St Bartholomew’s Church, Clyde Road, Dublin
Orfea Britannicais a touring programme devised by mezzo soprano Sharon Carty and the Austro-German recorder quintet Vuenv.
The title is a multi-layered pun. The music has mostly been chosen from the volumes of Musica Britannica, which have been creating a printed national collection of British music since 1951.
The idea is to create a quasi-operatic arrangement of songs and instrumental pieces (most of them by little-known composers) and shape it as a reversal of the Orfeo story, so the man who dies, not the woman.
The title also makes reference to one of the greatest of English composers, Henry Purcell, whose Orpheus Britannicuswas a two-volume anthology of his songs, published after his death.
Purcell, who doesn't actually feature in Orfea Britannica, was praised by Henry Playford, publisher of Orpheus Britannicus,for "a peculiar Genius to express the energy of English Words, whereby he mov'd the Passions of all his Auditors".
A grasp of words or, rather, the lack of it proved to be the weak point of Orfea Britannica. Too often the singing was dutiful rather than penetrating, as if the attractive, focused quality of Carty's tone should on its own be enough to communicate the forlorn and melancholy expressions of burdened, often death-obsessed love.
Neither melodic lines nor verbal stress were handled with the necessary light and shade. and it was the greatest music of the evening, John Dowland's Sorrow, come, that showed the limitations most clearly.
The accomplished musicians of Vuenv, whose range of instruments extended from the petite and pocketable to one that was taller than any of the players, sounded at all times polished and well blended.
If anything, their approach was too smooth, inclined to forego expressive pointing or probing in favour of technical security. The idea behind Orfea Britannicais excellent, but the delivery in Tuesday's performance was too pallid to make it all work.
On tour until Sunday
