The UK Premiere of SEVEN LAST WORDS at The ENO

The English Countrywide Opera (ENO) presents a unique live performance of Joseph Haydn’s Seven Final Words on the Cross, and Joel Thompson’s Seven Past Phrases of the Unarmed. This is the initially time these two pieces have been executed with each other are living in the United kingdom.

Offered in a live performance staging, Haydn’s piece – primarily based all over the 7 final text of Christ in accordance to the Gospels – will open, followed by Thompson’s modern choral function which responds to the unlawful killings of unarmed black males in the United States.

Seven Very last Words and phrases on the Cross

In Haydn’s piece, each of the 7 movements kinds a musical reflection on Jesus’s previous terms just before the crucifixion, as instructed by the Gospels of Matthew, Luke and John.

Commissioned in 1786 for a Excellent Friday provider at Cádiz Cathedral, Haydn tailored it in 1796 as an oratorio. At just more than an hour extensive, this piece is the shortest of the four oratorios Haydn wrote in his job, and gives a measured and emotive reflection of the Disciples’ tales of Christ’s sacrifice in the Christian tradition.

Sung in English, four soloists are joined by the award-successful English Countrywide Opera Refrain, and 20 supplemental choristers.

Conducting the ENO’s spectacular Orchestra in this reflective and emotive get the job done is British choral conductor Andrew Nethsingha, making his ENO debut. A distinguished Choir Director and organist, he founded a very highly regarded reputation at Gloucester Cathedral, and Truro Cathedral just before becoming a member of St John’s Faculty, Cambridge as Director of Tunes in 2007. In his time at St John’s College or university he has assisted to established up their recording label generating very acclaimed recordings, and has championed the addition of feminine singers to the Choir.

They are joined by a great line-up of soloists.

The soprano in this piece is a latest ENO Harewood Artist, British soprano Nardus Williams. She has formerly ‘fielded her loaded soprano with good poise’ (The Sunday Periods) in ENO’s broadcast of Handel’s Messiah, broadcast on BBC Two at Easter 2021. She sings the function of Fiordiligi in ENO’s future manufacturing of Così admirer tutte in March.

7 Previous Words and phrases of the Unarmed

Next a limited interval is the performance of Thompson’s 7 Very last Terms of the Unarmed.

American composer Joel Thompson takes advantage of the liturgical structure and tradition of Haydn’s piece as a departure for his choral do the job. Taking its title from the very last terms of seven unarmed black gentlemen unlawfully killed by regulation enforcement in the United States, it delivers the composer’s personal reaction to racially motivated law enforcement brutality.

That contains seven actions, each quotations the last words of an unarmed black guy, in a sobering meditation of both equally particular and collective grief.

At first published for a male voice choir, American Conductor Kellen Grey, will carry out the expanded chorus in this orchestral arrangement of the 15 moment piece. At the moment Assistant Conductor of the two the Royal Scottish Countrywide Orchestra and the Charleston Symphony, Kellen would make his ENO debut. A multipurpose and imaginative conductor, he is similarly enthusiastic about regular and experimental musical programming. He has gained praise for his engagements, such as his debut with the Chicago Sinfonietta, the place he labored with ‘laser-like target that allowed the full orchestra to feel to turn into a single organism’ (Chicago Picture this Write-up). A staunch champion of new music instruction, he serves as Tunes Director of the Charleston Symphony Youth Orchestra.

Nardus is joined by German mezzo-soprano Idunnu Münch. She is a present ENO Harewood Artist, and not too long ago sang Siegrune in 2021’s The Valkyrie. Idunnu been given praise for her ‘rich voiced’ (Tradition Whisper) Diana in 2019’s Orpheus in the Underworld.

Joining them is American singer Soloman Howard singing the bass solo. ‘Resplendent in voice’ (Chicago Tribune), he produced a much lauded ENO debut as Wurm in 2020’s Luisa Miller and due to the fact then experienced continued to impress the opera world with ‘superhuman’ (The Denver Post) vocal performances at some of the world’s main residences. He will sign up for Frederick in The Handmaid’s Tale at the ENO this April, singing The Commander.

Finishing this stellar line-up of soloists is very acclaimed, Grammy Award-winning American tenor Frederick Ballentine. With a vastly recognized occupation in the US, ENO audiences will try to remember him as the ‘vibrant’ (The New York Times) Sporting Lifetime in 2019’s Porgy & Bess (his ENO debut), a function he reprised at The Achieved in 2021. He tends to make a job debut as Nick in The Handmaid’s Tale with the ENO this April.

The English National Opera’s Seven Final Words and phrases is at the London Coliseum on Wednesday 13 April 2022 at 19.30.

Image Credits: Lloyd Winters