Under the soaring dome of the Grand Palais, Ukraine achieved its first triumph at the Paris Olympics on Monday night: Olha Kharlan dedicated her bronze fencing medal to her beleaguered homeland. That same night, under another soaring dome, that of St Paul's Cathedral in London, Ukrainian Freedom Orchestra and 180 singers from the UK-based Songs for Ukraine Choir united to perform Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, in the year of the work's 200th anniversary. The choral finale was sung not in Schiller's original German, but in Ukrainian. "Freude" (joy) was replaced by "slava" (glory). Flags were waved, "Slava Ukraini" shouted on both sides of the Channel. The two gentle forces of sport and culture united in an obligatory synchronicity.
In St Paul's, which was packed, the atmosphere was heady, familiar and chatty. Many, on and off stage, wore traditional embroidered white shirts. When the Ukrainian ambassador gave a welcoming speech from the pulpit, the roar of encouragement was a reminder of his national hero status: General Valerii Zaluzhnyi was Commander-in-Chief of the Ukrainian Armed Forces until February 2024. The choir's opening Ode to Joy, Slavic vowel sounds adding a rich and unfamiliar aural filter, drew applause midway through the movement, along with a light show of aloft telephones: powerful memories to take home. The concert opened with Bucha. Lacrimosa, a short, poignant work by Ukrainian Victoria Vita Polevá (b. 1962), written in response to the massacre there in April 2022. A solo violin (Marko Komonko) unleashes curls of notes into the vast space, until war sounds, percussive and chilling, shatter the peace.
Given the symbolism we heap on Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, we run the risk of, somewhat casually, neglecting its genius
The impact of such cultural events, intangible and personal, cannot be measured. Detractors call them feel-good activities, funded by wealthy patrons and therefore, besides their lack of logic, ineffective. You had to be there to know otherwise. The orchestra, which consists of Ukrainian musicians from home and abroad, was founded in 2022 by the Canadian-Ukrainian conductor Keri-Lynn Wilson in collaboration with, among others, the Metropolitan Opera in New York. Ukraine's first lady, Olena Zelenska, has given her support to the venture. Last month, the orchestra and choir performed at a shipyard in Gdańsk as part of their summer tour, in the presence of Lech Wałęsa, the former Polish president and a key figure in the Solidarity movement. (Wilson and the orchestra also recorded Beethoven's Ninth there last year, for Deutsche Grammophon.) The orchestra is constant. Each city provides its own choir. The British Songs for Ukraine Chorus was founded in spring 2023 as part of the Royal Opera House's creative exchange programme.
Given the symbolism we heap on the Ninth, we risk, somewhat casually, neglecting its genius: as a trailblazer, a trendsetter; grand in scale, revolutionary in style, risky, complex, virtuosic and taxing to play. St Paul's is not the place to display complexity or counterpoint, only scale. Some moments were inaudible, some dizzying, some deafening. Depending on who you believe and whether it is full or empty, the reverberation of the building can run for up to 13 seconds. Wilson handled the acoustic delay with aplomb, letting grand chords hang in the air as if waiting for each lingering note to reach a certain landmark before moving on.
The playing sounded well-drilled. To add "in the circumstances" is not to condemn with faint praise. Bass-baritone Andrii Kymach (BBC Cardiff Singer of the World winner in 2019) delivered his opening acclaim with power and grace, leading a strong line-up of soloists (Olga Bezszmertna, Nataliia Kukhar and Valentyn Dytiuk) and a choir that delivered its slavas with collective breath and heart. The concert ended with a hymn-like paraphrase, for violin and strings, of the Ukrainian national anthem called We Do Exist, by Yuri Shevchenko (1953-2022). In that moment of silence, we were all Ukrainians.
Ideas about home are also discussed in the Three Choirs Festivalthis year based in Worcester, alongside the wider theme of celebrating nature. In the short time I was able to attend I heard the BBC Singers, conducted by Sofi Jeannin, give a formidable performance of Francis Poulenc's cantata Figure Human (1943), a feverish cry, in several vocal lines, against the Nazi occupation of France. It ends with a soprano softly singing "Liberté" on a high E (think of the highest sound a human can make and you might be right). This was part of a concert that also featured Anna Lapwood playing her own arrangement, for organ, of Britten's Sea Interludeswith radiant choral settings by Kristina Arakelyan (b. 1994) in between (although each work might perhaps have stood better on its own), and In the land of Uz first heard at the Proms in 2017, by Judith Weir, a renowned composer.
An exemplary afternoon song recital, Songs from My Homeland, was given by the emerging Nigerian American soprano Francesca Chiejina and the British pianist Jocelyn Freeman. The repertoire selection was ambitious and varied, from Benjamin Britten's On This Island to Samuel Barber's wistful Knoxville: Summer of 1915 and accompanying songs by Gerald Finzi, Francis Poulenc, Madeleine Dring, Florence Price and more. Chiejina and Freeman ended their captivating collaboration with three jubilant Yoruba songs (arranged by Ayo Bankole).
Referring to his Fourth Symphony, Dmitri Shostakovich said that if the Stalinist regime cut off his hands, he would compose "with my pen between my teeth". Alienation and terror burned their way into the BBC Philharmonic's searing report on Wednesday Prom 16 conducted by John Storgårds. Listen to all 65 minutes, if you dare, on BBC Sounds, but be sure to hear the strange, unearthly ending. The performance followed Cassandra Miller's Viola Concerto (2023), a reserved but powerful lament that borrows its title I cannot love without tremeling from the French philosopher Simone Weil. It was written for the dazzling Lawrence Power, no virtuoso puppet but, as Miller demands, a soulful poet of sound.
Star Ratings (out of five)
Ukrainian Freedom Orchestra ★★★★
Three Choirs Festival ★★★★ ★★★★
