The Capitol Hill Chorale marked its 20th anniversary season with “As Spoken by the Prophets,” performed December 1 and 2, 2012, at Lutheran Church of the Reformation in Washington, D.C. Artistic Director Frederick Binkholder built the program around the Old Testament prophets, whose calls for reform, justice, and hope run through Isaiah, Jeremiah, and the Psalms.
The first half moved from Knut Nystedt’s “Cry Out and Shout” through Thomas Tallis’s “The Lamentation of Jeremiah,” Bruckner’s “Os justi,” Stanford’s “Beati Quorum Via,” and Brahms’s “Fest- und Gedenksprüche,” closing with five selections from Randall Thompson’s “The Peaceable Kingdom,” set to the words of Isaiah. After intermission, organist Jinsun Cho performed a festive voluntary by Petr Eben before the Chorale turned to carols and seasonal works, including Herbert Howells’s “Magnificat” and “Nunc Dimittis” with tenor soloist Edward Burgess, a traditional Neapolitan “Quando nascette Ninno,” William Billings’s “A Virgin Unspotted,” and John Gardner’s arrangement of “Tomorrow Shall Be My Dancing Day.”
The program notes, credited to Bill Grigg, cast the prophets as reformers who “pushed for an end to idolatry, human sacrifice, and debauchery” — a theme the Chorale carried through its pairing of ancient texts with 20th-century settings.
Program
- Cry Out and Shout — Knut Nystedt
- The Lamentation of Jeremiah, Part I — Thomas Tallis
- Os justi — Anton Bruckner
- Beati Quorum Via, Op. 38 — C.V. Stanford
- Fest- und Gedenksprüche, Op. 109, No. 1 (Unsere Väter hofften auf dich) — Johannes Brahms
- Abendlied, Op. 69, No. 3 — Josef Rheinberger
- The Peaceable Kingdom (selections I, II, V, VII, VIII) — Randall Thompson
- A Festive Voluntary from Variations on Good King Wenceslas — Petr Eben
- Good King Wenceslas — traditional
- Lo, How a Rose E’er Blooming — arr. Michael Praetorius
- Magnificat and Nunc Dimittis — Herbert Howells
- Quando nascette Ninno — traditional Neapolitan carol
- A Virgin Unspotted — William Billings
- Winter — Z. Randall Stroope
- Tomorrow Shall Be My Dancing Day — arr. John Gardner
Frederick Binkholder conducted, with Jinsun Cho as organist and assistant director, and Edward Burgess as tenor soloist.
