Opening concert: Missa Miniatura
Friday 21 March, 19:00
(Doors open at 18:15)
Oslo Cathedral
Adult: 550 NOK
Senior/student: 350 NOK
Child: 100 NOK
Duration: 1 hour and 40 minutes
Opening concert:
Continuum: Missa Miniatura
From J.S. Bach’s Mass in B Minor, BWV 232
Continuum
Soloists
Mathias Gillebo, narrator
Elina Albach, harpsichord and musical direction
Bach in step with the times
Experience J.S. Bach’s great masterpiece Mass in B Minor in a new and exciting arrangement at this year’s opening concert, performed by superb musicians.
The German harpsichordist Elina Albach and her ensemble CONTINUUM perform Missa Miniatura, an innovative and bold arrangement of J.S. Bach’s iconic Mass in B minor. The arrangement is for 13 musicians; a miniature version for a small ensemble, vocal soloists, and a narrator. Albach and CONTINUUM pare down the score, but add percussion and cornett. In this way, Bach’s voice leading and timbres are given a new chamber musical form. Albach has commissioned new texts by the Swiss writer Jürg Halter, who reflects on the different parts of the Latin Mass, but using a modern language and focusing on contemporary problems. This modern reflection reveals new facets of known material. Singer and theologian Mathias Gillebo has adapted the texts for a Norwegian audience.
Elina Albach says about Missa Miniatura: ‘I don’t want to perform the Mass in B minor in its entirety, but omit certain elements and replace these with text. Within the Mass format, I want to include our time’s existential problems and challenges, as well as emphasising doubt. What is faith? Do we need something to believe in, and does faith give us an advantage when meeting life’s challenges? And how is Bach’s music affected for us, as modern listeners meeting this deeply religious work, when these questions are highlighted?’
The opening concert launches our thematic focus ‘Masses and passions in step with the times’, where we present several new interpretations and arrangements of church musical works.
CONTINUUM is a group of instrumentalists and vocalists under the direction of harpsichordist Elina Albach. CONTINUUM wants to present early music in innovative ways that can relate it to the present. The ensemble is flexible, and the instruments adapted to the individual projects. The ensemble is led by the award-winning harpsichordist Albach, who likes to work with everything from large vocal ensembles to intimate trios. CONTINUUM made their debut at the festival Köthener Bachfesttage in 2015, and has since then performed at important festivals in Germany and Europe, as well as in Bolivia, at the invitation of Goethe-Institut Bolivia.
Elina Albach studied at the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis with Professor Jörg-Andreas Bötticher. She has conducted Vocalconsort Berlin, the Karajan Academy of the Berlin Philharmonic, and taught at the Hochschule für Musik Carl Maria von Weber in Dresden and the Hochschule für Musik Detmold. She has performed at a number of renowned festivals and concert houses all over the world. Currently, Albach’s main focus is arranging works from the Baroque canon for small ensembles.
Mathias Gillebo has his education from the Norwegian Academy of Music and the Academy of Opera in Oslo. He regularly works with leading orchestras and conductors, both in Norway and abroad, with works such as Bach’s Christmas Oratorio, St John and St Matthew Passions, Handel’s Messiah, and Mozart’s Requiem. He is an in-demand Bach Evangelist, and is often engaged in projects with newly written music. On stage, he has played several parts at the Norwegian National Opera & Ballet, the Oscarsborg Opera, and a number of regional operas. Gillebo is also educated as a theologian, and has worked as a priest in Oslo Cathedral. He wrote his Master’s thesis on how music affects thinking and language. He has a PhD from the Norwegian Academy of Music, where he wrote about singing, ethics, and politics with the project To Sing Reality, focusing on Bach’s Christmas Oratorio, Mozart’s Cosi fan tutte, and Mahler’s Kindertotenlieder.
Photo: Elina Albach: N. Navaee
