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Stabat Mater vs. Stabat Mater

Many of you would certainly be aware that our concert in July features two Stabat Maters – one of Verdi from his Quattro pezzi sacri, and one of Rossini. Here’s a sneak peek of how our two Italian opera masters accentuate the grief of Mother Mary in their respective settings of the Catholic hymn, on the first 1-2 pages of the vocal score:-

In Rossini’s setting, a dark mood is created by the orchestra’s plaintive opening, and the initial concealment of the tonic key is suggestive of a troubled heart. Thereafter, as the strings, chorus and vocal soloists take turns coming in, the “Stabat Mater” theme, a G-minor upward scale to its fifth, emerges as a graphical representation of the anguished Mother Mary weeping next to the cross on which her Son was crucified.

Verdi opens his Stabat Mater with ominous bare open fifths in bassoons, French horns and strings, which are interrupted by the choir singing a striking augmented fourth that is traditionally associated with human suffering; The descending, chromatic scale used in “Cujus animam gementem” is also thought to represent the agonizing cries of Mother Mary.

Come hear us perform Verdi’s Quattro pezzi sacri and Rossini’s Stabat Mater, in our upcoming concert. Tickets now available at urbtix outlets or online at http://bit.ly/1SARXnH

Event page: https://www.facebook.com/events/364342063776645/

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When high-C is not enough

Those who are familiar with Rossini operas would no doubt recognize that dotted rhythms, dramatic leggiero/coloratura lines, fast tempos, cadenzas and appoggiaturas, to name a few, are features commonly found in his works.

Can you identify any of the above features in Rossini’s “Cujus animam gementem”, an aria for tenor solo from his Stabat Mater which, partly due to it being notoriously difficult to sing, is often performed separately from the other movements of the work as a demonstration of the singer’s virtuosic vocal technique?

Come hear us perform Rossini’s Stabat Mater and Verdi’s Quattro pezzi sacri in our next concert. Tickets now available at urbtix outlets or online at http://bit.ly/1SARXnH

Event page: https://www.facebook.com/events/364342063776645/

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Crossing opera and sacred music

Rossini was quoted to have once confessed:- “I have only wept three times in my life: the first time when my earliest opera failed, the second time when, with a boating party, a truffled turkey fell into the water, and the third time when I first heard Paganini play.” His gleeful personality might have molded his compositional style – it is quoted that “audiences took his music as if to an intoxicating drug – or, to put it more decorously, to champagne, with which Rossini’s bubbly music was constantly compared”.

Although his setting of the Stabat Mater, a Catholic hymn contemplating the suffering of Mother Mary during the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, had been criticized to be too operatic and lighthearted for its subject, it is thought that the “operatic” features of the work serve to enunciate the grief and piety of Mother Mary and the sincerity of her prayer.

Come hear us perform Rossini’s Stabat Mater and Verdi’s Quattro pezzi sacri in our next concert. Tickets now available at urbtix outlets or online at http://bit.ly/1SARXnH

Event page: https://www.facebook.com/events/364342063776645/

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