The Passion: Snapshot of the Premiere

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On the whole, yesterday’s premiere of the Passion went well. Of course, I could readily draw up a list of 50 items which want improvement, or modification, or which just plain wanted happening, and I wish there had been the opportunity to address these (in many cases, preventively) in rehearsal — and the opportunity simply was not made available to me. But nothing that went amiss was ‘fatal’. And considering that it was the first public performance of a 40-minute piece for unaccompanied choir; that it did not even get started until the choir had already been singing off-&-on for 3 hours (the call was 11, and the Good Friday service started at 12); and that it was scheduled in Holy Week when there’s a lot else on the choir’s plate . . . truly, the composer is well content to say, “on the whole, good.”

[ 22 March 2008 ]

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