It’s been over six years since Cambridge’s iconic Senate House has been used as a performance space, and its comeback as a venue was long overdue: The Cambridge University Chamber Choir and Collegium Musicum’s special production of Handel’s Acis and Galatea made an overwhelming case for using it far more often. (A repeat was performed in Girton College Great Hall the following evening, staged ‘in the round’ with a more interactive audience set-up.)

Bright and undimmed throughout, the venue’s pale stone and high gallery was filled to near-capacity with an audience looking on as much as down at a production that wore its identity honestly: a CMP concert that was, delightfully, spilling over into the world of Handel’s ‘little opera’.

This blurring of boundaries began before a note was played, with chorus members already seated quietly among the audience near the front. When the Collegium Musicum opened under Margeret Faultless’ (Departing Director of Performance, Faculty of Music) brilliant leadership on first violin, the playing was immediately assured and full of life. The orchestra clearly relished the occasion, and their warmth was immediately reciprocated as I saw (from my seat near the wings) audience faces light up one by one. The shepherds drifted onstage, draped in soft pastels to match the orchestra, to open with ‘Oh the pleasure of the plains’.

“The space was set (in every sense) for the singers to take centre stage”

The tone of the production announced itself gently in these opening lines as warm, assured and unhurried. The acting throughout was pleasingly light-handed (the Cambridge choral instinct charmingly present in most of the cast); though director James Way (Deputy Director of Performance, Faculty of Music), performing as a tenor in the chorus to lead the shepherds from within, brought a little more theatrical charge to keep the production alive and moving. With scores in hand and a single chair the only set to speak of, the space was set (in every sense) for the singers to take centre stage.

Lydia Baldwin’s Galatea was an absolute highlight. Emerging from behind the orchestra, her gorgeous pastel green dress added to the sense that she had stepped straight out of Handel’s imagined pastoral world. Baldwin’s tone floated cleanly through the Senate House, and her first aria ‘Hush ye pretty warbling choirs’ felt like something heard for the first time. Harry Gant as Acis was the perfect complement: the picture of the humble shepherd, his tenor was beautiful and entirely unforced, and his acting quietly compelling in a way that snuck up on you. The two were wonderful together, navigating Handel’s intertwining lines with an instinctive musical ease. Their delight in each other and the music was certainly infectious.

The chorus was impeccably unified, observing the action with watchful stillness from the wings when not singing. A particularly inventive dramaturgical choice saw the role of Damon distributed across three performers – James Way, Tom Baarda, and Myriam Lowe – with Lowe’s aria attributed to the role of Coridon. The decision transformed Damon into something like a Greek chorus figure, a collective narrative voice of the shepherd chorus that added a lighter feel. Way’s delivery of ‘Shepherd, what art thou pursuing’ was particularly enjoyable and charismatic.

“The ending was something to savour”

The orchestra was a constant delight. The recorder players stepped forward on several occasions for wonderfully whimsical exchanges with the singers, engaging in duets as though the instruments themselves had been waiting for a chance to weigh in. A particularly lovely moment caught my attention during Acis’ lament, as Gant sank down to the step in despair and Faultless’ gaze and violin gestured towards him in a small interaction that landed perfectly.

After a short interval, James Gooding’s Polyphemus arrived onstage in a dark Barbour jacket, who I almost mistook for a slightly baffled audience member who had taken a wrong turn – until he opened his mouth, producing a bass voice of real depth and authority that captured the character’s hulking, petulant desire to perfection. His ‘O ruddier than the cherry’ was enormous fun, and his scheming menace throughout gave the production exactly the dramatic weight this pastoral idyll needed.

The ending was something to savour. Polyphemus’ killing of Acis arrived suddenly (before I knew it Gant was simply and startlingly on the floor), and what followed was quietly magical. Audience members rose and placed pastel origami birds/flowers before his body in a slow, tender procession, the mourning chorus continuing above. It was genuinely moving. Then, without warning, Gant rose. A red cloak (death) was shed, replaced with a blue one, and he walked the full length of the Senate House with quiet purpose, transformed into the river of Ovid’s myth, Galatea following behind. No fanfare, no fuss: the Senate House held its breath, and let the music do the rest.