In 1846, the premiere of Elijah featured a choir of 271 and ten soloists. With only just over a third of this number, Waverley Singers nevertheless delivered an utterly convincing performance as part of their 70th anniversary season - a testament to their enthusiasm, dedication and stamina.

Any choir of this size will struggle to balance against a full symphony orchestra in the relatively compact space of St Andrew’s Church - even Mendelssohn himself had to place his choir in front of the instrumentalists.

However, Waverley Singers responded with tip-top choral blend, singing with evident joy and purpose, their words reaching right to the back of the church. This really excellent choir’s discipline and dexterity during louder sections more than made up for the very occasional lapse in intonation elsewhere.

The team of four excellent soloists would have graced any international opera stage, each presenting several dramatic personae, even the warm yet commanding voice of Andrew Rupp in the title role retreating into the ensemble for the final quartet. This required great flexibility, most notably from tenor Harun Tekin, whose biting outrage as Ahab contrasted so effectively with his otherwise devout, legato music.

Also consistently impressive was the burnished bronze of Julia Merino’s mezzo, though her characterisation was not always quite as effective. However, the highlight was the peerlessly radiant, impassioned singing of last minute replacement soprano Hannah McKay, who sang almost entirely from memory, wielding her musical score more as a theatrical prop than as a source of reference. A name to watch.

One of the central themes of Elijah is that great power can reside in “a still small voice”. For evidence of this, one need look no further than Richard Pearce’s calmly authoritative conducting, drawing out another strong performance with his sensitively accommodating and engagingly encouraging direction.

Roy Rashbrook