Series ends on high note

From The Ottawa Citizen - FINAL EDITION

The NAC Orchestra concluded this season's baroque series Tuesday evening with an attractive program led by former music director Trevor Pinnock, one of the world's most respected baroque specialists.

The big attraction of the evening was Vivaldi's Gloria in D major, a work that has become a hit with baroqueniks in much the way Pachelbel's Canon in D major once was.

Pinnock led a very satisfying account of the score. The soloists, sopranos Kathleen Brett and Teresa van der Hoeven and mezzo-soprano Patricia Bardon, were musical and reliable, though only Bardon was outstanding.

The chorus, made up of the Cantata Singers of Ottawa and the Ottawa Regional Youth Choir, was outstanding. One might have wished occasionally for a little more punch in the double-fortes, but the precision and flexibility of the singing were entirely admirable.

The orchestra played beautifully and, while it surprised no one, Charles Hamann's oboe obligato in the Domine Deus movement was gorgeous.

The program opened with two instrumental numbers and two arias from operas by Handel. Patricia Bardon was the soloist in the arias, and her considerable gifts were well deployed. Her dynamics and phrasing were stunning and the balance she achieved between virtuosity and musicality in the coloratura passage work was exemplary.

The instrumental numbers were nicely done too, especially the lovely and delicate Musette from Il pastor fido. But in the Sinfonia from Agrippina, there was an ambiguity of rhythmic accent that made the entire allegro section unfocused and difficult to enjoy.

The Vivaldi Gloria may have been the main drawing card, but the show was stolen by the Danish recorder virtuoso Michala Petri who played a concerto for soprano recorder and strings by Sammartini and one for sopranino and strings by Vivaldi.

We often think of the recorder as a less than serious instrument. After all, anyone can learn to play Mary Had a Little Lamb on it in an hour or two, even if they've never seen the instrument before.

But its very simplicity involves limitations that only the finest of musicians can transcend. Fortunately, Petri is among the very finest on her instrument.

The soprano recorder is not inherently the most attractive of instruments, having a compass similar to that of the first two octaves of the piccolo. But in Petri's rendition of the Sammartini, it achieved a beauty and purity that transported the audience.

The sopranino is an even more difficult instrument with which to produce a pleasing sound. Its lowest note is the top line of the treble staff!

In the Vivaldi concerto, not even Petri could manage perfect intonation, but there was no end to the other delights her playing offered. On top of that, Pinnock's harpsichord accompaniment in the second movement complemented her wonderful sound to perfection.