Yesterday my husband and I made a day trip to Boston for a performance of Bach’s St. Mathew Passion a Symphony Hall by the Handel and Haydn Society. It was a lot of time sitting in the car, plus nearly 3 hours of sitting in the original leather seats of the hall, which date back to 1900. But it was a great performance. If you want a more in-dept review I will refer you to The Boston Globe.
(personal photo taken prior to part 2 of the concert removed per request of the Handel and Haydn Society — they do not allow photography of any kind within the concert hall.)
Harry Christophers conducting the St. Matthew Passion -photo: Kyle T. Hemingway, courtesy of Handel and Haydn Society.
The major female soloists were Soprano Gillian Keith and Alto (mezzo-soprano?) Monica Groop. Before attending the concert my husband had listened to a John Eliot Gardiner recording of the work. He made mention of the “Sind Blitze, sind Donner in Wolken vershwunden? ” chorus, and that, in case your German is a little rusty, translates to something like ” Have Lightening and Thunder vanished in the clouds?” Now the lead up to this chorus is a duet by the Soprano and Alto soloists. So while I might have been having intellectual thoughts what was really was going through my mind was
- our cat Lightning
- as the Soprano soloist
and
- our Thunder
- as the Alto soloist.
