This release makes a delightful companion to the
disc of Richard Rodney Bennett’s choral music from Signum which
I
reviewed
earlier this year. Unlike that release, this disc is reissued (see
review
of original release) specifically in memory of the composer’s
death; what is marvellous is that it duplicates none of the works on
that disc, and thereby doubles the representation of Bennett’s
choral music in the current catalogues. And like that Signum release,
this reissue comes with full notes, texts and translations where required.
The most remarkable work here is
Sea-change, written for the
Donald Hunt Singers. The opening and closing movements inhabit the same
world as the Vaughan Williams
Three Shakespeare Songs, even setting
some of the same texts (with the addition of an atmospheric tubular
bell); but
The waves come rolling (setting lines from Spenser’s
The Faerie Queen)
is something quite different, a depiction
of a sea storm set almost entirely in choral
Sprechstimme. It
sounds horrendously difficult to perform, but the Cambridge Singers
under John Rutter make it all seem natural and easy, and the results
are stunningly effective. One’s only criticism of this performance
might be that the contributions of the solo voices in
The Bermudas
are rather recessed in a resonant acoustic, with the result that the
words are unclear - even though full texts are given in the booklet.
As evidenced in the last of the songs in
Sea-change, Sir Richard
was never afraid to challenge settings of texts by the most illustrious
of his predecessors, and in
A farewell to arms he set exactly
the same combination of two poems (by Ralph Knevet and George Peele)
that Gerald Finzi had tackled over forty years earlier. But whereas
Finzi wrote his settings for solo voice and string orchestra, Bennett
here employs a full chorus accompanied by a solo cello; and the results
are very different indeed, even where the choral writing has distinct
echoes of Finzi’s gently bruising harmonies. There is no other
recording available of this work, and Sue Dorey brings to the cello
solo all the passion and involvement that is required.
A good-night is one of the songs contributed to Sir Paul McCartney’s
A garland for Linda commissioned in memory of his first wife,
and is familiar from the recording by the Joyful Company of Singers
of the complete collection (
review).
That first recording is disgracefully no longer available, however,
and Rutter and his group are just as effective in their delivery of
this delightful miniature. The words by Francis Quarles (1592-1644)
- although sometimes attributed to Charles I - have been set many times
by other composers from Purcell onwards. Bennett’s treatment sounds
new-minted and fresh, a real challenge to my own favourite setting of
the same words for male choir by the otherwise totally unknown Ieuan
Rees-Davies.
Verses is the earliest work on this disc, written when Bennett
was still regarded as part of the British modernist school. The response
to Donne’s words is sensitive and delicate, with no hint of the
more ‘serious’ music that the composer was writing at the
same time. An alternative recording by the choir of Magdalen College
Oxford is currently available only as part of a four-disc set of English
anthems, so this individual release is self-recommending.
Bennett wrote only one piece of music for liturgical performance, and
his setting of the
Missa brevis perhaps explains why. Although
his response to texts remains as lively as ever, one gets the feeling
that the Latin words did not inspire the same degree of involvement
as the English poets that he set. The results are quite adequate, but
lack the final element of individuality that is found so often in his
other works. Only in the final
Agnus Dei is there found a real
sense of rapture, despite the superb singing of the choir throughout.
The
Five carols are also early works like
Verses written
during Bennett’s ‘twelve-tone’ period, but they are
immediately approachable pieces which have been frequently performed
over the years. Oddly enough there is only one other recording of the
complete set, by Stephen Layton’s Polyphony, but this comes as
part of a carol collection and again it is valuable here to have them
as part of a conspectus of Bennett’s choral music. Once again
Bennett challenges earlier settings - three of these texts were treated
by Britten in his
Ceremony of carols - and comes out triumphantly
from the comparison. The setting of
Sweet was the song is particularly
beautiful.
The pieces
Lullay mine liking and
What sweeter music were
both composed for the Broadstairs Choir conducted by Edward Heath -
yes, the same man who was also Prime Minister of the UK from 1970 to
1974. Whatever may have been his shortcomings as a politician, he was
a consummate musician who took every opportunity to promote classical
music and composers - would that current politicians showed the same
sympathy. One can forgive almost anything for these commissions, both
of which are absolutely beautiful.
Lullay mine liking comes into
competition with the unchallengeable setting by Holst, but Bennett is
nearly as good and the superb solo singing, recessed within the resonant
church, here has the right sense of distance. The setting of
What
sweeter music is more elaborate, but the poem by Herrick is treated
with sensitivity.
The final track is a setting of the poem
Puer nobis by Alice
Meynell (1847-1922) and not a liturgical setting as might be imagined
from the title. It forms a beautifully subdued envoi to this disc.
This is an essential album for all those who love the work of Richard
Rodney Bennett, and should be heard by others too. The singing is as
impeccable as one might expect, even when lamenting the lack of clarity
of diction. The presentation is superlative, and as a record of Bennett’s
works for
a cappella chorus this is a worthy memorial to his
art.
Paul Corfield Godfrey
See review of original release by
Christopher
Thomas
