Beethoven: Mass in C Major

 

If you don't know Beethoven's middle-period Mass setting, it is one I enjoy hearing each chance I get. If the work is in a more traditional form than one might expect, the music doesn't suffer from such labels.

The Mass in C Major has had an erratic presence on recordings, this one included. When my personal preference of this work comes from John Eliot Gardiner and his period orchestra, you know the competing recordings must be middling or of a wide variety of qualities.

And this Naxos one is a disappointment too, a performance I had great hopes for. The chorus is the main culprit, I think. The youthful adult sopranos use a rather stark, straight-toned sound, reminiscent of a treble cathedral choir, which can be lovely, but hardly powerful amongst the other sections of the choir. When the music reaches its highest and loudest portions, a common recurrence in Beethoven, they just can't put out the sound in any dramatic way.

That is not all, though. While the chorus uses crisp consonants and offers vitality throughout, in Germanic Latin here, they are not always together in their execution, their vowel production is not always top tier, and I sense a tiring from the singers after a while, affecting tuning and ensemble. The soloists are fine, if not remarkable. I actually find the vocal team a little too voluptuous of vibrato in general, with mezzo-soprano Niina Keitel the most consistent sounding of the trio.

Troubling too is the engineering of the recording. The choir will be brought forward in their quietest moments, usually with appreciable energy from the ensemble as in the Miserere portion, but then in the following loudest, full-ensemble moments, the dynamic is exactly the same, as if the engineers were normalizing the choir throughout. This happens in the wind sections of the orchestra as well, where the woodwinds will be really present in the soundscape one moment, and then not. Too bad, especially from a team who has a good track record in recordings, such as these with Segerstam on Naxos.

The Turku Philharmonic Orchestra led by Leif Segerstam is in fine mettle, even if the string section is usually a tertiary character in the sonics of the Mass. Segerstam can be a little poky, which isn't usually a problem, but with all of the elements I mentioned above, simply compounds the issues.

More interesting is the operatic scena Vesta's Fire, a rarity from Beethoven. Here, Segerstam brings in tenor Tuomas Katajala, and a most refreshing voice he is compared to those in the Mass. True, soprano Kaisa Ranta and bass Nicholas Söderlund join back in, but they seem on more familiar ground in a dramatic stage setting. I have not heard Andrew Davis' recording of this same 10-minute piece, but expect his more familiar British singers would be equally appealing, if not a more dynamic set of performers.

As an extra, Segerstam provides the short chorus Meeresstille und Glückliche Fahrt. This is a classic number for choir, most famously performed by Michael Tilson Thomas in London as well as from Gardiner with the terrific Monteverdi Choir. The Finnish chorus on hand bears the same issues from the Mass, where, when the glory of the Prosperous Voyage appears, the choir doesn't have the inimitable impact it should.

I don't like hating on a recording at all, but I was looking forward to what Leif Segerstam had to say in Beethoven's Mass in C Major. It ends up, nothing I wanted to hear.

 

 

Works
Mass in C Major, op. 86 (33.52)
Meeresstille und Glückliche Fahrt, op. 112 (8.03)
Vesta's Fire, Hess 115 (10.55)

Soloists
Kaisa Ranta, soprano
Niina Keitel, mezzo-soprano
Topi Lehtipuu, tenor (op. 86)
Tuomas Katajala, tenor (Hess 115)
Nicholas Söderlund, bass

Performers
Cathedralis Aboensis Choir
Turku Philharmonic Orchestra
Leif Segerstam, conductor

Label: Naxos
Year: 2020
Total Timing: 65.29

 

Those looking for a recording of Beethoven's Mass in C Major best look elsewhere. I suppose diehards of this work would want at least a single hearing of this performance, but otherwise, only gluttons for punishment should visit.

Everything about this production should have been a winner, but it just didn't pan out that way.

I will be tossing mine to the moat for The Kraken to deal with as it wishes!

 

 

 

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