This is not only an
excellent program with a sensible alternation
between older and newer music but one
of the best quality choir recordings
I’ve ever heard both in performance
and recording. Having been a member
of a chorus and having listened to our
own concert recordings, I know how difficult
it is to put together a program with
a varied sound and high quality. That
being said, although Surinach’s canciones
are separate pieces, I would have preferred
to see them grouped together on the
disk rather than intermixed with the
other pieces. True, with a programmable
CD player, we can hear them in any order
desired, but that takes extra effort.
And for those who prefer a mixed-up
program, there is always the "randomize"
button.
St. John of the Cross
was from Avila, Spain, and wrote these
poems in about 1577 while imprisoned
in Toledo by the Church which would
canonize him in 1726. The style of the
poetry is almost hysterical in its hallucinatory
religious imagery suggesting that the
poet was near starvation and in despair
of his life. He remained devout nonetheless.
Surinach at his best
is a superb composer. These "Songs
of the Soul" are among his better
works, and justifiably the album is
named after them. His skill as a conductor
was shown in the first recording, on
MGM label, of Hovhaness’s St. Vartan
Symphony (No. 9), still the best
recording of the work ever made - sound
as well as performance. Surinach, like
Turina, studied in Germany. He eventually
emigrated to the U.S. but remained capable
of brilliant idiomatic writing in the
Spanish style, as here. He has composed
a wide range of music in many styles,
including a frenetic and satirical Piano
Concerto.
The modern pieces tend
to make excessive use of seventh, ninth,
etcetera, chords. Bach and Buxtehude
used such chords, but much more sparingly.
Victoria and the other Renaissance composers
used them more sparingly still, which
I think is closer to ideal.
After the Surinach,
the best pieces on the disk are the
Maclean and the Rütti, both of
which achieve marvelous effects with
broken rhythms and polytonal phrases,
and both of which are fiendishly difficult
to sing. Only the most skilled groups
would dare attempt them. The Maclean
piece sets part of the same text as
the fourth of the Surinach Canciones.
The choir was founded
in 1956 by Ronald Arnatt, then recently
arrived from England. The current director,
Philip Barnes, was also educated in
England and sang in many British cathedral
choirs. While I am aware that choruses
often mispronounce the words they sing
for the sake of optimum vocal tone,
in the finale of this disk with the
chorus chanting over and over "aunque
es de noche" what they are actually
saying is "onk wayz day no chay,"
with broad, fully glided American vowels,
enough to disturb the peace of my Spanish
teacher’s eternal rest. Although they
respected Victoria’s clear Latin vowels
while singing with hushed reverence,
apparently when they sing loud they
automatically go into "Broadway"
American musical mode. Surely singers
as good as these could have done a little
better than that.
Paul Shoemaker
see also review
by Robert Hugill