Rare Gem: Albany Chorale to perform ‘Stabat Mater’ on Feb. 21

ALBANY — The Albany Chorale, joined by soloists and members of the Albany Symphony Orchestra, will present its most challenging program of the year — a rarely performed gem from the Baroque period — at its Feb 21 concert.

“Stabat Mater” will be performed by the Albany Chorale at 7 p.m. a St. Patrick’s Episcopal Church, 4800 Old Dawson Road, in Albany.

“This is our masterworks concert,” chorale Artistic Director Marc Boensel said. “We try to do one concert each year where we feature high classical art music. All of these pieces come from the Baroque period, which is 1600 to 1750.”

Giovani Pergolesi composed “Stabat Mater” shortly before his death from tuberculosis in a Franciscan monastery in Pozzuoli, Italy. There have been some suggestions that he completed the piece the night before he died. It was scored for soprano and alto soloists, as well as violins, viola, cello and organ.

Boensel said five soloists will join the chorale for the concert.

“We are being joined by eight members of the Albany Symphony Orchestra,” he said. “They’re playing all the pieces, and we even have a guest conductor on one of the pieces.”

That guest conductor is ASO Music Director Claire Fox Hillard, who will take the baton “on one of the instrumental pieces we’re doing between choral works,” Boensel said. “The reason is I’m playing oboe on that one piece, so he’s going to step in and help me out — something we haven’t done at the chorale before.”

It will be an evening of firsts for the chorale, both in the program and venue. Boensel said his research indicates this is the first time “Stabat Mater” has been performed in the Albany area.

“It (‘Stabat Mater’) means, ‘there stands the mother.’ It’s the narration of the crucifixion from the perspective of Mary, (Jesus’) mother,” Boensel said. “Needless to say, it’s a very emotional piece of music. Very powerful.

“It’s rarely done. I did it once many years ago up in the (Washington) D.C. area, and it was the first time it had been done in that area in a while. I can’t find where anyone in south Georgia has performed it, just digging through references, archives and google searches. ”

While the program is not sung in English, the audience will be able to follow along, Boensel said.

“People shouldn’t worry that the whole piece is sung in Latin,” he said. “They’ll have a translation of the whole thing in the program. If they’ve never heard it before — and I bet most people in the Albany area haven’t — it’s one of the most powerful pieces to come out of the Baroque period.

“It probably really is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. You probably won’t hear it again. It’s unique and just not performed very often.”

It’s an ambitious program, but Boensel said his chorale is ready to tackle it. The vocalists have been working on parts of “Stabat Mater” since practices for the 2018-19 performance season started last summer.

“This has been in the works the entire season,” he said. “We have this large work, which we’ve been working on, really, since August, just doing it in bits and pieces. Now, we’re focusing on it primarily and making great progress.

“We will be 40 strong in the chorus. We’ve got five soloists singing with us, and the (ASO) instruments. We’re doing a whole lot of smaller pieces first, also from the same time but from different composers. There are Bach and Handel, which everyone knows, then on to the main work.”

Boensel said this will be the first time the chorale has performed at St. Patrick’s Church.

“We’re looking forward to that space,” he said. “We’ve never sung in that church before. They have beautiful acoustics, and we’re looking forward to it.”

Tickets for the concert are $15 for adults, $10 for students and free for children under 10. They can be purchased at Parker Music on Westover Boulevard, from any chorale member and at the door. The chorale’s website is albanychorale.org.

“It should be a real fine evening of classical music,” Boensel said. “It’s exquisitely beautiful, and I think they (the audience) will thoroughly enjoy it.”

Contact freelance writer Jim Hendricks at [email protected]. Follow @JimEHendricks on Twitter.