Classical Review: Magnificent Choral Concert from the Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir

Belated 90th birthday celebration of Arvo Pärt at the Cathedral Basilica

This past Tuesday (February 10) at the Cathedral Basilica of Saint Louis, the Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir (EPCC) sang a concert dedicated to the music of their compatriot Arvo Pärt (born 1935), in the second stop on their six-city 2026 North American tour. Last year marked Mr. Pärt’s 90^th birthday, as noted by articles in The Guardian and The New York Times. In St. Louis last year, however, nary a peep regarding Mr. Pärt’s music registered from any local ensembles, at least from what I could tell. So this concert marked the region’s one chance in recent times to partake of Mr. Pärt’s music live, courtesy of out-of-town visitors, of course.

Under the direction of their founder (in 1981) and once-again, since 2021, chief conductor Tõnu Kaljuste, this was the program (minus the encore, of which more anon), again all music by Mr. Pärt:

1^st half:

• 7 Magnificat-Antiphonen (1991)

• Missa Syllabica (1977): (a) ‘Kyrie’, (b) ‘Gloria’

• Summa (1977)

• ‘Peace upon you, Jerusalem’ (1977)

• Missa Syllabica: (c) ‘Sanctus’, (d) ‘Agnus Dei’, (e) ‘Ite missa est’

• Magnificat (1989)

2^nd half:

• The Deer’s Cry (2007)

• Nunc dimittis (2001)

• Dopo la vittoria (‘After the victory’; 2006)

• Kanon pokajanen (‘Canon of repentance’): (a) ‘Kontakion’, (b) ‘Ikos’, (c) ‘Prayer after the Canon’

Mr. Pärt is most celebrated for his compositional style known by the term ‘tintinnabuli’, whose basics the NYT article summarizes quite concisely. Core ‘tintinnabuli’ works of his include his instrumental compositions “Für Alina” and “Spiegel im Spiegel”, which in particular have a certain ritualistic and spacious ethos. Yet from the selections in this concert (and past scattered listening to select recordings), his choral music doesn’t seem obviously to follow this ‘tintinnabuli’ style, from piece to piece. Mr. Pärt’s music responds to the text individually, where he is not a prisoner of his musical mannerisms or writes the same piece over and over to different texts, ranging from Latin to Russian, Italian, and even English. Mr. Pärt also deploys forte and fortissimo passages very judiciously in these works, raising the volume only when he feels that he must.

The quality of this concert can be summarized in one phrase: magnificent from beginning to end. The EPCC singers clearly are highly seasoned in this repertoire, evident in their unforced ensemble blend and excellent tone. Likewise, the 73-year old Mr. Kaljuste is very much in the ‘old pro’ style of conducting, not showy at all, with clear and clean gestures to get what he wants. The singers were deployed in two rows, the ladies in the front row and the gentlemen in the back row, with the higher voices in each group (sopranos and tenors) on house left / stage right, and the lower voices (altos and basses) on house right / stage left. Several individual singers had their moments in the spotlight, including sopranos Yena Choi, Marie Roos, and Eleri-Kristel Kuimet, altos Catly Talvik and Annely Leinberg, tenor Danila Frantou, and bass Henry Tiisma. The solo ladies registered with a touch more personality compared to their male counterparts, but that reinforces the point that this is a choir of team players, where the men, for example, don’t act like “primo dons”.

Although the introduction from Cathedral Concerts executive director Scott Kennebeck implied that the EPCC had been to St. Louis before, several of the choir members gazed up at the Basilica Dome as if experiencing the building for the first time, evidently impressed at its scale, or perhaps also a bit gob-smacked by the 7-or-so second reverberation time. The EPCC and Mr. Kaljuste knew to deploy pauses in the music strategically, to mitigate the echo to what extent that they could.

The evening’s one disappointment was that the crowd size was dispiritingly small, just a few hundred, with plenty of empty space in the back and side pews. In fairness, however, those who did show up were very attentive and focused, a case of “quality over quantity”. No errant cell phones went off that I could tell, with the only noticeable additional sounds being the 8 PM and 9 PM chimes while selections were still in progress. Otherwise, the audience silence was very palpable indeed. I didn’t see a request in the program booklet to withhold applause after certain selections, or until particular “sets” of works had been completed. However, the audience held back its applause until the end of each half of the concert, to the great credit of all there. This brings us to the encore, which Mr. Kaljuste very concisely introduced as “a lullaby”, with a pause for effect, “from Greenland”. Given the moral authority of the subtext of these words from a citizen of a country that suffered 40+ years of Soviet totalitarian tyranny, no more need be said.

PS (2/14/26, 10:46 AM): The encore may have been a selection titled “Innarta Anaanaga“.