Scottish Chamber Orchestra
Handel’s Theodora, Friday 23 October, City Halls, Glasgow
Miranda Heggie, Four stars
WITH a performance both moving and thought-provoking, the Scottish Chamber Orchestra gave a thorough interpretation of Handel’s Theodora, a work considered by the composer to be the greatest of his oratorios, and one which tells of the unfortunate plight of the 4th century Christian Martyr Theodora and her equally ill-fated lover Didymus.
Under the expert command of Harry Bickett, who had stepped in to conduct with very short notice, the orchestra beautifully portrayed the anguish of the tale, with a distilled passion permeating through Handel’s exquisitely layered score. Directing the music from the harpsichord, his innate understanding of the work is evident as he commanded the orchestra with deftness and poise.
The quintet of vocal soloists gave compelling performances, each bringing a unique dimension to their character.
Countertenor Iestyn Davies proved himself to be a true master of his craft, singing with a stunningly sublime tone, perfectly suited to the music. The juxtaposition of a full, rich sound from the orchestra, with natural horns cutting through the strings like pealing bells, to the clean simplicity of just continuo and theorbo to accompany Davies’ heavenly singing was particularly effective.
Soprano Stefanie True sang the role of Theodora with a sweet and clear voice, with flawless control, while Neal Davies gave a powerful portrayal of the president of Antioch, Valens who sentences Theodora to her death. Croatian mezzo-soprano Renata Pokupic sang the role of Theodora’s companion Irene with a rich and velvety voice, although her dramatic style sometimes sounded a little over-romantic for the period.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here