"astonishingly high standards of choral singing ... excellent
performances and the organ contributions by Robert Quinney are all
splendid ... Enthusiastically recommended ..."
Musicweb International
MusicWeb International
This most enterprising disc contains twenty carols by living composers.
As you might expect from the list of composers, some of the pieces are
challenging to the listener but all are accessible. In my view, with one
exception, they all refresh and renew the great Western tradition of
Christmas music.
Six of the pieces were commissioned by the BBC and a further four were
commissioned for Stephen Cleobury’s "other choir" at King’s College
Cambridge. Signum claim that there are no less than eight premier
recordings here. Actually, I’m sorry to be pedantic but that’s not quite
right. The John Harbison carol has been recorded before, of which more in
a moment.
The BBC Singers have a formidable reputation for versatility and
astonishingly high standards of choral singing. Everything on this
programme both lives up to and enhances this reputation. Stephen Cleobury
directs excellent performances and the organ contributions by Robert
Quinney are all splendid. Incidentally, though it’s not made clear in the
documentation, I assume that it’s the tracks with organ accompaniment that
were recorded at the Temple Church. The recorded sound from both venues is
first class.
Although the programme consists of twentieth century music it is all
perfectly accessible but without any question of dumbing down. It’s fair
to say that the concluding items by Howard Goodall and John Harle are
lighter in mood and tone but that’s not unwelcome after an otherwise
serious recital. Goodall’s piece is delightfully open-hearted. As it says
in the succinct notes he "turns Renaissance Spanish sacred words into a
choral rumba" and hugely enjoyable it is. The Harle is a harmless and
rather witty piece of seasonal fun. I should warn listeners, however, that
my review copy had an (invisible) flaw and after around 1’30"was
unplayable on two of the three CD players on which I tried it – bizarrely,
it worked best in my car!
I was most impressed with the performance of Judith Weir’s very
imaginative Illuminare, Jerusalem. I remember hearing the first
performance of this a good few years ago from the King’s College Festival
of Nine Lessons and Carols. I didn’t understand it then but with more
familiarity I’ve come to regard it very highly. I’d go so far as to say
this is the finest performance I’ve heard of it. The precision and clarity
that the BBC Singers bring to the piece is tremendous. This expertly sung
and expertly balanced reading brings out Weir’s startlingly original
harmonies and use of rhythm.
Judith Bingham’s The Shepherd’s Gift was new to me. It’s very
impressive. The music is haunting and pensive at first but later, as the
Incarnation is revealed, the setting has power before relapsing into
quietude again. There’s also a fascinating, independent organ part. I also
enjoyed very much Bo Holten’s splendid and very beautiful tapestry of
interwoven English medieval texts, which introduces at one point the
traditional melody of the Coventry Carol. I wasn’t at all sure what to
expect from Steve Martland’s settings. In the event I found them very
accessible and very satisfying. The first of them, From lands that see the
sun arise, moves forward smoothly but purposefully in compound time. The
second, Make we joy, features buoyant dancing rhythms and is as effective
a response to the traditional text as the well-known setting by Walton.
Finally There is no Rose of such virtue alternates serene, chaste music
with more energetic episodes in an unexpected and successful combination.
Other successes are the carol by Carl Rütti in which the Swiss composer
takes a traditional melody and develops it enterprisingly. The American,
Conrad Susa, employs a text used by Vaughan Williams in Hodie and gives it
an innocent, joyful treatment, of which a splendidly exuberant organ
accompaniment is an integral part. When, by the way, is someone going to
give us a recording of Susa’s inventive and enjoyable A Christmas Garland?
I’ve already mentioned in passing the piece by another American
composer, John Harbison. This is his setting of O Magnum Mysterium. I’m
afraid Signum are in error in claiming this as a first recording. The
piece, which dates from 1991, featured on a Koch CD of Harbison’s music,
which I suspect is now deleted (3-7310-2 H1). That recording, made in
1995, was by the Boston-based Emmanuel Music under Craig Smith. Both that
account and this new one are very good, though for me Stephen Cleobury
takes the opening section rather too briskly by comparison with Craig
Smith. The slightly broader speed adopted by Smith, whose account takes
2’53" overall, enables him to emphasis more the devotional, mystical
aspect of the music and text. This is a fine Christmas piece, which I’m
delighted to see, included here.
The items by Thomas Adès, James MacMillan and Peter Maxwell Davies are
each pretty challenging to the listener. Adès employs quite a high degree
of dissonance. MacMillan’s piece, like the Adès another King’s commission,
is yet more demanding. The searing intensity of the opening phrases for
sopranos and tenors, singing at the top of their ranges and fortissimo, is
almost aggressive. Even in the quieter passages the intensity is not
reduced. The spare harmonies impart a real medieval feel, which is most
appropriate. I’d almost describe this as harrowing music, but it’s deeply
impressive. Unfortunately the Maxwell Davies item is the only one for
which the text is not printed, presumably due to copyright issues. This
gave me a problem in that I found it difficult to make out the words –
though the BBC Singers’ diction is generally very good – and so I couldn’t
really understand the piece as I would have wished. It seems quite a dark
piece though there are some chinks of light, as, perhaps, befits the
title.
It wouldn’t be Christmas without a turkey and unfortunately this CD
contains one such in the shape of the offering by Jerzy Kornowicz. I’m
afraid I simply could make neither head nor tail of this. The music is
punctuated (or interrupted) by a female speaker, who may have been
pre-recorded, intoning isolated words. The text doesn’t seem to have any
obvious connection with Christmas either. The BBC Singers do their best
but I wondered why.
However, the inclusion of one dud track should not deter purchasers and
in any case I may be in a minority of one in disliking the Kornowicz
piece. Anyone buying this CD can do so confident in the knowledge that
they will listen to a varied, stimulating and highly original collection
of Christmas music and that every piece is superbly realised by Stephen
Cleobury and his expert choir. Without exception these pieces must make
considerable demands on the performers but the degree of assurance and
expertise on display here is tremendous.
In my opinion the music included here enriches the wonderful tradition
of Western music for Christmas. I enjoyed it greatly and found it to be
one of the most stimulating choral discs to have come my way for a long
while. I hope many collectors will be encouraged to try this collection of
music that refreshes, extends and expands the Christmas music repertoire
while being respectful of the traditions of the genre.
Enthusiastically recommended.
John Quinn
Classical Music - Christmas Crackers
3rd December 2005
It would be easy to assume that Stephen Cleobury's
enthusiasm for contemporary music has been stimulated by his work as
conducor of the ever-adventurous BBC Singers, as evidenced in the
re-release of the Singer's album One Star at Last. But as the new
EMI double CD (On Christmas Day) embracibng 22 years of his
Christmas Eve commissions for the King's College Cambridge Christmas Eve
service makes abundantly clear, Cleobury hardly needed firing up.
"I'm not normally one to react in this way,' he says,
'but when I heard the final edit of On Christmas Day I permitted
myself a tingle of satisfaction. It's been a pet project, a crusade, which
I think may have encouraged others elsewhere in the church to become more
deeply involved in commissioning.'
It was just one year after his arrival at King's in 1982
that Cleobury invited Lennox Burkeley to write a new work, which turned
out to be In Wintertime. Already the idea of an annual commission
was in his head. What appealed was the idea of tradition and novelty
joining hands, a notion stimulated in his days as a Cambridge
undergraduate, when he witnessed a debate between Stockhausen and
Dallapiccola in which the latter expressed the belief that originality
could embrace musical tradition.
'Composers do find the idea of writing for Christmas
especially appealing,' says Cleobury. 'I can think of occasions when
people I've asked have thought first of how busy they are, but then said:
" Well, I guess I can find the time to write a four minute piece for
Christmas."
The list of composers featuread across the
two releases is mind-boggling - from James MacMillan, Peter Sculthorpe and
Alexander Goehr to Bo Halten, Roxanna Panufnik and john Harle. For his
Christmas Eve commissions, Cleobury has been able to call on the talents
of distinguished King's College graduates Thomas Adés, Judith Weir and
George Benjamin. But he says there is no overall grand plan as to who is
commissioned, beyond his having 'a larger list of composers in my head
than I can actually invite. Those I do ask tend to be people I've met or
worked with. Judith Weir's Illuminare Jerusalem, which has proved
so successful, came about after we spoke at a christmas party. I met Giles
Swayne and Harrison Birtwistle while working on Proms performances with
the BBC Singers.'
Six of the numbers on the BBC Singers album were specially
commissioned for it. 'We cast the net as widely as we could,' says the
Singers senior producer, Michael Emery, 'For example, Richard Rodney
Bennett has a fantastic gift for writing exquisite choral miniatures. The
Polish composer Jerzy Kornowicz was suggested by my Radio 3 colleague
Andrew Kurowski, who though Jerzy would come up with somthing new and
different, as indeed he did. His Waiting mixes in pre-recorded
fragments of speech. It's quite unlike any other sort of seasonal choral
piece you'll hear.'
'Howard Goodall and John Harle are both highly experienced
in the field of what's often called "commercial" music. John's Mrs
Beeton's Christmas Plum Pudding is a witty and affectionate tribute to
the musical styles of the 1930s, setting a specially-written poem by
Charlotte Cory adapted from the original Mrs Beeton Christmas pudding
recipe. Again, it combines music and speech. We compressed the recording
heavily and treated it to make it sound like an old 78rpm record!'
What is clear from both albums, however, is that
contemporary composers have over and again looked back in time for
inspiration. both in terms of texts and musical styles. 'I think that
often they seek to draw away from the tinselly, saccharine words of many
modern carols,' says Stephen Cleobury. 'Going back can give a sense of
universality and timelessness.'
Both the releases feature commissions from Judith Bingham
- for King's, God would be Born in Thee. 'I think that one of the
reasons that so many British composers go back in time to find their
Christmas texts is a hankering after the celtic midwinter festival, with
its powerful images of death and rebirth,' she says. 'I wouldn't describe
myself as a non-believer, but I imagine these themes are universal ones
that appeal to everyone.' Working with two very different choirs in
parallel is somthing Cleobury finds highly stimulating and intriguing.
'The BBC Singers of course have the advantages of vocal maturity and
stamina, particularly good sight-reading ability and emotional insight
into a text. But at the same time this kind of ensemble is potentially
made up of soloists, so you need to have regard to the traditional choral
elements of blend and balance, which are second nature as far as the
King's choir is concerned. I've inherited from my predecessors at King's
the tradition of discipline, but with the BBC Singers I've also had my
ears opened to vocal sound and colour.'
