Flamboyant Christmas Oratorio from Stephen Layton and the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment

Stephen Layton has done a good service to Christmas concert-goers everywhere by placing Bach’s Christmas Oratorio the day before Handel’s Messiah in his Christmas Festival at Smith Square Hall this year. In large part the works tell the same story, but they do incredibly different things. Handel does most of the work for you; no one is left guessing throughout Messiah about the import of the words and his music. Bach’s essential difference is his structure – the combination of recitative, aria and chorus in a jumbled format. The result is something harder to grasp at.

Layton certainly attempts to grasp it. With the excellent Polyphony choir he formed while a student, he has the perfect forces for a work such as this. The Christmas Oratorio is a big work, but the 14 singers, who used meticulous detail throughout, carried the force of a large choral society. Layton’s use of the pencil as a conducting tool is a scene to behold, as is his minimalist conducting style, frighteningly interrupted by spasmodic bursts of movement.

The soloists were well–renowned names in this repertoire, and largely superb. James Gilchrist has not lost any of his storytelling ability and deep reading in preparing texts, which makes him so powerful as an Evangelist. In the tenor arias, especially the fiendish “Frohe Hirten”, he struggled more, but his announcements of the heavenly host were more fluent and moving than many a lyric tenor. For his learning he is unequalled among British tenors today. 

Anna Dennis was probably disappointed that Layton opted to stop the Oratorio short at the end of Part 3, as the best soprano arias come later. She joined with the last–minute replacement Ashley Riches for a wonderful “Herr, dein Mitleid”, the duet which crowns the theme of wonder at God’s compassion in Part 3. Riches was entertaining with often interesting takes on the bass recitatives. His ‘Großer Herr, o starker König’ was fittingly ebullient.

Iestyn Davies charmed with his singing, with a wonderfully reticent rendition of “Schlafe, mein Liebster” and an equally beautiful “Schließe, mein Herze”. The only weakness was that he did not possess the projection of Gilchrist or Riches, the willingness to put the shaping of text above the simple melodic contour. Davies has one of the most beautiful voices in Europe, but for immediacy and drama, Gilchrist is your man.

Davies also struggled to maintain strict ensemble with the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, led by Margaret Faultless. Although placed at an awkward angle to the orchestra, the solo voices and the band were frequently just out of sync, perhaps something to do with the flamboyance of Layton’s beat and his obvious preference for line over strict ensemble. Whatever the cause, this was not the most scintillating of performances from the players, with Layton’s slightly slow tempo in the large choruses and dominance of the podium getting in the way of the chamber music sense which drives the best performances of this music. Layton’s expressive attention to detail could be said to have prohibited, rather than emboldened, his orchestra players in the most joyous choruses. The string section’s unremarkable performance of Corelli’s Christmas Concerto – a rather unremarkable piece in itself – was nevertheless firmly together. 

Layton is at his best when conducting choirs, and Polyphony’s commitment to the text and musical line in the chorales was highly powerful. “Ach mein herzliebes Jesulein” and “Brich an, o schönes Morgenlicht” were particular highlights. Such commitment to melodic line and drama are unusual even in the most famed British choirs. They were enough to make this a unique and rewarding interpretation of Bach's evergreen cantata collection.