Concert review
Concert of the Estonian National Male Choir “Signum magnum”
The concert took place in the Estonia Concert Hall on December 3.
The Estonian National Choir has long demonstrated that it is more than just a professional male choir. By honoring the truth, we are in a privileged position, since a unique collective in the world operates right here. The men’s choir founded by Gustav Ernesaksa in 1944 was a source of inspiration and mission for hundreds of men in war-torn Estonia in its early years.
Today’s RAM moves on other artistic tracks: it is undoubtedly still the first among male choirs, but the difference between recreational choirs and male choirs operating in universities is enormous. The main conductor and artistic director of the RAM since the 2011/2012 season, Mikk Üleoja, has transformed the national men’s choir into a vocally unlimited and flexible ensemble belonging to the top league, regardless of the repertoire of Shostakovich, Strauss, Schubert or Ernesak.
The concert “Signum magnum” was a parallel development of the work of two composers. One of the composers, Giovanni Gabrieli (1553–1612), is known to music history as organist and musical director of the church of San Marco in Venice; during his nearly three decades of activity in the sanctuary, multi-choir music was created there. RAM’s program included five motets from Gabriel’s lush creations, the arrangements for male choir of which were made by RAM composer and singer Aare Kruusimäe.
The listener who has followed the development of the men’s choir must have noticed conductor Mikk Üleoja’s passion for the work of contemporary composers, so this concert program was no exception. Today’s music was represented by another Italian, Giovanni Bonato (born 1961). Music created by two composers 500 years apart was suited to juxtaposition, forming a convex whole.
Bonato’s music is “spatial”, it is always sung in a circle around the audience. Therefore, architecture plays a significant role in the performance of a piece of music: the same piece can sound different when performed in different rooms, with new sonic nuances during each performance.
RAM has already sung Bonato’s works in the Estonian concert hall, it can be done. Since the acoustics do not support singers very much when they perform on the hall floor, this is quite complicated musical material. Quite a few musical innovations are represented in Bonato’s music: in addition to sometimes extreme vocal lines, rustles, whispers, vocalizations, hits, echoes, quotations and theatricality. The realization of the composer’s ideas is largely due to the vocal skill of the choir. RAM was more than in good shape that day: the voice was strong and the choir was just on the tip of conductor Üleoja’s finger in the center of the hall. What precision, what concentration!
Standing on a six-pointed Ukrainian flag, the singers stood around the audience, creating new sound fields with each piece. Bonato’s sometimes meditative musical pieces are accompanied by brushstrokes vividly colored with Gabriel’s work. Cellists Aare Tammesalu and Levi-Danel Mägila further enriched the soundscape, and in the last piece of the concert – the concert’s title track, Bonato’s “Signum magnum” – some of the choir’s singers even played glasses of water. The colored threads of sounds crossed over the heads of the listeners, and during the concert the creation transformed into an increasingly opaque sound field, in which the contact with oneself also grew while wandering pleasantly. After each piece the singers switched places and so the music could be heard from different angles, sometimes next to the tenors, sometimes on the fringes of the bass group. A very powerful, personal and physically moving experience.
The audience was visibly excited at the beginning of the concert, seeing the singers gather around them, initially looking from both sides of the hall, studying the program carefully and squealing at every surprise. However, as the concert went on, the audience became more and more calm, closed their eyes, lowered their heads, immersed themselves in what they heard and let themselves be pampered. The anticipation of the holidays was ignited by “One rose has risen” by Michael Praetorius (arranged by Jan Sandström), sung as an additional song of the concert, which took the sailing ship of dreams towards particularly wide oceans.
There were people in the hall who came to listen to the classics of the male choir or the popular Christmas carols, let’s face it: these concerts will also come in the near future, both on the occasion of the 115th anniversary of Ernesaksa’s birth and in the RAM Christmas concert series.
And I thought during the concert, how throughout the month of December we seek the good and share the talent. In the rush before the holidays, people buy endless gifts for their loved ones to show they care. I recommend going and listening to the concerts of the Estonian National Men’s Choir: world-class audio treatment is guaranteed.
2023-12-05 14:27:00
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