Sing for joy?
Post categories: Jessica Duchen
| 17:18 UK time, Tuesday, 3 March 2009
The ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳NOW's Elijah as broadcast on Radio 3 last Sunday evening (conducted by Thierry Fischer) is now available to view on the Internet. Follow this link.
provides an eloquent introduction (in which I'm afraid that I almost thought he was going to say the Patron Saint of the day was Mendelssohn!) One interesting point he makes is that by Mendelssohn 's time - the premiere of Elijah having taken place in 1846 - grand-scale oratorios of this type were somewhat out of fashion.
The oratorio as a form holds a special place in British musical life. We may lag behind Germany in our number of composers of genius; our musical tuition for young people has sadly never approached the levels of excellence common in Russia or Hungary; but for amateurdom in its finest and truest sense - an absolute passion for making music in a non-professional context - we must surely be world leaders, and there principally for choral singing.
Some of my formative influences involved singing in a school choir which regularly sent a contingent to participate in the at the Royal Festival Hall. We sang special arrangements of works ranging from Vivaldi's Gloria to Haydn's Creation and Fauré's Requiem. Getting to know such amazing music from the inside and being part of it with all the adrenalin of performance in real time, moreover in a great concert hall with a huge audience, was an overwhelming, unforgettable experience - especially at the impressionable age of 14.
There is no better reason to sing than for joy, and few better joys than to sing. It's proven to be healthy, too - it opens up your channels, gets the oxygen flowing and provides, I've heard, a form of healing that involves being part of a 'flow' greater than oneself, engaging with many others in creating something of beauty and communicating the positive energy of sound to each other and an audience. Something like that, anyway. Alas, these days I can't sing to save my life, but I have innumerable friends whose weekly highlight is their participation in choral societies or the fine vocal ensembles associated with top professional orchestras.
If it hadn't been for Mendelssohn, and especially , the entire tradition of oratorio singing might well have lapsed irredeemably, and our singing with it. Elijah is a gift for choral societies - easy to follow, well written, dramatic and effective. Perhaps it served as a shot in the arm to national musical life.
So we have much to thank our Felix for. And if there's something better than listening to Elijah, it would be singing in it. If you can, do.
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