John Rutter’s Mass of the Children with the KZN
Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Naum Rousine, the Durban Symphonic Choir and
the Durban Girls’ College Choir along with Easter extracts from Handel’s Messiah will take place on March 24 at
Mariannhill.
Soloists will be Camilla
van der Merwe, Richard Salmon, Mhlaba Buthelezi, Langelihle Mngxapi and
Nomulungelo Zubane.
Mass of the Children was written in response to an invitation to
compose a new work for a concert given in Carnegie Hall during the American
Choral Directors Association’s national convention in New York in February
2003.
Rutter’s
larger-scale choral works have been relatively few – the Gloria, the Requiem
and the Magnificat are the most often performed – but each one has a distinct
character. The Mass of the Children represents
something new in the composer’s work insofar as it was conceived with an
integral role for a children’s choir alongside an adult mixed choir, two
soloists, and orchestra. The role of the children’s choir is to add a further
dimension to the traditional Latin Mass sung by the adult choir, sometimes
commenting, sometimes amplifying the meaning and mood.
The Mass itself (a
Missa Brevis, that is to say a Mass without a Credo section) is mainly sung by
the adult choir or the soloists. The children sometimes sing the Latin – for
example at the Christe eleison, the
opening of the Gloria and at the Benedictus – but elsewhere they and the
two soloists sing specially-chosen English texts which in some way reflect upon
or illuminate the Latin. The work opens with two verses from Bishop Thomas
Ken’s morning hymn for the Scholars of Winchester College, and it closes with
the children singing his evening hymn with Tallis’ timeless melody, as the
adults intone the traditional Dona nobis
pacem, a prayer for peace. This creates a framework (from waking to
sleeping) within which other texts and moods appear in kaleidoscopic
succession, like events in a day or landmarks in a life.
The concert takes
place on March 24 at 14h30 at St. Joseph’s Cathedral, Mariannhill Monastery. Tickets
R80 (R40 children under 12) available at the door. More information from Ros
Pearson on 082 668 0044 or 031 201 0860. Safe parking available
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