BUDE Choral Society performed Mendelssohn’s ‘St Paul’ oratorio at St Michael and All Angels Church, Bude, to a very appreciative audience recently.

Felix Mendelssohn’s often-neglected oratorio, ‘St Paul’, is full of spine-tingling choruses and moments of serenity and beautiful melody.

Written over 100 years after Bach’s Great Passions, ‘St Paul’ follows a similar structure of recitatives and arias, chorales and grand choruses. This demands a chorus that shows tremendous stamina and dynamic range and a quartet of soloists that can deliver resonance and clear annunciation.

The choir coped with the great demands that were placed on them that are both physically and musically taxing. The choruses ‘Rise Up! Arise’ and the final ‘Not Only Unto Him’ are particularly demanding and the choir, particularly the sopranos, showed their ability to sustain their ensemble throughout.

The men were particularly effective in ‘Stone him to death!’, sung with real malice, and a particular highlight was the delightful soft singing by the altos in ‘How Lovely are the Messengers’.

Cornish soprano, Cheryl Rosevear, was particularly impressive as she occupied the central narrative role — similar to the Evangelist in the Bach Passions.

She showed immense stage presence and authority with clear diction, excelling in the aria ‘I will sing of Thy great mercies’.

The impressive St Paul was sung with gravitas by the bass Darren Jeffery, whose commanding presence and wonderfully sonorous tone thrilled the audience.

South African tenor Arthur Swan shared the narrative role and showed a warmth of tone, particularly displayed in the tenor/bass duet, ‘Now we are ambassadors’.

Contralto Paula Quigley stepped out from the choir to sing the thoughtful ‘But the Lord is mindful of His own’ with great sincerity. Conductor John Hobbs’ long-established operatic experience led to a performance that had a real sense of direction rather than just a sequence of choruses and arias.

Nicholas Danks’ sympathetic organ accompaniment was full of energy and the choir is indeed fortunate in having a musician of his pedigree at their disposal.

This performance was dedicated to the memory of Philip Uglow, who sang with the society for ten years and who sadly passed away earlier this year.

A collection was taken for his two chosen charities — The Brain Tumour Society and Children’s Hospice South West.