concert review: Messiah

There are people for whom Handel's Messiah is an annual Christmas tradition (although its first few performances were mostly at Easter). We are not among those people: shalmestere was in a performance of the Messiah once or twice in school, while I've done a Messiah sing-along and attended a handful of performances in my life. The last one I recall was a historically-informed performance at the acoustically-perfect Troy, NY music hall, and it was a revelatory experience: light, agile, and crystal clear.

Last night's performance by TENET and the Sebastians had similar forces: twelve singers, each of whom had a solo or two, and fifteen instrumentalists. The performing venue was a church in Manhattan, with very different acoustics: there was a fifty-foot long choir-and-altar space behind the performers, so the tutti sections weren't as "crystal clear" as in the Troy performance (although there were moments that, as shalmestere said, sounded like one voice). The instrumentalists included a pair of natural trumpeters -- at least, I didn't see any valves, although there was finger movement synchronized with the notes so I think each trumpet had a single cornetto-style finger-hole -- who did an impressive job. Some of the vocal soloists struck me as working too hard, with notey ornaments or overdone vibrato, while others (Michael Maliakel on "Darkness Shall Cover the Earth", Margot Rood on "Rejoice Greatly", and Helen Karloski on "He was Despised") knocked my socks off with their clear, natural-sounding control. All in all, an enjoyable evening, although we got to bed after midnight so I'm even more underslept than usual this morning.

Almost everybody in the audience stood up for the Alleluia chorus. This strikes me as a silly shibboleth of a ritual, so I didn't, but I guess it has the advantage of allowing people to stretch their legs a bit after two hours of music.