Some time ago I
reviewed another choral collection
by the Choir of Queen’s College, Cambridge
(Flight of Song – GMCD 7213)
which offered a number of fairly recent
British choral works. The present release
under review goes on exploring the British
choral tradition, sacred and profane,
familiar and not-so-familiar, in works
by composers with a lasting association
with the genre, although several works
here will probably be rather unfamiliar.
For example, Vaughan Williams is represented
here by a couple of short works (Heart’s
Music and Valiant-for-truth)
which were new to me. The motet Valiant-for-truth
is yet another off-shoot of Vaughan
Williams’ lifelong concern with Bunyan’s
Pilgrim’s Progress which culminated
with the completion of the ‘morality’
in the early 1950s. RVW’s Three
Choral Hymns were composed for
the Silver Jubilee of the Leith Hill
Festival in 1930. For the occasion,
he also wrote the Hundredth Psalm
for the Lower Division and the fairly
well-known Benedicite.
These are settings of three hymns by
Miles Coverdale (Easter Hymn, Christmas
Hymn and Whitsunday hymn).
More than twenty years later, he will
return to Coverdale’s Christmas Hymn
which he will partly set again in his
Christmas cantata Hodie.
By sheer (or calculated?)
coincidence, settings of the same texts
(albeit in the older spelling) by Brian
Brockless also feature here. Brockless’s
and RVW’s settings are fairly simple
and straightforward, although they nevertheless
challenge the singers’ skills, each
in its own way. So does Brockless’s
fine setting of Campions’s There
is a garden in her face.
Britten has the lion’s
share here with his fine and fairly
popular Festival Te Deum Op.32
(one of his most successful short sacred
works) and the somewhat lesser-known
part-song cycle Five Flower Songs
Op.47. Both get superbly assured
and vivid readings Five Flower
Songs Op.47 is a splendid example
of Britten’s mastery when dealing with
words, displaying a keen understanding
of the words and much technical ingenuity
(particularly so in the cleverly done
The Succession of the Four Sweet
Months, developing into a fairly
complex fugal structure). This beautiful
ends with a rumbustious finale.
Jonathan Harvey has
consistently composed for voices and
has brought some fresh air into the
British choral tradition in which he
was brought up. Come, Holy Ghost,
in which the plainsong hymn Veni
Creator Spiritus is transformed
in many novel ways including aleatoric
techniques, has become a real 20th
Century classic in its own right, in
spite of the many demands it puts on
singers. By comparison, the earlier
setting I love the Lord
is fairly simple, but quite effective
in its own way, too.
Skempton’s choral music
featured generously in Flight of
Song and is further illustrated
here with his Two Poems of Edward
Thomas. As much else in his
output, the music is simple, almost
minimalist at times, but quite effective
in its simplicity and economy of means.
I enjoyed the present
release enormously which, I think, may
be safely recommended both for the unfamiliar
works on offer and for the overall quality
of the singing. Recording and production
are up to Guild’s best standards.
Hubert Culot
see also
review by John Quinn
The Choir of Queen’s College, Cambridge; Samuel
Hayes (organ)a; Matthew Steynor (director),
James Weeks (director)b 