Matthew Jocelyn

Beat by Beat | Art of Song
Five Sopranos
and A Mezzo
HANS DE GROOT
Emma Kirkby: It has sometimes seemed to me that my interest in
early music began with listening to Kirkby. When I checked dates, I
realized that that was not true. I bought my first early music LP (two
of Bach’s Brandenburg Concertos, conducted by August Wenzinger)
when I was a schoolboy in the early 50s, while Kirkby’s career did
not begin until 1971 when she joined the Taverner Choir as a founding
member. But my mistake highlights the fact that Kirkby’s singing has
been central to early music performances ever since. On October 18
she and her accompanist, the fine lutenist Jacob Lindberg, gave a
recital of English music ranging from William Byrd to Henry Purcell
at Trinity College Chapel. Now that Kirkby is in her mid-60s the
incomparable beauty of her singing is also layered with a lifetime of
nuance; every presentation provides a lesson in how these songs can
be delivered.
In the first half of the program we heard a number of students,
members of the University of Toronto’s Schola Cantorum. Until
recently the University had not shown much interest in early music
but this changed with the appointment of Daniel Taylor (best known
as a countertenor but now also a conductor) as Early Music Area Head.
Many of these performances were very fine, a tribute to the singers
but also to Taylor’s leadership and to the extra coaching the singers
received from Kirkby and Lindberg.
Agnes Zsigovics: Kirkby studied classics at Oxford University and
became a schoolteacher. At that time she would have had no notion
that a professional career could be built on the singing of early music.
That is no longer the case and Kirkby’s career is one reason why that
change became possible. There are now many singers who specialize
in Early Music and one of the finest is a Canadian soprano Agnes
Zsigovics whom we shall be able to hear on November 14 with the
Ottawa Bach Choir and York University Chamber Choir in a performance
of Bach’s Mass in B Minor at Grace Church on-the-Hill. The other
soloists are Daniel Taylor, alto, Rebecca Claborn, mezzo, Jacques-
Olivier Chartier, tenor, Geoffrey Sirett, baritone, and Daniel Lichti,
bass-baritone. The conductor is Lisette Canton.
When I asked for an interview with Zsigovics, she accepted readily
and added: “Isn’t it every soprano’s wish to talk about themselves all
day long?” I decided not to take this too literally and I was right not to
do so. She is not a self-absorbed diva but a down-to-earth and disciplined
artist committed to her craft. As a young woman she sang in
choirs at school and as a member of the Bell’Arte Singers. Her first big
break came in 2005, when she sang with the Toronto International
Bach Festival and was asked by the conductor, Helmut Rilling, to sing
the soprano solo in Bach’s Cantata BWV106 (the Actus Tragicus).
Daniel Taylor heard her and invited her to sing part of Pergolesi’s
Stabat Mater at a private function and to join the Theatre of Early
Music. In 2007 she sang in Bach’s St. John Passion under Rilling with
the Toronto Symphony Orchestra.
I have heard her four times in recent years: in the virtuoso soprano
part of Allegri’s Miserere and as Belinda in Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas
(both with the Theatre of Early Music), in Vivaldi’s Gloria (with
Tafelmusik) and as the soprano soloist in the Grand Philharmonic
Choir’s performance of Bach’s St. Matthew Passion in Kitchener last
Good Friday.
She has now sung outside Ontario many times. In May she
performed at the Bethlehem Bach Festival (and she will return there
next May) and she took part in the reconstructed St. Mark Passion by
Bach at the Festival d’Ambronay in France in September. As for the
near future: in January she will be in Montreal in a program of Bach
cantatas, in April she will sing Monteverdi’s 1610 Vespers in Chicago
with Music of the Baroque and in May she will sing Bach in Calgary.
Agnes Zsigovics and Benjamin Butterfield with the Bach
Choir of Bethlehem in a performance of the Bach Mass
in B minor at the Bethlehem Bach Festival (2014)
She will make her debut in a fully staged operatic performance when
she will sing the role of Eurydice in Gluck’s Orfeo ed Eurydice in
Grand River, Michigan. We can also hear her voice on several recordings,
two with the Theatre of Early Music (The Voice of Bach on RCA,
and The Heart’s Refuge on Analekta) and one with Les Voix Baroques
and the Arion Baroque Orchestra under Alexander Weimann (Bach’s
St. John Passion, on ATMA). Zsigovics is now looking at the possibility
of launching her first solo recording.
Simone Osborne: Like Zsigovics, Simone Osborne could be
described as a lyric soprano but, unlike Zsigovics, she is primarily an
opera singer. In 2008, when she was 21, she won the Metropolitan
Opera National Concert Auditions. In 2012, Jeunesses Musicales
Canada chose her as the first winner of the Maureen Forrester Award.
She was a member of the Ensemble Studio of the Canadian Opera
Company and has performed a number of roles for the COC on the
main stage: Pamina in Mozart’s The Magic Flute, Oscar in Verdi’s
Un Ballo in Maschera, Gilda in Verdi’s Rigoletto, Nannetta in Verdi’s
Falstaff and Lauretta in Puccini’s Gianni Schicchi. She will return
to the COC later this season to sing Micaela in Bizet’s Carmen. On
November 12 and 14, we have a chance to hear her in concert with the
Toronto Symphony Orchestra. Part of the TSO’s Decades Project, that
concert will show the diversity of styles in works from the first decade
of the 20th century. Osborne will sing three pieces: the aria Depuis le
jour from Charpentier’s Louise, first performed in 1900; the Song to
the Moon from Dvořák ‘s Rusalka (1901) and the soprano solo in the
final movement of Mahler’s Fourth Symphony (1901).
Isabel Leonard: The Women’s Musical Club of Toronto can always
be relied on to provide artists and programs of interest. I, myself, am
very much looking forward to the recital by the American mezzo
Isabel Leonard on November 19 inWalter Hall. A few seasons ago
Leonard sang with the COC in Mozart’s La clemenza di Tito and she
was splendid in the role of Sesto. The recital will include works by
Montsalvatge, de Falla, Ives, Higdon and others.
Sondra Radvanovsky: I last heard Sondra Radvanovsky in a dazzling
performance as Queen Elizabeth I in Donizetti’s Roberto Devereux
for the COC. On December 4 she will give a recital in Koerner Hall.
The program includes the aria Sposa son disprezzata from Bajazet
by Vivaldi, the Four Last Songs by Richard Strauss, the Song to the
Moon from Dvořák ‘s Rusalka and songs and arias by Bellini, Barber,
Giordano and Liszt.
Magali Simard-Galdès: Jeunesses Musicales Canada has announced
that the winner of the 2015 Maureen Forrester Prize is the soprano
Magali Simard-Galdès. The prize consists of a 30-city tour in which
she will perform a program of art songs including a new song cycle by
Tawnie Olson, commissioned by the Canadian Art Song Project.
Hans de Groot is a concertgoer and active listener,
who also sings and plays the recorder. He can be
contacted at artofsong@thehwolenote.com.
26 | Nov 1 - Dec 7, 2015 thewholenote.com