Review: Dalmatica, Greyfriars Kirk

All the historical background and research references were there for us to peruse in the programme: this was Croatian chant that has developed since medieval times, which uniquely exists in two traditions – the Roman Catholic (sung in Latin) and the Byzantine (in Glagolitic).****

But as a performance, it was going to succeed or fail only on the strength of its performances, and of the music itself. And the combined forces of Paris-based early vocal group, Dialogos, and Kantaduri, six traditional cantors from Croatia, delivered a rich and beguiling tapestry of chant.

The four women, led by Katarina Livljanic, took the Latin chant, with often bare-sounding intervals and deliciously clashing dissonances. The six men, singing the Byzantine music, gave sometimes rugged, folksy-sounding deliveries, full of rich, deep harmonies that seemed to reverberate in your body. But both groups sang with an astonishing vocal purity and rhythmic suppleness, as if they were breathing as one.

As they processed around the Greyfriars nave or gathered in clusters surrounding the audience, and as their contrasting chants overlapped to bewildering sonic effect, it didn’t matter that we weren’t versed in Croatian liturgical history. We still experienced – directly, and in a highly moving way – the profound spirituality of the region’s music.