Johann Nepomuk Hummel is named a lot for being a pupil of Mozart and Haydn as for his precise music. A virtuoso pianist himself, he wrote a major quantity of piano music however there may be a lot else moreover.
His brief oratorio, Der Durchzug durchs rote Meer (The Crossing of the Purple Sea) is one in every of Hummel’s unpublished works and was thought to be misplaced till 2004, when German conductor and musicologist Hermann Max found it within the British Library, the place it had been lurking for over 100 years, and recorded it in German.
There’s now an opportunity to listen to the work in what might be its first London efficiency when Medici Choir, conductor David Gostick carry out Hummel’s oratorio in a brand new English translation as The Crossing of the Purple Sea on Saturday 5 April 2025 at at Holy Sepulchre London EC1. Medici Choir might be joined by Brandenburg Sinfonia and soloists Luci Briginshaw, Eve McGrath, Patrick Ashcroft and Edwin Kaye in a programme that additionally contains Mozart’s Mass in C minor.
The work is clearly influenced by Handel and Haydn, although the manuscript for the work is undated. it appears seemingly that it dates from the years 1804 to 1816 when Hummel was chief of the orchestra in Esterházy, although he truly acted as kapellmeister although the submit was formally held by Haydn.
Additional info from the choir’s web site, tickets from TicketSource.
