Echo Vocal Ensemble, Latto, Union Chapel review - eclectic choral programme garlanded with dance

Echo Vocal Ensemble have their genesis in Genesis. Sarah Latto’s group were initially formed by a cohort of the Genesis Sixteen young artists’ programme – and she has turned them into one of the most innovative vocal groups around. The programme at Union Chapel on Sunday night was a good example of their approach, with eclectic repertoire, new commissions, improvisation, a smattering of classics – and a loose-limbed dancer adding a visual element.

The conceit of the programme was the progression from dusk to night. We started at 6pm, to catch the last light of the day, and ending with the windows of the church black. The lighting effects didn’t always help this day-to-night narrative, the slightly over-egged effects sometimes making things brighter against the prevailing darkening. But aside from this, the possibilities of the Union Chapel, with its excellent acoustic, were explored imaginatively, the opening items presented from the back of the church, and a sequence in the second half from the gallery.

There was a new commission in each half. Sarah Dacey’s All That We See presented its text, taken from a medieval Arabic scientist, with a suitably wide-eyed sense of discovery. Scattered bits of speech sat within harmony that was reminiscent of Gesualdo (whose O Vos Omnes came earlier), and the equivocal ending was beautifully judged. In the second half, organist and composer Bel Comeau’s Enter the Tumultuous Night combined organ improvisation with choral singing. The spectacular opening organ crescendo explored the full range of the Union Chapel instrument, but when the choir came in, there were moments when the organ overwhelmed. But the final bars, for choir alone, were powerful, and I found the piece enjoyably ambitious. Earlier, Comeau’s playing of Messiaen was equally loud and colourful, but somehow out of keeping with the prevailing tone of the concert.

The stylistic range of the programme was dizzying: from Freddie Crowley’s perfectly judged, disconcertingly gentle solo opening, the traditional Irish The Last Rose of Summer, to some excellent Renaissance polyphony, to some choral improvisation (an Echo speciality) and a poppy Don’t Fly Too Close to the Sun, with stylish singing by Gabriella Liandu and a soulful organ accompaniment, Comeau making the church’s instrument sound like a Wurlitzer.Dancer Jamal Sterrett (pictured above by Gala Kononenko) performed three numbers, his infinite flexibility and grace – there was a fluttering finger thing in the last dance that was like a strobe lighting effect – was hypnotic. Sarah Latto’s (pictured top right) leadership of the group was, like her spoken links, both reassuringly down-to-earth and skybound: her fluid conducting gestures have a weightlessness that lets the singing fly. She was also self-effacing enough to sit back and let the choir, up in the gallery, segue from a captivating group improvisation on Tallis into Laura Mvula’s Sing to the Moon. Although ubiquitous these days, I haven’t heard it done better, Margaret Lingas’s solo floating into the church’s roof.

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