Mozart's Great Mass

Dear Patrons,

It is a great pleasure to welcome you to Perth Concert Hall tonight. The Holy Week collaboration between WASO and St George’s Cathedral Concert Series has become a wonderful annual tradition.

Tonight’s pairing of Mozart’s Great Mass and Haydn’s Nelson Mass is an intoxicating fusion of two genius composers writing at the heights of their powers.

Indeed, many commentators consider both works heard tonight as the finest of each composer’s canon. In terms of choral writing, such commentary becomes even more persuasive. Indeed, it is not unreasonable to suggest that Mozart’s Mass in C Minor surpasses his Requiem given the alternating power and delicacy in every movement.

With regard to Haydn’s The Creation, it has been said to suffer from longueurs. This cannot be said about the Nelson Mass, which is riveting from start to finish. The harmonic language and style of the writing is most startling for the Classical period and clearly anticipates Rossini’s Stabat Mater.

Thank you for attending tonight’s concert, which promises to be a memorable occasion due to the sheer quality of the repertoire.

I must finish by thanking the incredible supporters and sponsors of St George’s Cathedral Concert Series, Julian and Alexandra Burt. They are the modern-day Esterházys of our state.

Dr Joseph Nolan
Artistic Director, St George’s Cathedral Concert Series

Joseph Nolan
Conductor

Joseph Nolan has been hailed by ABC Classic as ‘a wonderful gem of a musician’ and by Limelight as a ‘visionary conductor’. He has appeared in concert alongside artists of global stature including Asher Fisch, Susan Graham, Gabriela Montero, David Robertson and Alexander Shelley.

Joseph has worked with many of the major orchestras, most recently as a soloist on a national tour with the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra alongside Alexander Shelley and Gabriela Montero. Next month, Joseph will make his concerto debut with the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra at St Peter’s Cathedral, Adelaide.

Joseph’s work has received innumerable five-star reviews, Editor’s Choice, Critic’s Choice and Recordings of the Month and Year in Gramophone, Limelight, Musicweb International and BBC Music Magazine. Joseph’s career began as a scholarship holder at the Royal College of Music, London, where he won additional scholarships from the Countess of Munster Trust and the Hattori Foundation to study for two years with the legendary Marie Claire Alain in Paris. Appointed to His Majesty’s Chapels Royal, St James’s Palace in 2004, Joseph performed on numerous occasions at Buckingham Palace. In 2008, he accepted the position of Master of Music at St George’s Cathedral.

Joseph was made a Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres by the French government for services to French music in 2016; and in 2018, he was awarded the prestigious Higher Doctorate, the Doctor of Letters, by The University of Western Australia.

Joseph is now under worldwide general management with Mark Stephan Buhl Artist Management based in Vienna.

Samantha Clarke
Soprano

Australian/British soprano Samantha Clarke is the winner of the 2019 Guildhall Gold Medal and prize winner in the 2019 Grange International Festival Singing Competition. Samantha studied at the Royal Northern College of Music, as a Sir John Fisher Foundation and Independent Opera Scholar, under the tutelage of Mary Plazas.

Her operatic roles include: Helena and Tytania (A Midsummer Night’s Dream), Fiordiligi (Così fan tutte), Donna Elvira (Don Giovanni), Pamina (Die Zauberflöte), Countess (Le Nozze di Figaro), Anne Trulove (The Rake’s Progress), The Governess (The Turn of the Screw), Theodora and Beth (Little Women).

Recent and future engagements include her role debut as Violetta (La traviata) with West Australian Opera, Marzelline (Fidelio) and Mendelssohn’s Midsummer Night’s Dream with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra and Simone Young, Fiordiligi (Così fan tutte) at Queensland Opera, Dorset Opera and Grange Festival, her Proms debut in Mozart’s Requiem, Beethoven Symphony No. 9 in Tasmania, Adina (L’elisir d’amore) at West Green House Opera, Golden Cockerel at the Adelaide Festival, and Flower Maiden (Parsifal) at Opera North.

Fiona Campbell
Mezzo soprano

Fiona Campbell is one of Australia’s most versatile and beloved classical singers - the winner of the national Limelight Award for Best Solo Performance 2011 and vocal winner of the ABC Young Performer of the Year Award and the ASC Opera Awards.

Fiona sings regularly as a principal artist with all of the major ensembles and orchestras in Australia and with Opera Australia, Opera Queensland and West Australian Opera. Her international collaborators have included the Brodsky Quartet, Tokyo Philharmonic, Manchester Camerata, Prague Chamber Orchestra, Hong Kong Philharmonic and Glyndebourne Festival Opera.

She was Associate Artist for José Carreras in Japan, Korea and Australia and for Barbara Bonney in Tokyo and London. In 2022, she returned to WASO and the QSO and appeared as Laura (Iolanta) and Flora (La traviata) for West Australian Opera.

Recently, Fiona became an inaugural member of Katie Noonan’s vocal quartet AVÉ – Australian Vocal Ensemble – and the Creative Director of the Perth Symphony
Orchestra.

© Patrick Togher Artists’ Management 2023

Image credit: Steven Godbee Photography

Ashlyn Tymms
Mezzo soprano

Ashlyn Tymms’ 2022 performances included Beethoven Symphony No. 9 with the Melbourne Symphony and Mahler’s Symphony No. 3 with the West Australian Symphony. She also made her Sydney Opera House début in Handel’s Messiah.

For West Australian Opera, she has sung Dorabella (Così fan tutte), Santuzza (Cavalleria rusticana), Hansel (Hansel and Gretel) and Flora (La traviata); in 2023, Ashlyn returns to WAO as Emilia (Otello) and in the title role in Carmen.

Ashlyn graduated as a HF Music Scholar at the Royal College of Music, London (Masters of Vocal Performance with Distinction) and was awarded the Outstanding Australian Musician Award by the Royal Over-Seas League, London.

She sang Rosimonda in Handel’s Faramondo at the London Handel Festival. Other roles include Judith in the world premiere of The Two Sisters with Tête à Tête Opera, La marchande de journaux in Poulenc’s Les mamelles de Tirésias, Euridice in Monteverdi’s L’Orfeo and the title role in Dido and Aeneas.

© Patrick Togher Artists’ Management 2023

Paul McMahon
Tenor

Performing regularly as a soloist with symphony orchestras, chamber music groups and choirs throughout Australia, New Zealand and Asia, tenor Paul McMahon is one of Australia’s finest exponents of baroque and classical repertoire, particularly the Evangelist role in the Passions of J. S. Bach.

Career highlights include Bach’s Johannes-Passion with the Australian Chamber Orchestra under Richard Tognetti; Bach’s Matthäus-Passion under Roy Goodman; Haydn’s Die Schöpfung under the late Richard Hickox, Mozart’s Mass in C Minor under Masaaki Suzuki and Mozart’s Requiem with the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra under Manfred Honeck.

Paul’s most recent appearances include Handel’s Messiah with the Queensland and West Australian Symphonies, Carmina Burana with the Melbourne Symphony, the title role in Samson in Perth Concert Hall, the Evangelist in Bach’s Johannes-Passion and Matthäus-Passion in Melbourne, Brisbane and Perth as well as a CD recording of art songs by Australian composer Calvin Bowman.

© Patrick Togher Artists’ Management 2023

David Greco
Baritone

Internationally regarded for his interpretations of Schubert Lieder and the works of J.S. Bach, baritone David Greco has sung on some of the finest stages across Europe and has appeared as a principal in opera festivals such as Festival d’Aix-en- Provence and Glyndebourne. In 2014 he was the first Australian appointed to a position with the Sistine Chapel Choir in the Vatican.

He regularly appears with leading Australian ensembles such as Pinchgut Opera, the Australian Brandenburg Orchestra, Australian Chamber Orchestra, Sydney Philharmonia and, most recently, the Sydney Symphony Orchestra in their Helpmann award-winning concerts of Bach’s cantata, Ich habe genug. As a principal artist with Opera Australia, he appeared in The Eighth Wonder and The Love for Three Oranges, and his appearances as Seneca in Pinchgut’s Coronation of Poppea and Momus in Platée received critical acclaim.

David Greco is an active researcher into the historical performance practice of 19thcentury vocal music and recently received his doctorate from Melbourne University. This led to the first Australian recordings of historically informed performances of Schubert’s song cycles Winterreise and Die schöne Müllerin (ABC Classic), the latter receiving an ARIA nomination for Best Classical Album (2020).

St George's Cathedral Consort

St George’s Cathedral Consort is the premier mixed voice choir in Western Australia and is frequently hailed as the leading choral ensemble of its type in Australia. The Consort has been described as elite, world class and producing a sound akin to the evanescence of snow by The Australian and The West Australian newspapers. Formed by Dr Joseph Nolan in 2009, the Consort complements the Cathedral Choir and performs during the highly acclaimed St George’s Cathedral Concert Series.

The Consort sings regularly as a solo choir with the West Australian Symphony Orchestra, and has sung with highly regarded UK ensembles: The Academy of Ancient Music and vocal groups The Hilliard Ensemble and The King’s Singers. The Cathedral Consort has also performed for Musica Viva and Perth Festival to rave reviews and can often be heard on ABC Classic. Seesaw Magazine reviewer, Rosalind Appleby, stated The Cathedral Consort shone in this repertoire….you would be hard pressed to find better performances anywhere in the world.

Image credit: Rebecca Mansell

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
(1756-1791)

Mass in C minor, K.427 The Great

I. Kyrie
1. Kyrie elesion

II. Gloria
2. Gloria in excelsis Deo
3. Laudamus te
4. Gratias agimus tibi
5. Domine Deus
6. Qui tollis peccata mundi
7. Quoniam tu solus
8. Jesu Christe
9. Cum sancto spiritu

III. Credo
10. Credo in unum Deum
Et incarnatus est

IV. Sanctus
11. Sanctus Dominus
Hosanna in excelsis

V. Benedictus
12. Benedictus qui venit
Hosanna in excelsis

From the opening bars of the Kyrie of this Mass, Mozart’s mature imagination is at full stretch. Gravity and a severity laced with pathos express the prayer for mercy of the text. In the weighty and expressive Qui tollis, and the tremendous fugue on Cum Sancto Spiritu, Mozart recomposes the choral idioms of Bach’s Mass in B minor and Handel’s Israel in Egypt in the style of Viennese classicism.

This Mass in C minor is unfinished, like Mozart’s other major choral church work of his mature years. The Requiem’s creation was interrupted by death. Mozart’s failure to complete the C minor Mass is more puzzling.

Once Mozart had left the service of the Prince Archbishop of Salzburg in May 1781, he was no longer obliged to compose church music. Yet in the summer of that year he began a largescale mass. Struggling to gain paternal approval for his marriage to Constanze Weber, Mozart wrote to his father on 4 January 1783 that he had ‘promised in his heart’ that when he brought Constanze from Vienna to Salzburg as his wife he would perform a newly composed mass there. He mentioned, ‘as proof that I really made the promise – the score of half a mass for which I still have high hopes’. Mozart had Constanze in mind for one of the soprano solos, with unusually low notes. The Mass was destined to remain incomplete. A performance probably took place in Salzburg later in 1783, with Constanze singing both the solo soprano parts, and movements from earlier Mozart masses used for the unset parts of the text. In 1901 the movements Mozart left unfinished were completed by Alois Schmitt, who also supplied the missing parts with music from earlier Masses by Mozart. Then in 1956 H.C. Robbins Landon returned the work to its original fragmentary state, in an edition that brought the Mass back into regular concert performance.

This Mozart setting revives the archaic form of the Baroque cantata mass, where choruses and solos alternate as separate movements. Form and style are perhaps a result of Mozart’s growing awareness at this time of the music of Bach and Handel. A Bach-inspired crisis in Mozart’s music, according to musicologist Alfred Einstein, came to an end while the C minor Mass was coming into being. Perhaps Mozart felt that the stylistic disparities within this Mass were too great to be resolved, and no longer wished to continue along the way he had set out. The Mass in C minor displays the influence of Bach and Handel in the choruses, and a more operatic and Italian character in the solos and ensembles, especially Et incarnatus est, a virtuoso aria for soprano, with parts for flute, oboe and bassoon, and culminating in an elaborate cadenza. Einstein likens this aria to Italian Christmas music: a nativity song for an angel.

The Kyrie and Gloria are complete, but Mozart only finished two movements of the Credo, as far as Et incarnatus est. Crucifixus, Et resurrexit, Et in Spiritum Sanctum and Confiteor are missing. The Benedictus is complete, but the second choir’s part in the Sanctus and Osanna has to be reconstructed from the orchestral parts. The Mass in C minor remains ‘a magnificent torso’: if not Mozart’s greatest church work, as many would claim, at least the work containing his greatest choral writing.

© David Garrett

This performance of Mass in C minor K427 by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (edited by Richard Maunder) is given by permission of Hal Leonard Australia Pty. Ltd., exclusive agent for Oxford University Press of Oxford.

Year of Composition:
1782.

Last WASO performance:
26 November 2011; Paul Daniel, conductor.

Instrumentation:
one flute, two oboes, two bassoons, two horns, two trumpets, three trombones, timpani, organ and strings.

Joseph Haydn
(1732-1809)

Mass in D minor Hob.XXII:11
Missa in angustiis (Nelson Mass)

I. Kyrie. Allegro moderato
II. Gloria. Allegro
III. Credo. Allegro con spirito
IV. Sanctus. Adagio
V. Benedictus. Allegretto
VI. Agnus Dei. Adagio - Vivace
VII. Dona nobis. Allegro vivace

The Nelson Mass is the most celebrated of Haydn’s late masses. It owes its fame partly to its historical association with Lord Nelson, but more importantly to its superb musical qualities, its unity of inspiration, and its special, challenging sound. Some authorities have claimed this is Haydn’s greatest single work.

Haydn composed his six last masses after returning in 1795 from his second visit to London. Nicolaus II, the fourth Prince Esterhazy Haydn had served, required of his Kapellmeister only that he write a mass each year for the September name day of his Princess, Maria Hermenegild. The third of these compositions was the Missa in angustiis, a title which could be freely translated ‘Mass in dire straits’. In that summer of 1798 the threat of Napoleon to Austria and Europe seemed extreme, and Europe’s embattled state is certainly reflected in the music, especially the Benedictus, which is invaded by fanfares for trumpets and drums. Trumpet fanfares in the mass were an old Austrian tradition, but no-one ever used itas dramatically and memorably as Haydn does here.

Haydn was composing this mass while Nelson was fighting the battle of Aboukir on the Nile; when news of Napoleon’s defeat reached Vienna, people wept for joy. Haydn later studied the battle with keen interest, and he too thought it meant the end of Napoleon’s domination, but he could not have known of the battle until after the mass was finished. In September 1800, two years after the mass was first peformed, Nelson visited Eisenstadt and gave Haydn the watch he had worn at Aboukir. The composer gave him his quill pen in return. Nelson almost certainly heard then a performance of the ‘Nelson’ Mass, and this may be the real origin of the name by which the piece became known in Austria and Germany.

Haydn’s Nelson Mass declares its challenging individuality straight away, with a unison descending D minor arpeggio, punctuated by menacing trumpets in their lowest register, and gaining an ‘acidic’ character from the held chords on the organ. This is Haydn’s only mass in a minor key, and for a moment it may seem that he has returned to the tense world of his ‘Storm and Stress’ symphonies of 20 or more years before.

The difference is in the greater breadth of phrase and of harmonic movement. Haydn has found a settled sureness of style, symphonic, but able to be turned to any purpose. The Nelson Mass, and its immediate predecessor, The Creation, are very different, but equally sure in their unforced originality.

The trumpets, though first sounded low, are high ‘clarino’ trumpets. By the time voices come in, we have heard the full instrumental complement of this mass: three trumpets, kettledrums, strings and organ. Soon we will discover that the organ has a solo, concertante part in many places. This unusual instrumentation was a necessity: in 1797 the Prince had dismissed the wind ensemble which played at the castle of Eisenstadt and reinforced the court orchestra. When this mass was first published, the solo organ part had been eliminated and replaced by oboes and bassoons, along with many other alterations. Haydn himself never revised or rescored this mass. He knew his instrumentation was exceptional, and was not worried by the reaction of contemporaries who found the music ‘noisy’. The organ part, which he played himself, was designed to show off the organ in Eisenstadt’s Stadtpfarrkirche, the church where the mass was first performed on 23 September 1798. Modern editions of the Nelson Mass, such as the one for tonight’s performance, return to Haydn’s original intentions.

The Kyrie immediately reveals the dramatic and symphonic character of this mass, as the soprano soloist leads from the opening themes of this urgent prayer for mercy to an exciting sonata-form development of these figures. She then reappears with thrilling effect soaring on elaborate runs over the reprise of the opening by chorus and orchestra. The soprano also leads off the Gloria with the music which returns to knit it together. A cheerfully affirmative movement in D major, this music moves away from the oppressed character of the Kyrie. ‘Laudamus te’ is set to unison off-beat phrases, marked by sforzandi. ‘Qui tollis’ is a bass solo beginning with a phrase broadly spanning a downwards octave, answered by the strings gracefully turning upwards. At ‘Miserere nobis’ the organ plays its first conspicuous solo. These ideas are built into a rising supplication for mercy, a tension released by the return of the Gloria theme, set to the words of the ‘Quoniam’. The coda to the whole movement is an exciting fugue on the words ‘In gloria Dei Patris, Amen.’

The Credo begins with a relentless twopart canon at the fifth; ‘Et incarnatus’ brings a touching contrast in a graceful Rococo solo, a hymn to the Virgin which links this mass with Mozart’s Litanies. Haydn’s account of the Passion is in tense chromatic unison phrases, joined by fanfares; the music becomes halting and quiet. The outburst at ‘Et resurrexit’ is punctuated by dramatically placed pauses in a headlong rush. Throughout the monotone chanting of the articles of faith, tension is built by repetition and brilliant string figuration, finally blooming into an ecstatic vision by the soprano soloist of the life of the world to come.

A concise Sanctus emerges from and returns to silence – an island of contemplation. Hairpin dynamics in the choir’s singing are reminiscent of ‘Chaos’ from The Creation, and punctuated by a staccato thud from trumpets and timpani. The Osanna shows a masterly handling of tension and relaxation. Perhaps the Benedictus is the most remarkable movement of all: an orchestral procession, ever more detailed and elaborate, given touches of unease by rests and soft trumpet notes. Then, after some wonderfully rich alternations of solo quartet and choir, comes what the great Haydn authority H.C. Robbins Landon calls ‘the boldest and most powerful music in the whole of Haydn’: a bar’s rest, then a tremendous warlike hammering of the note D by trumpets, drums, and chorus, as though Europe were pleading for a saviour from the ravages of war. The conclusion of the mass in the Agnus Dei and ‘Dona nobis pacem’ is typical of the whole, combining brilliance, rhetoric (in the solo soprano’s recitative-like passage), learning (the fugue) and sombre dramatic force, the rhythms at once exuberant and uneasy.

© David Garrett 2002

Year of Composition:
1798.

First WASO Performance:
1964; Frank Callaway, conductor. With the West Australian Choral Society.

Instrumentation:
one flute, two oboes, two clarinets, bassoon, two horns, three trumpets, timpani, organ and strings.