Gabriel KACZMAREK (b.1986)
Msza 1050 (2015)
Izabella Tarasiuk-Andrzejewska (mezzo); Tomasz Raczkiewicz (counter-tenor); Józef Biegański (boy soprano)
Cantanti Chorus/Mierzejewski Michał Sergiusz
Sinfonietta Polonia/Chau Cheung
rec. 14 May 2016, POSm Concert Hall, Poznan, Poland
ACTE PRÉALABLE AP0364 [50:33]
This is the first recording of an ambitious headliner of a
work by young Polish composer Gabriel Kaczmarek. It's hot off the creative
anvil. Look at the session date for this recording which, by the by, is quite
vivid. The acoustic is a studio but the cathedral illusion is more than passably
put across.
This thirty year old composer wrote Msza 1050 to mark the 1050th
anniversary of the beginning of Christianity in Poland. Kaczmarek plies his
craft through ballet (a large-scale Alice opera-ballet-acrobatics
was written in 2013 and a Snow-Queen ballet in 2016), film, advertising
and electronic music.
By no means avant-garde, the Msa is in twelve movements, each separately
tracked. The opening Kyrie eleison is dominated by a healingly rounded
minimalist chugging rhythm. Over this we hear calming female voices smoothly
lofting a long-limbed melody. The Gloria defies expectations and
is for the most part subdued with joyous outbursts being isolated peaks. It
is sweetly tempered for full choir. This music is not abrasive and should
appeal instantly. Then a prayerful Psalm in Polish is again underpinned
by a railroad ostinato with some intriguing accelerations - nothing extreme.
A silvery pianissimo arches over and under the Alleluia;
this is no shouted eruption; rather a mystic and quietly intoned celebration.
The Credo finds dusky-toned mezzo Izabella Tarasiuk-Andrzejewska
and counter-tenor Tomasz Raczkiewicz modestly balanced amid a suave auburn
mattress of string writing. Fast chattering string figuration and bongo drums
impart forward motion to Czego chcesz od nas Panie (tr.6) with the
choir singing quietly as if they have a secret to express. Sanctus
at first delivers overt excitement and this is felt in fulsome writing for
voices and orchestra. This falls away into a cathedral of incense swirling
until a confident Hosanna sweeps all before it.
Ojcze nasz takes the form of a prayerful, slow-footed march. Agnus
Dei is built on another of those healing ostinati over which the mezzo
rather tremulously sings, seemingly shaken to the core by sorrow. The orchestral
Communio is like a bell tolling slowly. This rises up a shallow gradient
across the longest movement of the twelve (7:45). It's a 'slow
burn' — steady but with a glowing penumbra. The Ave Maria
carries the meditative atmosphere higher still into bluer unclouded realms.
The darkly trembling mezzo left me with some doubts although her melismas
do impress. The final Ego te baptizo has plenty of tidal surge to
impel choir, solo voices and orchestra to a fittingly ecstatic close.
This is a well contrasted and welcoming large-scale piece in a melodically
accessible but not simplistic vein. It is most enjoyable with a strong spiritual
dimension clothed in commercial and classical apparel.
The helpful glossy-surface booklet is in Polish, English and German.
Rob Barnett
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