There are moments in Mendelssohn’s Elijah when the chorus roars suddenly into life, an explosion of massed voices. There are others when a single child’s voice is the counterbalance for the heft of a baritone and orchestra. Or when the whole musical apparatus stops dead as the chorus waits for a divine voice that never comes. Mendelssohn’s oratorio is based on a Bible story – but it’s also unmistakably a piece about the power of sound.
Like Elijah’s 1846 world premiere in Birmingham Town Hall, this was a performance without the acoustic plug-in of a cathedral’s vaulted roof. But the stage was stuffed (even more so than the sold-out auditorium) and the opening brass chords immediately set the tone: big, bold, expensively burnished. Not a period instrument in sight, of course, though the London Symphony Orchestra’s modern brass was paired with stylishly lo-vibrato, aerated string playing. The result was an orchestral texture where finicky minutiae were audible as they ricocheted around the violins and woodwind solos danced gracefully to the surface, but where the sum total – a bottom-heavy, studio-ready blend – had serious oomph. Think of it as Mendelssohn in HD.
The London Symphony Chorus served up voluptuous chorale sections, jaunty fugato and excellent diction throughout. That they couldn’t always match the visceral impact of the orchestra was perhaps inevitable, at least not without more space. (The Victorians would have added another 100 singers and called it a “monster concert”.) Soloists from Guildhall School of Music and Drama made up a carefully balanced semi-chorus, all cashmere tone and dead-centre pitching.
Ewan Christian was suitably angelic as the child, joining an exceptional lineup of adult soloists. Sarah Connolly was warm and compassionate (except as a deliciously Wicked-Witch-of-the-West Queen). Masabane Cecilia Rangwanasha could have sliced through Barbican concrete with her tungsten-edged, exquisitely rich tone and Allan Clayton provided tenor luminosity on tap. As Elijah himself, Gerald Finley was an introspective, sensitive prophet – new man rather than hunter-gatherer. On the podium, LSO’s chief conductor designate Antonio Pappano stood arms whirling (no baton), leaping in time as if to conduct in boldface, but never loosening his grip on the details.
