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“Timid mumbling and loud praying”
10.06.2008The month of May saw some considerable successes for the Nederlands Kamerkoor. Firstly with Peter Dijkstra in two tremendous programmes and then in the ZaterdagMatinee, with conductor Otto Tausk.
Peter Dijkstra had put together two fine programmes, one with works by Bach and Handel and in collaboration with the Holland Baroque Society, the other with the Residentie Orkest and music by Puccini, Pizzetti and Verdi.
The Swedish Radio Choir, Nederlands Kamerkoor, Residentie Orkest and Peter Dijkstra
Together with the Swedish Radio Choir (of which Peter Dijkstra is the permanent guest conductor), the Nederlands Kamerkoor sang the exceptional Quattro Pezzi Sacri of Giuseppe Verdi. “The acoustic impediments were overcome in Verdi’s Quattro Pezzi Sacri,” wrote Guido van Oorschot in the Volkskrant. “Timid mumbling and loud praying both came easily to this combination of choirs from Sweden and Amsterdam. A glittering aura was created around the song of praise to the Virgin Mary, which Verdi wrote for women’s voices only.” And Thiemo Wind’s headline in De Telegraaf read: “Choirs give dazzling performance in half-empty hall in The Hague”. But every one of that admittedly not very large audience did rise to their feet to cheer the choirs, orchestra and conductor at the top of their voices.
Holland Baroque Society, Nederlands Kamerkoor and Peter Dijkstra in ‘Dixit Dominus’
Dijkstra achieved no less success with the ‘Dixit Dominus’ programme. In Zwolle, Amsterdam, Alkmaar, Leeuwarden and Cuyk all were in agreement: this successful collaboration between the Holland Baroque Society is worth repeating. The soloists were received with equal enthusiasm, with the duet between Heleen Koele and Barbara Borden being the tranquil highlight of Handel’s Dixit Dominus. In the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam an audience of over a thousand also held its breath. “This Dixit Dominus was rock-solid”, wrote the Leeuwarder Courant. “Delightful freshness under conductor Dijkstra”, was the headline in the Noordhollands Dagblad.
The Holland Baroque Society performing the Third Brandenburg Concerto in Alkmaar
And finally there was the new and exciting piece by Jacob ter Veldhuis, or ‘Jacob TV’, as he has become known since his growing success in the United States: Mountain Top. This work was commissioned by the ZaterdagMatinee for the Nederlands Kamerkoor, and features a thrillingly rapping Martin Luther King in his last speech, given the day before he was assassinated; plus images and text projected by Jaap Drupsteen onto a large screen; and the percussionists of the Radio Kamerfilharmonie. A host of cameras recorded this spectacle in the Concertgebouw for television, the broadcast being expected some time during next season. We’ll keep you informed!
The Nederlands Kamerkoor during the performance of “Mountain Top”
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