Messiah [Hybrid SACD]

Our conductor is Frieder Bernius. Our band, Stuttgart Barockorchester, plays on period instruments with period performance manners. Our chorus is Stuttgart Chamber Choir, founded by Frieder Bernius. The soprano is Carolyn Sampson. The alto is Daniel Taylor. The tenor is Benjamin Hulett. The bass-baritone is Peter Harvey. The score is the newest Urtext edition, indebted to no less than Ton Koopman. The version being performed involves English text.

Right from the opening phrases of the Messiah Overture, we know we are in quite stylish hands with nearly impeccable HIP musical manners. The overture tempo is not particularly fast or slow, so Messiah seems to be opening with fairly mainstream gestures.

Benjamin Hulett hails from UK, so one presumes he is comfortable with the English text. His vocal metal is silvery, throws off a lot of light, and he immediately makes an apt impression. I haven't heard a tenor soloist that sounds so right-weighted for the tenor solo assignment, since, say, the USA's John Aler. At least for Richard Westenberg and Musica Sacra, Aler's voice was even a slightly more fresh and gorgeous instrument. Hulett isn't quite so fresh, nor so sounding of polished-pure silver as Aler; but Hulett is near kin, vocally and artistically. At least one online reviewer at a big music site took deep offense at Hulett's manners. In the long held note of the tenor's Comfort Ye, Hulett does indeed take a long-breathed time. He's not just showing off, though. He commands musical attention by varying the loudness and tone of the moment, and interpretively this is not unfitting for drawing our listener attention to the point, that God is profoundly concerned with comforting the exiled and lost of ancient Israel, promising return, restoration, salvation. Of course, since this oratorio is Messiah, the prophet's words are indisputably heard by later Christian believers as a reference to Jesus of Nazareth whom they follow as the Messiah who embodies that return, that spiritual restoration. My two cents is that I cannot object at all to Hulett; he's musically and textually right on point. Don't be put off if you come across some complaint about the matter, then.

The choral entry in the first part of the oratorio is, of course, the famous text, And the glory of the Lord. Immediately we know we are in for some of the best choral singing to be heard in recordings. In addition to all the high choral arts we usually equate with quality, we are going to get even more from this Stuttgart Chamber Choir. Like some other HIP-mannered choruses, they get to ornament. And unlike several of the other choruses who sing ornaments in Messiah, the Stuttgarters are in complete and easy command of their ornamenting. No turn or ornamental flourish sounds the least bit awkward, nor overly self-conscious, nor unduly garish or glaring in the context of the choral number at hand. This choir makes ornamenting sound just as it should, then: integrated as a vocal practice, all aimed at the music and at the meaning of the text. The band is single-minded with the ornamenting chorus, too.

Bernius sets solid, mainstream tempos throughout the oratorio, just as he did with the band in the opening overture. When we get to the People Walking in Darkness, bass-baritone Peter Harvey is excellent, too. He often strikes just the right vocal balance between plainness and moving the narrative text along, and vocal-tonal body with touches of luxury in dramatic phrasing, none of which still yet, violates the boundaries of good musical taste. Our alto Daniel Taylor is actually a counter-tenor; and while I confess freely how much I tend to prefer a deeper-stronger female alto for this oratorio's big alto assignments (O thou that tellest good tidings to Zion, He was despised) - I cannot really complain about Daniel Taylor. His voice is not quite as big and brilliant and rounded as, say, David Daniels; but he sounds big enough, and he really knows his own voice well enough to make vivid, compelling use of what he can do in his musical assignments.

Just listen to the chorus so deftly phrasing how the government shall be upon his shoulder in Unto Us A Child Is Born (number 11). Their English is impeccable, quite an achievement for any chorus singing such complex and nuanced music. Now their vowels sound neither American nor British; nor any variant of either. Clear vowels, just not American or British vowels. So a new sound of continental English must be arising? No complaints. Most indigenous English speakers would be happy to be able to sing like that.

The uncommon lilt of the choral For Unto Us leads right into a flowing Pifa, also brimming with crisp-dancing musical line and tonal texture. Soprano Carolyn Sampson ushers in the angels who appear to the Nativity shepherds with that canny balance of plainness and narrative, touched with more than enough of the vocal silver-platinum, that marked the tenor soloist Hulett. Not to be underestimated in vocal and in musical value, then, these soloists - not even if individual comparisons of past favorites might still win out, head to head, toe to toe, vocal art to vocal art. Glory to God. In the highest. Sampson ramps up vocally - with weight, shining platinum polish, and celebratory vocal flourish for Rejoice Greatly. The band's phrasing and ornamentation in all of this reaches higher than, Ho-hum here we are, waiting for the next number to come along. The Stuttgart band's brilliance, combined with their fluency of musical phrasing is matched by the lively and interesting ways that passing ornaments enhance the moment. (Check out both the band and chorus, chiming a lament together, in Behold the Lamb of God.) If you want benchmark comparisons to indicate just how good this period instrument band is playing in the two super audio discs of this Handel oratorio, you have to pull down the recent super audio set of JSB's Brandenburg Concertos by Richard Egarr and the Academy of Ancient Music; or open up Capella Augustina under Andreas Spering in Haydn's Creation oratorio. The Stuttgart players' musical color, phrasing, ensemble, polish, and charm are just that endearingly committed. Really nice, too, to have high resolution super audio surround sound capturing this reading. Thanks, many thanks, to Carus-Verlag, producer Uwe Walter, engineer Christoph Herr.

Some particular emerging review consensus on the internet seems to be that this is a very good reading, but just misses being top-notch, so not a shelf keeper for the Handel Messiah ages. I must respectfully disagree. Rarely do we get choral singing of this caliber in the Messiah - though nearly every choir worth the name hits the notes, and stays in tempo. Here Bernius and the Stuttgarters are rising high, far beyond basic technical and musical matters of choral performance. Their lilt and enthusiasm are infectious; dancing tempos, entirely fluent choral ornamentations, not too little, not too much. Backed up by the band playing its period instrument heart out. With high quality soloists, too. Now about those soloists, as I've suggested, one can make endless comparisons with other soloists who have done stellar singing in Messiah on discs. I continue to miss a suitable female alto voice in He Was Despised. The combination of all musical elements is the magical thing here. And we get high resolution super audio surround sound, to boot.

The winter holiday season regularly issues new music recordings. Nutcrackers, Messiahs, Christmas Oratorios. My personal fav mix this near season will include this Bernius Messiah, a second Messiah by the Australian Cantillation singers, the new super audio JSBach Christmas Oratorio from Hermann Max and the Rheinische Kantorei/Das Kleine Konzert. For Nutcracker sweets, I already take great delight in the SACD set by Alexander Vedernikov with the Bolshoi. Five Stars for Bernius and the Stuttgart singers and players, for a wonderful near future winter holiday season, best to all.

› Go to Amazon.com to see the review  5.0 out of 5 stars