St Petersburg, Concert Hall

Antonín Dvořák. Stabat Mater


Soloists:
Anastasia Kalagina (soprano)
Anna Kiknadze (мezzo-soprano)
Alexander Timchenko (tenor)
Ilya Bannik (bass)

Mariinsky Theatre Chorus and Symphony Orchestra
Principal Chorus Master: Andrei Petrenko

Conductor: Michael Güttler

A composer of famous operas and extremely popular symphony and chamber music – symphonies, symphonic poems and overtures, instrumental concerti, quartets, trios, vocal cycles and songs – Antonín Dvořák turned to the genres of the cantata and the oratorio more than once in the course of his life. A Catholic of deep conviction, he composed a number of works inspired by Biblical and Evangelical subjects. These include Biblical Songs for voice and piano, Psalm 149 for chorus and orchestra and major works for choral soloists and orchestra – the Mass in D Major, Requiem, Te Deum and Stabat Mater.
Writing Stabat Mater came at the same time as several tragic events in the composer’s life. Soon after the death of his young daughter, in March 1876 Dvořák began sketches for the cantata, completing them in early May. Fate was to prove exceptionally cruel to the composer: work on Dvořák’s funereal cantata, which took two years, was overshadowed by the deaths of two more of his children – another daughter and his firstborn son who was aged four years.
The premiere of the cantata took place in Prague on 23 December 1880, followed by performances in Brno and Budapest; when it was subsequently performed in London on 10 March 1883, Stabat Mater was a sensational success. One year later, Dvořák was invited to London to conduct his masterpiece.
In England, since the times of Handel a tradition of grandiose choral festivals had developed in which huge choruses would take part; from the late 19th century they were frequently joined by extended orchestras. Dvořák conducted the chorus and the orchestra, a total number of almost one thousand performers. This concert heralded the pan-European worship and widespread acclamation of Dvořák’s music. Today, too, along with the composer’s symphonies, Slavonic Dances and Cello Concerto, Stabat Mater is one of Dvořák’s most popular works.
Traditionally (starting from the Middle Ages) divine worship on Good Friday is dedicated to the Mother of God mourning Christ on Calvary. Stabat Mater Dolorosa – The Sorrowful Mother Stood – is a mediaeval hymn that preceded the reading of the Gospel during Catholic mass. It is generally accepted that the author of the Latin text was called Jacopo (Jacopone) da Todi, a Franciscan monk from the Italian town of Todi. Here are a few terze rime from the text of the cantata:

At the Cross her station keeping,
Stood the mournful Mother weeping,
Close to her Son to the last.

Through her heart, His sorrow sharing,
All His bitter anguish bearing,
Now at length the sword has passed.

Be to me, O Virgin, nigh,
Lest in flames I burn and die,
In His awful Judgment Day.

While my body here decays,
May my soul Thy goodness praise,
Safe in Paradise with Thee.
Amen.

Dvořák’s cantata is one of the most significant musical renderings of this poetic verse to which major composers have turned throughout the ages, among them Pergolesi and Penderecki. The music of the cantata, which follows a text by Jacopo da Todi, conveys degrees of the dramatic Ascension of the soul – from darkness to light and from earthly grief to heavenly consolation.
Iosif Raiskin

Age category 6+

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