subtle message of support to the suffering Catholics in England, and Byrd’s eight part motet also emphasised the grief of exile.
In the first half of the concert, we heard Byrd’s sorrow for the destruction of Jerusalem, mirroring his sorrow at the persecution of Catholics in England, in the two-part motet, ‘Ne irascaris, Domine/ Civitas Sancti tui’. These deeply powerful texts from Isaiah 64: 9 and 10, resonate even more poignantly now, after the recent events in Israel and Gaza, and Byrd’s settings were eloquently performed by The Sixteen, giving us all reason to contemplate the impenetrable problems still facing this part of the world.
The concert ended with Byrd’s outstanding motet, ‘Vigilate’, thought to date from earlier in his career. There are clear echoes of the Italian madrigal tradition, and Byrd’s word painting is delicious. You can almost hear the cock crowing at ‘an galli cantu’, and the sleepy suspensions at ‘dormientes’ suggest the slumbers of the less than vigilant watchers. The Sixteen really rose to the challenge of this complicated piece of writing, luxuriating in their superb technical control, guided as ever by the fluent conducting of Harry Christophers.
A top notch concert.
