Musical ambassadors

It’s not every choir rehearsal where first you need to pass a military checkpoint. But this is no ordinary choir.

Paul Linder meets me at the entrance to the Military Academy at rue Hobbema 8, on the edge of the European Quarter in Brussels. We cross the dark courtyard, skirting round the armoured vehicles, up a broad flight of stairs, and there – unexpectedly – is an elegant, high-ceilinged chapel, flooded with light and flanked by white columns edged with gold. And standing at its centre, smiling a welcome, are Claire Vanherenthals and Dirk De Moor, president and conductor of the European Union Choir.

The idea of post-war economic and political cooperation in Europe took root in the 1950s, culminating in the signing of the Treaty of Rome in 1957, which established the European Economic Community of Germany, France, Italy, The Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg. Yet only a year later a parallel cultural cooperation began with the creation of the EEC Choir (as it was then known), drawing together singers from the six founding states. A trio of concerts in late 1958 saw performances from Lassus to Mozart, and the following year the choir began its annual cycle of Bach Passions, alternating the St John and St Matthew, often in the magnificent Cathédrale Sts-Michel-et-Gudule in Brussels.

As the EEC and later the EU expanded, so singers from other countries joined, and the choir now boasts members from over 20 nations. Any British? ‘Deux!’ says De Moor emphatically. ‘You know,’ he leans forward conspiratorially, ‘the British have their own choir with rehearsals in English.’ He shrugs: ‘They like to do their own thing.’ Where have we heard that before? But this aspect of drawing people together from different countries is central for De Moor. The day I attend a rehearsal, a soprano from Norway is auditioned (the choir is open to singers from beyond those working in the European institutions or citizens of member states) and an alto from Croatia is at her first rehearsal. For De Moor, there’s no real difficulty in drawing different national styles together. ‘Music is a universal language,’ he explains, ‘and we are singing a shared European culture.’ That’s true, and if there are minor competing differences in pronunciation (I detect a few variants of Latin in the motets we sing), these are quickly reconciled. Rehearsals are taken in French – bien sûr, as French is the majority spoken language of Brussels and one of its two official languages – yet De Moor is quick to demonstrate the musical effect he wants too. With warmth and skill, he welds his polyglot voices into a united whole.

The choir comprises amateur singers drawn from a host of professions, including diplomat, teacher, translator and student. Because it attracts people who come to work in Brussels for a fixed term, the composition of the choir is always changing ‘Probably between a quarter and a third of singers each year are new,’ Claire Vanherenthals estimates. Yet those that join are committed to rehearsals – the bass next to me had travelled 100km to sing – and to the choir’s success. De Moor is able to hire professional musicians to accompany the choir in concert – previous orchestras have included the National Orchestra of Belgium and the Philharmonic Orchestra of Strasbourg – and while Brussels may be its spiritual home, the choir has sung in a number of renowned concert halls and cathedrals across Europe. Sometimes at short notice: the evening I arrive, Claire Vanherenthals is busy responding to a plea to take the choir to Milan for a concert in a few weeks’ time. Concerts are well attended; an audience of 500-600 is standard, and the popular Christmas concert can pull in up to 2,000 people.

Over the years the choir has performed much of the standard large-scale European repertoire from the last few centuries: Bach, Handel, Vivaldi, Scarlatti and Corelli from the baroque, Mozart and Haydn Masses, The Creation and The Seasons, chubert, Beethoven’s Choral Symphony, through the 19th century with Berlioz, Mendelssohn, Schumann, Brahms, Dvo ?r ák and Bruckner, and into the 20th with Carmina Burana and the Poulenc Gloria. De Moor is (rightly) unapologetic about these choices: ‘We are the musical ambassadors of the European message,’ he says; ‘it is my honour to assist and guide the members of the choir in their great musical journey.’ Yet there have been plenty of diversions en route, with performances of music by Franck, Jongen and the (much) less wellknown Giovanni Paisiello, Michel Corrette and Pieter van Maldere, as well as renaissance motets and opera choruses. In addition, a handful of non-Europeans have made the occasional appearance, including Villa-Lobos, Scriabin and Randall Thomson. The choir has also stretched its repertoire to the present day, performing works by the contemporary Belgian composer Michel Lysight, including his Les chants de Casanova and Anamnèse, a work for choir and strings which warns against a collective forgetting of the past in order to enlighten the future.

Where the opportunity permits, programming embraces as much of Europe as it can – at their last Christmas concert, the choir sang 20 works from 20 different countries, each presented by a member of the choir from that country. The choir also has an unusual connection with one of Europe’s great spectacles, listed on UNESCO’s index of intangible cultural heritage: Le Cadre Noir. Linked historically with the town of Saumur in Maine-et-Loire, the Cadre Noir is a corps of elite French cavalry dating back to the end of the 16th century. Their performances are a magnificent combination of precise equestrian display and music, provided live in Brussels by the EU Choir and orchestra. De Moor likes to build concert programmes that reflect wider European events and history. The recent centenary of the start of the first world war was marked with a performance of Le Chemin des Dames by the Belgian composer Jacques- Alphonse De Zeegant. This symphony for chorus, mezzo-soprano and orchestra is a moving tribute and prayer for the fallen of the 1914-18 war. This year, the 60th anniversary of the signing of the Treaty of Rome, and France’s significant contribution to it, is marked in a programme of French music from the 19th and 20th centuries, with a range of pieces from Fauré’s Cantique to Gounod’s Gallia (Lamentations) and Louis Vierne’s powerful Messe solennelle in C sharp minor for choir and two organs.

Sometimes the choir performs at specific EU events. In 2007 it sang at the celebration to mark the enlargement of the EU to 27 member states, and more recently it performed at a meeting of mayors from major European cities. But De Moor is careful not to overstate the choir’s function as EU ‘house’ choir or its support by the EU: ‘At first, the choir was subsidised by the EU, but that stopped in 1990,’ he explains, adding diplomatically, ‘there are many calls on its resources.’ While the choir has not faced the imminent prospect of closure – as the EU Youth Orchestra did last year – it nevertheless needs to be careful in expenditure, despite financial support from the City of Brussels, the Belgian National Lottery and the Walloon Region. ‘Jacques Delors,’ adds Paul Linder ruefully, ‘he was more interested in sport!’ Despite these strictures, the choir was able to mark its 50th anniversary with a double CD recording of Mendelssohn’s Elijah with the National Orchestra of Belgium. An oratorio by a German composer, inspired by Bach and Handel, premiered in Birmingham, with a soprano solo written for the ‘Swedish nightingale’ Jenny Lind – the work seems an apt choice for this most inclusive of choirs.

‘If that is Europe, then I am part of it!’ De Moor, who has conducted the choir for the last 26 years, quotes these enthusiastic words from an audience member at the close of one concert, as for him they summarise the raison d’être of the EU Choir. ‘I am totally convinced that Europe in essence is a poetic undertaking,’ he says. ‘We aim to reveal this poetry to our audiences through our modest contribution.’ And so he does. In drawing together singers from around the continent (‘We even have a Spanish-Italian couple who met in the choir!’ he says gleefully) and celebrating a shared musical culture, it’s hard not to see the choir as a microcosm of all that is good about the European project. Long may it – and the EU - flourish.