Details
Royal Hall
Ripon Road
Harrogate
North Yorkshire
HG1 2RD
England
Programme
Giacomo Puccini – Messa di Gloria
Gioachino Rossini – Stabat Mater
Performers
Andrew Padmore – Conductor
Sarah Power – soprano
Austin Gunn – Tenor
Stephen Gadd – baritone
Clare McCaldin – mezzo-soprano
Harrogate Choral Society
Manchester Camerata
Programme Note
Sadly we have had to cancel this concert due to a covid outbreak amongst choir members, the box office will be in touch with ticket holders.
Puccini is most famous for his contribution to the world of opera even though he began his musical career playing and composing church music. As his musical studies progressed, it was clear that young Puccini possessed the talent to become one of the world's greatest operatic composers – and his Messa di Gloria is evidence of such promise. Puccini himself wrote: "the Almighty touched me with his little finger and said, 'Write for the theatre - mind, only for the theatre!
Interestingly, although Rossini saw his Stabat Mater as a work of sacred music the lyrical style in which Rossini sets his composition is in parts, quite operatic in character. This is in contrast to the solemnity of the thirteenth-century text. He declared, “The music should be of the finest quality” and the Stabat Mater is indeed full of glorious music.