Sacred Music festival continues

The second event of this year's Outaouais Festival of Sacred Music was given at St-Benoît-Abbé Church in Hull last night.

It featured the Cantata Singers of Ottawa, the Hull Chamber Orchestra and four vocal soloists performing Mozart's Vesperæ sollenes de confessore, K. 339 and the Requiem, K. 626.

The Vesperæ created a strong impression from the first beat with the Cantata Singers' powerful, focussed sound and conductor Louis Lavigueur's (if you'll pardon the pun) vigourous musical direction. There was a bit of roughness in the orchestral playing, but the orchestra isn't terribly exposed in this piece, and in any case did fairly well most of the time.

The Requiem received an altogether more nuanced, powerful performance, in part, one imagines, because it was dedicated to the victims and survivors of the terrible events of Sept. 11. The quartet of soloists, Dominique Cimon, Renée Lapointe, Bernard Cayouette and Frederic Julien, was particularly unified, and the choral and orchestral work was exceedingly expressive.

Tomorrow night, the Ottawa Symphony Orchestra and Ottawa Choral Society will perform one of the great masterpieces of music and, indeed, of western culture, the Verdi Requiem.

It will doubtless have the same dedication, and musicians and music lovers will have the chance to pay their respects, reflecting upon the terror, hope and glory of the human condition.