Mass in D Major

Bold, taut and propulsively energetic, Ethel Smyth’s Mass in D Major was famously described by one Archbishop as a work in which “God is not implored but commanded to have mercy”. It’s a piece that catches the essence of Smyth, Britain’s leading female composer of the early 20th century. Premiered in 1893 at the Royal Albert Hall, the Mass helped establish Smyth on the musical map. Through influential friends, Smyth gained a private audience with Queen Victoria at Balmoral, where the composer gave a passionate account of the Mass at the piano—singing and playing all parts herself, to the monarch’s reported delight. It was this powerful advocacy that earned the work its high-profile first performance. Smyth’s approach to faith—essentially dramatic rather than spiritual—sees her tinkering with traditional liturgy, moving the Gloria from the heart of the Mass to supply an unusually triumphant ending. The opening “Kyrie eleison” grows out of low, grumbling darkness in the basses, music feeling its way to solid ground, swelling to a powerful climax before fading away again. The “Credo” that follows is a mercurial sprint through contrasting moods. “Sanctus” and “Benedictus” supply a more lyrical interlude, solo voices coming to the fore, before an impassioned “Agnus Dei”—memories of the opening darkness and doubt resurfacing in the tenor’s anguished pleas—and a blistering final “Gloria” bring the Mass to a rousing conclusion.