The Florentine Camerata was a group of humanists, musicians, poets and intellectuals in late Renaissance Florence who gathered during the late 1500s  to discuss and guide trends in the arts, especially music and drama. Unifying them was the belief that music in its purest form could rejuvenate and improve society.

The Camerata of Bangalore, under the baton of Neecia Majolly, offered a truly rejuvenating experience in their performance in St Mark’s Cathedral on September 22 which provided the perfect setting for the evening’s programme with its wonderful architecture and acoustics. In the company of the choir, and Leslie David at the organ, we were taken on a journey through 20th century Western classical music, ranging from an eternal cathedral classic, Henry Balfour Gardiner’s Evening Hymn, Samuel Barber’s touching Agnus Dei, to Arvo Pärt’s intricate and piercing Beatitudes.

The main pieces of the evening were French composer Maurice Duruflé’s solemn Requiem, composed in 1947, and Benjamin Britten’s cantata Rejoice in the Lamb.

Very different in style and modus, the Requiem is a meditative composition using thematics from Gregorian chants. The organ plays an important role in the music, not only as accompaniment to the choir and expressive soloists , but also as a way of creating dramatic climaxes and sudden moments of contemplation.

The Camerata, presently consisting of 18 members, made a fresh and youthful interpretation of the work, mastering powerful outbursts of despair and rage in the movement depicting the day of wrath, but also the sublime and angelical voices of paradise. To make the experience truly blissful, however, better synchronisation between organ and choir, as well as a little more preciseness in the entries of the choir, would have been beneficial.

The music by Balfour Gardiner, Barber and Pärt offered great contrasts, and each piece showed once again the impressive range of the choir, from subtle pianissimo to powerful fortissimo.
Benjamin Britten’s cantata Rejoice in the Lamb, with text by Christopher Smart, is an eccentric composition, full of religious symbolism.

Smart’s text explores the poet’s relationship with his cat Jeoffrey ;an alto solo extols a mouse’s valour in the face of the cat’s predatory nature; a slow, gentle, tenor solo relates how flowers are the messengers of God’s blessing and poetry; and a bass solo (Sriram Aravamudan) concludes with a recitative over how different letters in the alphabet symbolises different aspects of God. Sound weird? Well, weird and wonderful, as the message from the presenter of the evening, turned out to be very true!

The choir managed to create both mysterious moods in subtle sequences as well as to excel in fast, vigorous dance-like sections, and on the whole it was an inspiring performance, “very lively and gay” as Britten himself prescribes.

The evening with the Camerata had attracted a large number of listeners, and we who were there can truly agree with the eternal thoughts of the Florentines – concerts like this are both rejuvenating and relaxing.