Czech Chamber Choir/Lubomir Matl

{TABLE} Otce Nas ................. Janacek Beatitudes ............... Liszt Mass in D ................ Dvorak {/TABLE} CHORAL concerts have a along tradition at the Wexford Festival. But, over the last two years, the use of the Czech Chamber Choir as the backbone of the festival chorus has allowed development in the area of works for smaller choral forces (the established choral concerts tackle large scale, choir and orchestra pieces). Saturday's concert at St Iberius Church was devoted to three works from eastern Europe, tying in with the festival presentation of a Czech opera, Fibich's Sarka.

Janacek's Moravian Our Father, Otce Nas, was written in 1901 for performance with a tableau vivant recreating depictions of peasants reacting to visions of Christ from a senes of paintings by the Polish artist Jozef Mecina Kresz. Liszt's Beatitudes is a section from his oratorio Christus, a large and long work first heard towards the end of the composer's life in 1873. Dvorak's organ accompanied Mass in D was commissioned for the consecration of a chapel in 1887; it is rather backward looking in style, modest in scope but not without affecting touches which raise it above the level of strictly occasional music.

The real pleasure of Saturday's performances, given under Lubomir Matl (also the festival's chorus master), was the singing of the choir, musically responsive, blended yet clear, demonstrative without being showy. The soloists were rather more mixed. The best were Ludovit Ludha, an ethnically persuasive tenor in the Janacek, and Ruti Halvani, a luscious (but not overly so) mezzo soprano who shone in the Dvorak (in a part originally sung by the composer's wife); their colleagues were rather too inclined towards a style that was operatically pressured.

The accompaniments by organist Andrew Synnott (joined by harpist Andreja Malir in the Janacek) were pointed and stylish.