Svenska Kammarkören singing "Stjärnan" by Susanne Rosenberg

What a joy, very special for me to sit and listen to this beautiful concert Sunday 16th of Dec in Christinae church in Göteborg.

Svenska Kammarkören (Swedish Chamber Choir) conducted by Simon Phipps.

A program of christmas songs and as a very special event they performed for the very first time a piece written by Susanne Rosenberg, "Stjärnan" (The star). Susanne is my former teacher from the Royal Academy of Music in Stockholm. I appreciated her piece very much, it was performed with elegance by the choir. It's based on various folk traditions like the old "star-songs" that I have written about in my blogg recently + religious hymns sung in the villages in the old days. Susannes mastery of this art is famous not only in Sweden but abroad. Susanne has a unique knowledge how to create multi-part singing out of the techniques provided in folk music.

Among my top favourites in their concert was Praetorius Det är en ros utsprungen in a beautiful arrangement by J. Sandström.
I favour Susanne's piece because I'm so deeply attached to her music and my long history hearing her artistery in music. Plus I love to hear when choirs perform newly written music in addition to the classical pieces.
I also enjoyed very much hearing Ding dong merrily the sky. Just because Simon Phipps has his background in english choir tradition and he really made something light and extra out of this wellknown song.

Simon Phipps with parts of Svenska Kammarkören.

Svenska kammarkören is one of the top choirs, and they are capable of diverse styles and complicated choir pieces. Hearing them do a piece by Susanne was really interesting. They bring out some deep qualities in her song Stjärnan. Because I'm familiar with folk music I also know what a singer can do if you are trained in the style. I can imagine that there are more to explore for Svenska Kammarkören, especially in the field of rythmical singing, the very small details in how to make the music bounce. What they did now was beautiful, I'm not talking about right or wrong, it's just that there are so many levels to explore.

Karin Ståhl, to the left on the bottom row, sang the beautiful solo-part by the end of Susanne's piece "Stjärnan".

Let's face it, we are in the time of holy madness of christmas concerts.....



I wish you all a very good week! Eva