Choir makes tough piece sound simple; CLASSICAL Four Sacred Pieces/Liverpool Cathedral.

Byline: GLYN MON HUGHES

PAST experience of largescale works in Liverpool Cathedral have not always been good. Elgar oratorios, for instance, lost detail in the cavernous mush of that notorious acoustic.

On the other hand, that stupendous Britten War Requiem last year made the cathedral the only choice for such a performance.

So it was for the latest Royal Liverpool Philharmonic concert of religiously-inspired works. To have performed in the Philharmonic Hall would have been to deny the breathtaking grandeur of Respighi's Vetrate di chiesa - Church Windows - or the sublime Four Sacred Pieces by Verdi.

It was in Vaughan Williams' Fantasia on a Theme of Thomas Tallis where the fine detail risked being lost. No such thing.

Positioned at the back of the wellpacked nave was the best place to hear the work, if only because the solo string quartet played from the bridge at the rear of the cathedral.

Vasily Petrenko conducted a rounded, searching performance. At times brooding, it managed to envelop the whole cathedral in a wall of sound.

The same was true of Respighi's Church Windows, three recast piano pieces, one original. The tumult of the second movement - St Michael expelling the devil from heaven - and the ponderous, introspective third movement depicting the matins of St Clare showed Respighi at his best.

The trademark opaque orchestration worked in the cathedral, especially in the final movement which uses the De Angelis mass setting, one of the most approachable Gregorian offerings.

Here delicious bitonality - working in two keys at once - turned into a tumultuous conclusion.

However, it was the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Choir which stole this particular show.

An exemplary performance of Gorecki's Totus Tuus, an unaccompanied work for double chorus, brought together moments of high drama with total repose.

Mantra-like repetition, the hallmark of this composer, came to life through changes of timbre and dynamic and only the sublime concluding pianissimo was spoilt by extraneous banging of doors.

The same was true of the Verdi Four Sacred Pieces. Here was the pent-up energy of the operatic Verdi, especially in the opening unaccompanied Ave Maria. Seriously complex harmonic language which, for a lesser choir would have spelt disaster, sounded simplicity itself for the RLPC.

Again, it was the pianissimos which made this special.

Some stunning unisons in the Stabat Mater and an exceptional performance of the Laudi alla Vergine Maria by the women's voices led into a positive performance of the concluding Te Deum in which soprano Emma Morwood had what could be described as a concluding cameo role.

CAPTION(S):

Emma Morwood