Sandström “Messiah” can’t hold a candle to Handel

By Jonathan Blumhofer, Boston Classical Review

George Frideric Handel’s Messiah isn’t the only oratorio about the life of Christ: in addition to the Bach Passions, there are, among others, Berlioz’s L’enfance du Christ, Liszt’s Christus, and Richard Danielpour’s The Passion of Yeshua. But until 2009, the Baroque icon was the only one to set a libretto on the subject by Charles Jennens.

That was the year conductor Helmut Rilling led the premiere of Sven-David Sandström’s Messiah at the Oregon Bach Festival. Commissioned to mark the 250th anniversary of Handel’s death, the score received its East Coast premiere Sunday afternoon at Jordan Hall, in a joint concert by the Cantata Singers and New England Philharmonic.

Read the full article at Boston Classical Review.