Lammermuir Festival review: Dunedin Consort, St Mary’s Church, Haddington

By David Kettle
Published on 17/09/2012 03:23

Kicking off this year’s Lammermuir Festival with Bach’s St John Passion was always going to be something of a statement, but it was even more of a dramatic one in John Butt’s vivid performance with his period-instrument Dunedin Consort.

Dunedin Consort

St Mary’s Church, Haddington

* * * * *

You could easily see the piece as a kind of liturgical opera describing Christ’s last moments in Butt’s urgent, restless interpretation. And his pared-down forces – a handful of strings, a few woodwind and just two voices per part in the choruses – made everyone seem like a soloist.

Textures were transparent yet surging with energy, and the eight singers managed to balance preserving their individual sounds with combining as a powerful whole.

Nicholas Mulroy made a lucid Evangelist: he had his work cut out narrating the whole tale, but he pulled it off superbly, although his boyish voice could have carried more in his arias.

Matthew Brook had a sense of nobility and detachment as Christ. Soprano Joanne Lunn had a beautifully ringing tone in her solos, but her interpretation was, too finely detailed.

Special mention must go to cellist and viola da gamba player Jonathan Manson, whose solo gamba playing in the aria at Christ’s death was almost unbearably sorrowful.

If the rest of Lammermuir’s offerings match the exceptional opening night, we’re in for quite a festival.