THE Venetian Splendour concert performed by the combined forces of the Yorkshire Bach Choir, Yorkshire Baroque Soloists and the English Cornett and Sackbut Ensemble, conducted by Peter Seymour, was the opening in the eagerly-awaited York Early Music Christmas Festival.

The programme opened with a fine, joyful Monteverdi Deus in adjutorium followed by a nicely judged balance between the alternating tutti and solo sections in Schutz’s Nun Danket Alle Gott. Alto Laura Baldwin was especially engaging.

Samuel Scheidt’s Ach Mein Herzliebes Jesulein opened with the loveliest of cornett imitative duets and a fully satisfying ensemble performance. Also a delight was Gawain Glenton’s melancholic virtuoso solo performance of Giovanni Bovicelli’s Diminutions on Angelus ad pastores. However, Giovanni Gabrieli’s magnificent Jubilate Deo highlighted a fundamental difficulty with this concept of Venetian splendour.

The performance was a full-throttled, energetic one, but it was crying out for spatial separation to reinforce the drama of this antiphonal style.

Peter Seymour did try to address this in the following Magnificat Anima Mea (also Gabrieli) by separating the soloists into two groups and the instrumentalists to the side of the platform. But it didn’t impact and I couldn’t hear the violins.

In Ecclesiis (also Gabrieli) had two lovely solos by Bethany Seymour and Jason Darnell. After a somewhat problematic performance of Michael Praetorius’ Wachet Auf, we were treated to a gutsy, full-bodied performance of Schutz’s Deutches Magnificat. Der engel sprach (also Schutz) was simply delightful, wonderful playing.