Quotes

The New York Times

It was through the finely adjusted balances, shadings and vocal colorations that The St. Cecilia Chorus and Orchestra made its mark.…

David Randolph has the knack of getting a huge amateur chorus to sing with the lightness and clarity of a professional group one-fifth its size.

The Mozart was an exquisite highlight, singers and orchestra bathing the music in a radiant glow.

– Robert Sherman

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Mr. Randolph is a sound and experienced conductor, and he understands the traditions of Messiah better than most musicians.

– Harold C. Schonberg

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The St. Cecilia Chorus and Orchestra, under the direction of David Randolph, presented a strong performance of [the Brahms Requiem] in Avery Fisher Hall.

The massive chorus had been very well prepared, and the results were evident in both enunciation and balance.

– Patrick J. Smith

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David Randolph, the conductor, kept the choral texture light in many places, and took brisk tempos when text and music permitted. He varied interestingly by the use of color contrasts.

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Mr. Randolph's Messiah could stand as a good model.

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The Beethoven, despite the cruel strain of its high soprano parts, had a warm, communicative quality.

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The performances were conducted with devotion and authority by David Randolph; one particularly admired the crisp, persuasive playing he summoned from The St. Cecilia Orchestra.

Music Journal

The following weekend brought out the indefatigable Randolph for Bach's Christmas Oratorio. Randolph knows the music so well, as in the case of Messiah, that his cues are perfectly secure, his gestures go beyond tempo and accent to form whole phrases, factors often omitted when conductors perform polyphonic music with instruments and voices.

The St. Cecilia Chorus and Orchestra, so admirably led by maestro Randolph, performed with the precision, musicality and meticulous attention to dynamics and diction that weld such large forces into one responsive instrument.

Asbury Park Press

The cumulative impact of Randolph's emotional involvement with this immense work has been transferred to my spirit. As I write this, the glow of his powerful interpretation still warms me. It is an experience one never really forgets.

– Albert Cohen

Gannett (Westchester) Newspapers

No conductor today can be more intimately familiar with Messiah than Randolph. Randolph's mastery of all this intricacy is, by now, positively humbling.

Newhouse News

With brass and percussion scattered throughout Carnegie Hall … the mere control exerted by the conductor was awesome.

Of infinitely greater importance was the fact that Randolph's insightful conception [of the Berlioz Requiem] was fully realized in a profoundly moving performance that will be treasured long by every member of the attentive and enthusiastic throng that filled every seat in the hall.

– Byron Belt

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David Randolph's St. Cecilia Chorus and Orchestra brought Haydn's profoundly beautiful, moving and exalting St. Cecilia Mass to Carnegie Hall. The dynamic conductor, his splendid chorus and orchestra, paid handsome tribute to their namesake, providing one of the season's most rewarding musical events.

– Byron Belt

The News Tribune

It was in sum a masterfully conceived and conducted Messiah. It may also be the only Messiah which can achieve this level of clarity and impact simultaneously and should be required hearing for any student or lover of this immortal classic.

– Albert H. Cohen

The New York Daily News

One of the best Messiahs undoubtedly is the one conducted by David Randolph.

– Ron Eyer

The New York News World

Not only did Randolph masterfully fuse the orchestral and choral sound into a unified force but he added spiritual dimension to this immortal classic.

– Joan Sealy

New Yorker Staats-Zeitung

Randolph does not conduct the [Mozart] Requiem; he celebrates it.

Mozart's relatively seldom performed C Minor Mass was deeply impressive, thanks to the joyous entrances of the magnificently disciplined chorus, the excellent performance and David Randolph's impressive power.

– Egon Stadelman

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During the holiday week, we got to hear Bach's Christmas Oratorio by The St. Cecilia Chorus and its Orchestra under the leadership of its brilliant musicologist, David Randolph … the audience was swept along by the brilliant sound of the chorus. Under Randolph and his musicians the notes were transformed into life.

The work's beauty was intensified by the inspired guidance of David Randolph. … Randolph finds something new in each of his concerts that he gives with his chorus, his orchestra, and with his first-class soloists.

– Egon Stadelman

The Star-Ledger

If you want to hear Messiah done with a grandeur and style that would please Handel himself, go hear David Randolph conduct. Randolph may know this oratorio better than any conductor. From beginning to end, [the performance] is marked by the magisterial stamp of David Randolph. In a unique way The Messiah is his piece.

There are times that Randolph convinces me that he is some kind of a genius. Few conductors are so free and spontaneous with Handel's highly formal and conventional music, yet at the same time, so faithful to the score and to period practices. Under his direction, [the music] came robustly alive, without the sacrifice of sensitivity and the work's sacred character. It was a pleasure from start to finish.

Some two decades ago, Randolph knocked the critics and musicologists on their ears by restoring to Handel's masterpiece his original chamber orchestration and by training the chorus to sing in authentic Baroque style – clear textures, bright colors, sprightly tempos. His "innovations" later were adopted by many choral directors and are, more or less, "the rule" today.

– Michael Redmond

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During some 20 years of daily reviewing the New York cultural scene, few organizations gave this choral fanatic greater pleasure than did David Randolph's St. Cecilia Chorus and Orchestra.

Randolph's large chorus was beautifully trained, and sang with a secure, warm tone all evening, able to illumine the most gentle passages as well as the grander climaxes. The conductor's sense of style made each of the works a joy, but the Beethoven [Mass in C Major] rose to quite special levels of eloquence, particularly in the radiant, gentle closing Agnus Dei.

Through the years Randolph has mastered orchestral conducting as surely as his long admired choral expertise. The results are almost always musically alive and enjoyable.

– Byron Belt

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David Randolph's was the most compelling performance of the work this listener has ever heard. It was drama, pure and simple … the most exciting and moving Messiah I have heard to date.

– Paul Somers

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Conductors have been known to get old. Even music critics have been reliably reported to age – with more or less grace than conductors, depending. Yet it does appear that Randolph alone has discovered the musical fountain of youth.

Randolph's interpretations retain an inimitable vigor, freshness and punch. One suspects that this conductor has forgotten more repertory than many of his colleagues will ever know.

There's a point in Randolph's interpretation, of course. He evidently conceives of Mozart's Requiem as a dramatic work, and one is inclined to agree with him.

– Michael Redmond