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Performance, to be staged Sunday, features ‘Hallelujah Chorus’ from Handel’s Messiah
BRETT ANNINGSON TIMES & TRANSCRIPT
One of the great masterworks of the classical music canon will be in the spotlight this weekend when one of the province’s renowned orchestral ensembles shares a Moncton stage with some of the city’s finest choral voices.
Tutta Musica, an ensemble of professional teaching musicians, presents
Choral Symphony on Sunday afternoon at the Moncton Celebration Centre.
The performance is a collaboration between Tutta Musica and three choirs: the Greater Moncton Chorale, the In Harmony District Children’s Choir and the Jeunes chanteurs d’Acadie.
Tutta Musica consists of instructors from the New Brunswick Youth Orchestra’s Sistema program, an after school music education program for elementary school students. Sistema has been active in the province since 2009 when it was introduced through a partnership with the original program in Venezuela, where it has helped more than 400,000 children. The New Brunswick program is overseen by Antonio Delgado, who also heads the youth orchestra.
Under the program, school children learn to play instruments as part of an orchestra, free of charge. Sistema NB now operates six centres, in Moncton, Saint John, Richibucto, Tobique First Nation, Edmundston and Miramichi, and engages more than 700 children daily.
To pull this off requires the teaching talents of many professional musicians. Tutta Musica was created as means to showcase the teachers’ performance talents.
The name Tutta Musica means “all music” and the group’s aim is to bring classical music to a larger audience in New Brunswick.
“We have people hired to teach who are from all over Canada, many from right here in New Brunswick,” said Delgado, the musical director and conductor.“They are all performers in their own right and we thought it would be a wonderful idea to give them the opportunity to play together and do events as a group.”
The musicians are spread out across the province, so often this takes the form of quartets or smaller ensembles doing shows,but every now and again it means bringing the whole group together.
“What we have also noticed,” said Delgado,“is that there is a huge choral movement in Moncton. There are many choirs and it is very popular. So think of Choral Symphony as a show giving acknowledgement to this great movement. We reached out to the Moncton Chorale and we also got some of the younger choirs involved. It is going to be a great show.”
The idea behind the show is to put on a very classical performance with some surprises to make it an inclusive repertoire.
Most of the show is from Mozart’s Requiem.
The Requiem Mass in D minor was composed in Vienna in 1791 and left unfinished at the composer’s death on Dec. 5, 1791. The composition was finally completed in 1792 by Franz Xaver Süssmayr and was delivered to Count Franz von Walsegg,the anonymous benefactor who had paid Mozart 100 ducats to commission the work – originally to commemorate the Feb. 14 anniversary of his wife’s death.
“At the end of the show we will have all of the choirs on stage at once,” said Delgado,“and we will be singing the“Hallelujah Chorus” from Handel’s Messiah. It is so well known and so powerful, especially when done with so many talented musicians and voices.
“There are many reasons to come see the show,” Delgado said.“It is a very inclusive repertoire, for starters. There is something for everyone to enjoy and you do not need to know classical music to get something out of it.
“The second reason is that it is an opportunity to appreciate the wonderful talent we have here in Moncton – many people might not know how strong the chorale movement is in New Brunswick and this is an opportunity to see it. Last but not least it helps to fulfil the mission of Tutta Musica to collaborate with local artists and bring New Brunswick culture to light in new ways.”
