Sometimes, there is safety in numbers. For BBC Prom 6, Verdi's Messa da Requiem, the Royal Albert Hall audience were greeted by choir seats packed to the gills: some 280 singers of the combined forces of the BBC National Chorus of Wales and the Crouch End Festival Chorus. Just the sight of a chorus on such a scale was impressive, but as soon as the hushed notes of the Introit began, it became clear that we were in for a choral treat of the highest order.
Having that many singers may help with volume of sound, but it makes one of the hardest tasks in choral singing even harder: making text intelligible at pianissimo in a large hall. That task was accomplished with aplomb: pianissimi were featherlight, words were crisp, fervent and projected to the back of the hall. The splits between groups of voices were perfectly delineated, giving the sense of a dialogue as the lines were passed from one side to another, giving just a hint of the fireworks to follow.
The Kyrie made clear that our four soloists all had voices of high quality even at Albert-Hall-filling volumes, most notably the pure beauty of SeokJong Baek’s tenor. The ensuing Dies irae revealed that each would be taking on a different and clearly defined character through the piece. Bass Soloman Howard was the terrified sinner, distraught by fear of what is to come: his repetition of the word “Mors” in Mors stupebit et natura (Death and nature shall stand amazed) would be chilling. Baek was the innocent whose vocal timbre alone underpinned his appeal to divine mercy. Mezzo Karen Cargill was the voice of authority, announcing that all is written in the Book of Judgement (and apparently unfazed by having a camera thrust almost into her face as she did so). Finally, Soprano Latonia Moore was the voice that would reach the heavens with our pleas, soaring above chorus and orchestra.
There were many vocal highlights to savour: Moore’s highs in the Recordare, a meltingly glorious duet between Moore and Cargill for “Juste judex”, Baek’s imploring Ingemisco, the Agnus Dei an oasis of calm amidst the mayhem, the counterpoint in the Lux aeterna, Moore’s barnstorming “Dum veneris” cutting through the chorus in the closing Libera me. Even a single word like “sempiternam” in the Agnus Dei could be impregnated with untold depths of emotion.
If the orchestral performance wasn’t quite as revelatory, the BBC National Orchestra of Wales demonstrated good cohesion and certainly enjoyed their big moments. The power chords in the start of the Dies irae thundered as they should, with the brass having the expected field day. Percussionist Phil Hughes clearly relished being let off the leash for the enormous bass drum rolls, in partnership with Steve Barnard’s timpani. Off-stage trumpets rang out hauntingly. Short woodwind quotes punctuated the string textures, in a way reminiscent of Don Carlo. Throughout, conductor Ryan Bancroft kept tight control of this large number of performers, with excellent togetherness considering the wide distances between the outermost of the singers.
The Requiem is often considered a quasi-opera, but in Bancroft’s hands, it was unusually reverent in the quieter passages. It fell to Moore to bring out the alliance of devotion and full Verdian operatic drama in the Libera me, her voice a reminder of the glory days of Leontyne Price singing “Pace, pace” in La forza del destino.
