Very Special Christmas music in Rome in Music and Vision 24 December

Very Special

Christmas music in Rome
impresses GIUSEPPE PENNISI

This year the Christmas period in Rome coincides with the beginning of the 'Jubilee of Mercy', an extraordinary Jubilee called for by Pope Francis to reflect, among other things, on inequalities among nations and people. Thus, the musical programs provide a special emphasis on these aspects. There are concerts in almost every church. Some make strange programming choices: eg the most important Anglican church in Rome (St Paul Within-the-Walls) started its Christmas music program with Carmina Burana by Carl Orff (Hitler's composer in residence), forgetting that it had been written for a Nazi youth meeting in Frankfurt and that its medieval text is an anthem to drinking and fornication. Also, there is the usual flurry of ballets and musical comedies as well as pure entertainment music.
In this report, I focus only on three main programs. The first is linked more to the Jubilee than to Christmas. Three important institutions (the Pontifical Institute of Sacred Music, the Sistina Musical Chapel and the Teatro dell'Opera) joined forces for six special concerts in St Augustine Basilica (where one of the best known Caravaggio paintings can be seen). The concerts include religious music through the centuries from Gregorian choruses, to baroque, to Benjamin Britten and Wolfgang Rihm. The first concert was held on 8 December 2015 (when I was in the audience) and will be repeated on 30 December in St Anne parish within the Vatican walls. It included compositions by Gabriel Fauré, Francis Poulenc and Felix Mendelssohn, as well as Gregorian Chants, the Song of Solomon and the Magnificat. The Fauré-Poulenc-Mendelssohn part was handled by the Rome Teatro dell'Opera Chorus (directed by Roberto Gabbiani) with four soloists — two sopranos, Marika Spadafin and Angela Nicoli, and two altos, Michela Nardella and Marzia Zanonzin).

Roberto Gabbiani conducting at the Basilica di Sant'Agostino in Rome. Photo © 2015 Yasuko Kageyama. Click on the image for higher resolution

The more ancient music was performed by the Sistina Musical Chapel directed by Franz Karl Prassi. This was an excellent beginning to this concert series, and a very enthralling concert also due to the beauty of the Basilica.

The Choir of the Cappella Musicale Pontificia Sistina, with director Monsignore Massimo Palombella. Click on the image for higher resolution

The second event is the special Christmas program proposed by the National Academy of Santa Cecilia over the period 9 December 2015 until 7 January 2016. It includes a 'festival within the festival' of fifteen American Gospel concerts, with American artists, and HD projection of Walt Disney's Fantasia with a full live orchestra. The high point is Haydn's The Creation with an all-star cast: Andrés Orozco-Estrada in the pit and Christiane Karg, Benjamin Burns and Günter Groissböck as soloists, performed from 19 to 22 December. I attended the 19 December performance at 6pm; even though this was Christmas shopping time, the auditorium was packed and the audience enthusiastic. Andrés Orozco-Estrada depicted Haydn's path from chaos to the creation of Adam and Eve very well.
The opening night was a very special Christmas concert played and sung not by the regular symphony orchestra and chorus but by teenage instrumentalists and singers under training with Salvatore Accardo as their conductor and soloist (in two Beethoven pieces for violin and orchestra). I attended the performance. In short, on 9 December an audience of some two thousand and eight hundred was confronted with an orchestra of one hundred and twenty youngsters and a chorus of two hundred (average age: ten), dealing with Beethoven, Rossini, Adam and an anonymous Irish composer. Under Accardo's guidance (as well as that of the chorus master Vincenzo De Carlo), the vast ensemble was very cohesive, even though in certain passages not as smooth as their seniors of the regular symphony orchestra. At the same time charming and engrossing, this performance was warmly applauded.

The children's concert with Salvatore Accardo conducting. Photo © 2015 Riccardo Musacchio and Flavio Ianniello. Click on the image for higher resolution

The third event is the Italian premiere, and the first performance in a stage version, of Credo, a multi-ethnic and multi-religious oratorio on a libretto by Father José Tolentino Mendonça (with passages from writings by Ibn Arabi, Giordano Bruno, Giorgio Caproni, Zvi Kolitza and Fernando Pessoa). In the score by Mario Tronco, Leandro Piccioni and Pino Pecorelli, there are quotations from Rossini, Britten, and religious Sufi and Senegalese songs. Credo is produced by the Accademia Filarmonica Romana and had its world premiere in September 2015 at the São Domingo Church in Lisbon. The performers are singers from various countries and the multi-ethnic Orchestra di Piazza Vittorio; their adaptations of Magic Flute and Carmen had, respectively, some 250 and 300 performances around the world. It is an interesting oratorio, quite different from the operatic adaptations.

The Orchestra di Piazza Vittorio ensemble for 'Credo'. Photo © 2015 Serena De Angelis. Click on the image for higher resolution

As an intimate prayer to God, the piano and the sotto voce dominate the score. I was at the 17 December opening night. The audience loved Credo and, at their request, the final chorus was encored.

Copyright © 24 December 2015 Giuseppe Pennisi,
Rome, Italy