Harpenden Choral Society Presents Rossini Stabat Mater & Mendelssohn Lauda Sion

Rossini’s Stabat Mater is suffused with lyrical melodies, colourful harmonies, and dramatic moments, delivered by four soloists and the chorus as they unfold the story of the Virgin Mary at the Crucifixion of her son. The subject is indeed sorrowful, but the listener is uplifted by the sincerity and beauty of the music. When it was performed for the first time in 1841, it was an enormous success. It succeeded because Rossini brought to this poem of grief & suffering all his skills as a composer of opera.

Mendelssohn composed Lauda Sion in 1846 for the six-hundredth anniversary of the creation of the Feast of Corpus Christi. Mendelssohn was busy composing his great oratorio Elijah when he received the commission for this work, but he was a workaholic and produced this gem of a composition, full of melody and with the clean classical elegance which is the hallmark of Mendelssohn’s music.