reviewvancouver: Early Music Vancouver - Summer Festival 2024 - Bach Untamed

Glorious music and heavenly performances graced Christ Church Cathedral on Tuesday evening. Bruce Dickey’s handpicked selections stretched from the majestic Venetian Gabrielis of the 16th century to the tender Lutheran composers of the north in the next generation.

There were no works by Bach, pace EMV’s theme of “Bach Untamed” for this year’s festival, but this was music fundamental to Bach’s musical inheritance. Intricate and varied counterpoint, shifting dynamics, rich textures, splendour and intimacy, charm and emotion were all on display.

Where "Exaudi Domine", the first piece, was composed in versions for 6 or 16 singers, here two sufficed gloriously. Soprano Hana Blazikova’s crystalline voice and Charles Daniel’s tenor filled the nave with beauty. Two trombones (Catherine Motuz and Maximilien Brisson) and cornetto played by the incomparable Bruce Dickey added richness and depth aided by Chloe Meyers on violin, Alon Sariel on archlute and Alexander Weimann on organ.

These two singers and five instrumentalists made up the full complement of performers, but what music they made. Alexander Weimann throughout provided organ accompaniment, often joined by Alon Sariel and the archlute, providing harmonic support, adding and varying textures, and contributing fine adornment to the whole.

From the magnificent "Exaudi" and the more plangent and tender "Sancta Maria succurrere miseri", "Exultavit cor meum" by Giovanni Gabrieli’s student Heinrich Schutz brought a fluid change in mood and balance. The solo tenor, with cornetto, violin, and organ, is both triumphant and full of gratitude to God for his success. From the almost impossibly soft to glorious full-throated resonance, Charles Daniels intermixed joy and worship. Praise happily dedicated fills "Paratum cor meum", also by Schutz, and delicately offered through Blazikova’s very clear voice, gracefully supported by the archlute, violin and cornetto. In both, voice and instruments seemed to meld into a pool of sound..

Bright and rich, the instrumentalists alone returned to Gabrieli, passing the repetitions from cornetto to trombones to violin and back for a lively "Canzon seconda a 4".

Two vocal duets followed, the longing "Bone Iesu", accompanied by Alon Sariel and the extraordinary "Domina labia mea". Trumpets and cornetto open with a delightful bouncing theme which is then pierced by an ethereal soprano voice floating above, joined by the tenor. The gorgeous rippling whole demands ornamentation from all and trombones and cornetto sent lacy jewels to the audience. This splendid piece showed Hana Blazikova to perfection and Daniels’ astonishing ease in florid and exceptionally beautiful ornamentation.

IThe first half finished with the full group back for another Venetian, Francesco Usper, whose setting of "Vulnerasti cor meum" from the Song of Solomon is both affectionate and moving.

The second half of the programme moved to Germany. There is less grandeur and perhaps a darker sensitivity. Fear of death is very much present, punctuated by hopes of heaven. Sorrow too is a constant affliction. Charles Daniels moved me to tears.

The programme finished with uplifting themes: first a missionary task – "Gehet hin in alle Welt / Iehret all Heiden" ("Go into all the world, Teach all the nations") – is joyful, albeit with a touch of damnation in the finish. And finally the entire group lifted all our hearts with Schein’s setting of Rinckart’s well-known hymn "Nu danket alle Gott" "(Now thank we all our God").

It should not be blasphemous to give thanks for the great composers who gave us this music and the splendid performers who brought it to life.