In the beautiful surroundings of St Peter’s Anglican Church Cremorne , a bell rings. Then Glenn Amer’s rich, full tenor voice fills the church with the processional Lead Kindly Light and ALLELULIA! ALLELULIA! SACRED SULLIVAN begins.
It is a blend of church service , concert and musical lecture with a fascinating , witty and informative script written and narrated by Melvyn Morrow and musical segments performed with great panache by Glenn Amer , who happens to be musical director at the church. ( Readers might be familiar with their wonderful past concerts at Mosman Art Gallery, to name just one example).
The work explores the now mostly forgotten sacred works of Sir Arthur Sullivan (yes Sullivan of Gilbert and Sullivan) compositions which, in their day, made the usually stuffy Victorian audiences of thousands go wild with enthusiasm. Sullivan remained a lifelong bachelor, but his private romantic life was as complicated as it was turbulent.
The concert is an engaging chronological look at Sullivan’s life and his various sacred works – he was a prolific composer of hymns (perhaps most famous for Onward Christian Soldiers but not forgetting among others Lead Kindly Light, It Came Upon the Midnight Clear, Alleluia Alleluia, Hearts to Heaven and Voices Raise, Angel Voices Ever Singing to name just a few.)
We learn that before he made his fortune writing operettas with Gilbert, Sullivan worked to pay the bills by playing the organ at various fashionable London churches and also by writing hymns. He wrote 68 original hymn tunes and arranged about 75 others. And then there are his oratorios and cantatas .His oratorios are The Light of the World, The Prodigal Son, On Shore and Sea , and we hear snippets from his Te Deums and The Golden Legend .Plus we hear The Lost Chord.
The show also examines Sullivan’s attitude to the Church. Did Sullivan truly believe? How do we define ‘sacred’ music ? Mention is made of how he portrayed curates (see the The Sorcerer with its romantically conflicted Victorian clergyman, Dr Daly – Amer gives a most poignant and affecting version of Time Was When Love and I Were Well Acquainted ). And don’t forget the stirring Hail Poetry from The Pirates of Penzance .
We hear excerpts from On Shore and Sea , a dramatic somewhat controversial (and still would be today , with its Christian vs Muslim plot) cantata which Sullivan composed for the third Great Exhibition in 1871 with libretto by playwright, Tom Taylor.
At the same time as his first collaboration with Gilbert in 1871, Sullivan was also writing his famous Festival Te Deum. In fact, over his lifetime, Sullivan wrote three Te Deums . The first was in 1866, a short, simple choir setting. The second, in 1872, was to celebrate the recovery from typhoid of the Prince of Wales – later King Edward VII whose lifetime ‘fervor’, despite Sullivan’s Te Deum, was notably more sensuous than religious . Nonetheless, the 1872 Te Deum was produced on a scale which even today, Hollywood might balk at : perhaps think of Cecil B.De Mille and Star Wars combined! .It required a full orchestra as well as a full military band .Also an organ. Plus a chorus of – imagine it – two thousand. It was performed in the Crystal Palace to an audience of twenty six thousand ! The mind boggles.
There is an extended look at one of Sullivan’s mega -hits, 1873 The Light of the World that had critics reaching for the superlatives and audiences in hysterical raptures . Morrow points out that it could perhaps be considered the Victorian era equivalent of Jesus Christ Superstar – Jesus sings his words in character, adding a dramatic human dimension to the work , while the chorus establish narration and mood, and the solos focus heightened operatic realism.
We are also treated to a mention of Sullivan’s oratorio The Martyr of Antioch, and a look at another of Sullivan’s giant blockbusters , of 1886 – The Golden Legend where Sullivan wrote for 325 voices and 120 orchestra players . In addition to the usual orchestral instruments, Sullivan augmented the woodwind section with piccolos, cor anglais, bass clarinet, contrabassoon, cornets , trumpets … as well as featured sections for bells, harp and organ!
We hear adapted excerpts from the above works, dynamically and charismatically performed by Amer on the organ and in fine voice.
We then learn of the sad passing of Sullivan from kidney disease , hear his funeral march from King Arthur and a couple of other hymns and the concert concluded with a spirited and vigorous rendition by the audience (congregation?) of Onward Christian Soldiers .
By the turn of the nineteenth century the entire canon of Sullivan’s religious works had fallen into secular disregard or condescending disfavour. Morrow and Amer hope to counteract this and start a renaissance of interest in his now rarely heard sacred music in this stirring , dramatic and insightful concert.
Running time – allow approximately 90 minutes no interval.
SACRED SULLIVAN was a one off performance at St Peter’s Anglican Church Neutral Bay 15 September 2019
Featured image : Tenor Glen Armer.
