John Rutter Article in The New York Sun
All Together Now
June 27, 2006
By GEORGE LOOMIS

Tell a Methodist church choir from Coral Springs,Fla.,or a high school choir from Grand Junction, Iowa, that it has been selected to perform at Carnegie Hall and you will have plenty of incredulous choristers on your hands. But as reality sinks in, incredulity will turn into motivation. On Sunday afternoon, the hardworking efforts of some 19 choirs from around the country culminated in a concert in the famous hall, led by the noted English choral conductor, composer, and arranger Paul Rutter.

Mr. Rutter is a frequent guest at such concerts at Carnegie, which are presented by MidAmerica Productions and bring an astonishing 9,000 amateur choristers to New York annually. More than 500 singers, divided into two megachoruses, participated in Sunday's concert, the first of three such events in two days. For the occasion, Mr. Rutter chose an upbeat program of works by Leonard Bernstein and himself.

Bernstein's "Chichester Psalms," commissioned for performance in 1965 by the Cathedral of Chichester in Sussex, England, has benefited from the recent rise in popularity of Bernstein's music, which during his lifetime was held by the arbiters of taste to be insufficiently modernistic. Bernstein himself, in a cute little verse published in the New York Times, averred that the "Chichester Psalms" were "certain to sicken a John Cager" because of their "tonal and tuneful" idiom. Indeed, the first movement of the threemovement work recalls "West Side Story" in the vigor of its syncopated Latin rhythms. The text is Psalm 100 ("Make a joyful noise unto the Lord"), and the music Bernstein conjured up to go with it is as exhilarating as it is joyful.

Bernstein breaks up the texts of Psalm 23 with verses from Psalm 2 ("Why do the nations rage"), which makes for a fiercely threatening middle section. But the serene, rising melody heard earlier makes a comforting return when the text of Psalm 23 resumes. The quintuple meter of the melody for Psalm 131 gives the final movement an almost Russian quality, and the piece ends with a moving a capella section.

Mr. Rutter clearly knows how to draw the best from a chorus. It sometimes seems that the larger the amateur chorus, the mushier the sound, but not so here. The chorus sang firmly, responsively, and, when needed, agilely, as the well-defined rhythms of the first movement demonstrated. In the second movement, the chorus was joined by a young Turkish mezzo soprano, Ezgi Kutlu, who made a fine impression with her sultry sound.

Bernstein stipulated that "Chichester Psalms" be sung in Hebrew, and I had some difficulty following the transliterated texts in the program. But the chorus's diction sounded fine in Mr. Rutter's "Gloria," no doubt in part because the Latin text is more familiar. For this 22-minute piece, Mr. Rutter divided the text from the Ordinary of the Mass into three contrasting movements: an energetic, well-declaimed opening; a pastoral-like middle movement in which contemplative winds add to the feeling of repose; and a final movement with syncopated rhythms that brought the Bernstein to mind.

If fact, the juxtaposition of these works suggests that Mr. Rutter might like to be viewed as a successor to Bernstein. But sometimes his music seems a little too facile, and the orchestral writing, particularly for brass, is often very glitzy. But this music can make for a visceral experience, and the chorus gave its all.

After the intermission, Mr. Rutter returned with another large chorus for two more of his works. "Distant Land (A Prayer for Freedom)," inspired by the release of Nelson Mandela from prison,flirts with sentimentality,but its primary melody is arresting and gains in impact with restatement. The chorus sang it eloquently and also contributed enthusiastically to "Feel the Spirit," a collection of spirituals arranged by Mr. Rutter. Here Ms. Kutlu made a welcome reappearance, contributing to several of the numbers, including the haunting "Steal Away." Mr. Rutter's arrangements pointed up the link between spirituals and jazz, with a suggestion of ragtime rhythm in "I Got a Robe" and a jazzy improvisatory clarinet part in "Ev'ry Time I Feel the Spirit." The New England Symphonic Ensemble supplied handsome orchestral support in all four works.

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