NSO/RTE Philharmonic Choir/Alexander Anissimov

Missa solemnis - Beethoven

Beethoven's Missa solemnis presses dramatisation of a sacred text towards its limits. The composer's almost Romantic response to the words stretches the imagination of listener and performer, partly through frequent and sudden changes of tempo, metre, dynamics and scoring; and vocal technique is pressed too, especially in the unusually high choral writing.

Such music tempts a conductor towards drama, and Alexander Anissimov did not resist quite enough. The more elaborate sections, such as the Gloria, were obscured rather then clarified by a tendency to make too much of every event. A wilful, almost hedonistic, revelling in contrasts and intensity must have been nerve-racking for any performer who values precision; and precision did sometimes suffer - in balance between choir and orchestra, in ensemble and in definition of ideas, especially at links between sections.

That said, the RTE Philharmonic Choir was on strong form in music which requires confidence, dexterity and stamina. They sang as one. The soloists - Mary Hegarty (soprano), Alison Browner (contralto), Justin Lavender (tenor) and Tigran Martirosyan (bass) - were well-matched, and some of their contributions were among the highlights of the evening. It is significant that those highlights were almost all in places where the conductor chose not to intervene, in the choral fugues for example. The most striking instance of the latter was the Sanctus where Beethoven spoke for himself.