The Pittsburgh Camerata isn't your usual a cappella choir.
It projected an attitude of earthiness and skepticism as much as spiritual sincerity at its Saturday night concert in Highland Park.
The first half was devoted to classically earthy pleasures and frustrations: drinking, sex, and money. Music director Gayle Clark Kirkwood's program notes helpfully pointed to the amorous symbolism and musical double entendres in Clement Janequin's "Chant des oiseaux." The virtuosity of the singers was impressive in conveying Janequin's interplay of melody and tongue-tripping bird calls.
The great composer Josquin Desprez had a sadder song to tell, reminding a patron of money long overdue. To have had to use a motet to convey this message itself says a lot.
But the most immediately significant piece was Pittsburgh composer Andrew Kohn's setting of "A Drinking Song," by W.B. Yeats. His poignant melody made a perfect match with what is a love-song text. This gifted young composer has no trouble conveying the feeling of time passed and still magical.
The first half concluded with a Brahms song about women interrupting, then joining their men in a drinking get-together. Though there was some tenor strain, "Tafellied" was performed with zest, not the least by pianist Gabriel D'Abruzzo.
Kohn's song was also important because it raised expectations for the second half, which featured the premiere of his extended work, "Four Inscapes." Commissioned by the Pittsburgh Camerata with assistance from the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, Kohn's work did not disappoint. It shows the composer to be a perceptive reader of the poems by Gerard Manley Hopkins.
Kohn's gift for word painting coexists with a fine feeling for apt melodies and harmony. His ability to weave unifying structures with his surface attractiveness made this piece to hear again.
It is good news, therefore, that Kohn's "Four Inscapes" will be on the next Camerata CD. The ensemble's "Christmas Mosaic" CD is a local classic.
Two shorter pieces set the seal on the concert's change in mood. Randall Thompson's "Alleluia" earns its classic status the old fashioned way: It rings true. Then the choir turned to the spiritual "I'm goin' to Sing," with enthusiasm but not affectation.
St. Andrew's Episcopal Church, nestled in a quiet residential area, was a winning site for the concert. A Goth Revival building that opened in 1906, it has fabulous acoustics.
This concert was off the beaten path, conceptually as well as physically. It is part of an alternative classical music thriving in Pittsburgh for those looking for satisfaction beyond the mainstream.
Mark Kanny, a free-lance critic, regularly covers music for the Post-Gazette.