Sydney Chamber Choir’s In Paradisum presents 10 choral pieces by predominantly 20th century composers from Estonia, Norway, Sweden and Australia.

Singing in several Nordic languages, English and Latin, the 26 singers conducted by Artistic Director Sam Allchurch perform unaccompanied, with cellist Julian Smiles joining the ensemble for two works by Joseph Twist and Anne Cawrse. Showcasing the onomatopoeic sounds of the languages of northern Europe, it is revelatory to hear how suited these are to expressing images and emotion through music.

Sydney Chamber Choir. Photo supplied

The program draws on the folk tunes and styles of the represented composers, paying homage to the Virgin Mary and exploring love in many forms. It speaks of the seasons, nature, passion and a spectrum of moods. Some build on elements that hark back to the very beginnings of sacred music with references to Gregorian plainchant and ancient chorales.

The exceptional pieces brought together here exemplify skilled and adventurous writing which continues to develop choral techniques and which the choir sings with excellent musicianship and masterful skill, both individually and as an ensemble. Conventional rhythms and harmonies are challenged, new sounds are proffered, but the effect is always beautiful and the word painting is vivid.

Some featured composers were taught or inspired by older masters, absorbing their aesthetics and applying it to new ideas. Knut Nystedt studied with Aaron Copland; Veljo Tormis, was influenced by Bartók and Kodály and in turn taught Arvo Pärt. Sven-David Sandström studied with Ligeti and was inspired by JS Bach.

Grieg’s Ave maris stella, Knut Nystedt’s Stabat Mater and Arvo Pärt’s Bogoroditse Djevo are three Marian themed pieces placed throughout the program. Ave maris stella is an appealing cameo reflecting Grieg’s accomplishments as a writer for choir and voice. Its mood of tranquillity and deft key changes are ably achieved.

Nystedt’s Stabat Mater, Op. 111 (1987) with cellist Smiles is the climax of the evening. A searing piece for choir and cello, narrating the suffering of Mary as she stands at the foot of the cross, it is powerful and unsettling. Alternating with passages of sheer lyricism and lucent harmonies, it takes us out of our comfort zone as Smiles and the ensemble present a compelling account of the dissonant chords, niggling chromatics and rhythms and keys that seek a home. The cello is a central part of the texture with its large leaps of register, shivering tremolos, jabbing double stops and demanding central cadenza, ending in a final march into paradise.

Sam Allchurch. Photo © Robert Catto

Bogoroditse Djevo, a Slavic hymn to the Virgin is a beautifully articulated, lightly tripping multimetric shout for joy, accented by rhythm and vivid shading. Its strophic, stepwise melody is punctuated by rich columns of chords as the melody is passed around the voice parts and the companion parts take up a droning accompaniment.

Veljo Tormis wrote seven songs in his song cycle Autumn Landscapes. The choir presents us with three, On hilissuvi (It is late summer) Üle taeva jooksevad pilved (Clouds are racing) and. Kanarbik (Heather). The songs are brief, but eloquent. Cluster chords, triplet rhythms and shifting harmonies glide over anchoring pedal points, finely coloured and controlled by the ensemble, singing of late summer and racing clouds, adding an incandescent shimmer to the flaming lines of Heather.

The Greatest of These by Anne Cawrse sets an adaptation of the familiar biblical text from 1 Corinthians. Ee have the pleasure of hearing some of the choristers as soloists. It is deceptively simple to hear, beautiful in its caressing simplicity but demands solid musical skills.

Biblical texts from the Old Testament’s Song of Songs are the inspiration for Four Songs of Love (Let him kiss me, Until the daybreak, Awake, O north wind and His left hand) by Sven-David Sandström, sung as a pleasing continuous bracket. His inventive style, described as post-modern, plays with rhythms, voices and concepts of tonality, creating a rich, almost instrumental choral soundscape, performed with finely balanced voice parts.

Joseph Twist’s heartrending Lament for Cello and Choir opens with a silken, sobbing soliloquy from Smiles, growing into an interplay between voices and instrument. At times the arpeggiated cello underpins the choral textures, and at others, the cello draws back to let the voices emerge from the tapestry.

Jan Sandström’s take on the time-honoured Renaissance carol Det är en ros utsprungen  (Lo, How a Rose E’er Blooming) by Michael Praetorius slows the heartbeat right down to a slowly unfolding, sustained reverie of fresh harmonies.

Two short pieces, Galina Grigorjeva’s In Paradisum and Urmas Sisask’s Benedictio, a fiesta of syncopation complete the line-up.

Allchurch’s varied positioning of the singers achieves appealing spatial effects in the overall blend and highlights the various vocal lines and soloists. Robust programme notes offer words, translations and insights. With In Paradisum, Sydney Chamber Choir takes choral performance to a new level, exploring bold writing and innovative techniques, rewriting the old and bringing divine new repertoire to the Sydney stage.