MusicWeb International One of the most grown-up review sites around 2023
Approaching 60,000 reviews
and more.. and still writing ...

Search MusicWeb Here Acte Prealable Polish CDs
 

Presto Music CD retailer
 
Founder: Len Mullenger                                    Editor in Chief:John Quinn             


CD REVIEW

Some items
to consider

new MWI
Current reviews

old MWI
pre-2023 reviews

paid for
advertisements

Acte Prealable Polish recordings

Forgotten Recordings
Forgotten Recordings
All Forgotten Records Reviews

TROUBADISC
Troubadisc Weinberg- TROCD01450

All Troubadisc reviews


FOGHORN Classics

Alexandra-Quartet
Brahms String Quartets

All Foghorn Reviews


All HDTT reviews


Songs to Harp from
the Old and New World


all Nimbus reviews



all tudor reviews


Follow us on Twitter


Editorial Board
MusicWeb International
Founding Editor
   
Rob Barnett
Editor in Chief
John Quinn
Contributing Editor
Ralph Moore
Webmaster
   David Barker
Postmaster
Jonathan Woolf
MusicWeb Founder
   Len Mullenger

alternatively Crotchet   AmazonUK

Arthur WILLS (b. 1926)
Full of Wills!
Te Deum Laudamus (1967) [5:39]
Missa Brevis (1980) [11:03]
Ave Verum corpus (1960) [2:46]
The Carol of King Canute (1967) [1:54]
‘Ely’ (1984) [5:57]
Organ: March – ‘City of Ely’ (1981-1994) [7:42]
There is no rose (1976) [4:03]
Sing a new song (1964) [2:09]
Evening Canticles (1968) [6:45]
‘Caedmon’ (1985) [24:09]
The boys of Ely Cathedral Choir/Paul Trepte
Jonathan Lilley (organ; piano)
rec. Ely Cathedral, 1-3 May 2007
GUILD GMCD7315 [72:53]


I used to have one-to-one harmony and counterpoint lessons with Arthur Wills as part of the baffling B.Mus. degree course at the Royal Academy of Music. I had already perfected a sphinx-like inscrutability in order to conceal my ignorance during other lectures, but there was nowhere to hide in Dr. Wills’ tiny room in the rear annex, and while I enjoyed discovering all about retrograde inversions and melodic augmentation I fear the severe averageness of my academic talents were all to obvious to my grand tutor. Arthur was in fact very kind to me, accepting me onto that high-powered course with no real evidence of any brilliance on my part, and giving me the benefit of the doubt after I had initially been accepted onto the Performer’s Course – which at the time seemed to require no discernable academic talent or motivation whatsoever. The benefit to me was that when I was kicked off a year later I was miles ahead of my poor colleagues on the in-between degree course of the GRSM; my sphinx-like inscrutability no longer such a necessary survival tool when told ‘not to answer that question, he’s already done it last year.’
 
Needless to say, the works on this CD are beautifully crafted in every way. They mostly share the kind of gentle English music world of someone like Herbert Howells, and with Wills’ directorship of music at Ely Cathedral from 1958 to 1990 these pieces are heard in their ideal setting, and with the accompaniment of an organ which the composer knows as well as his own doormat. The organ receives one impressive solo, the ‘City of Ely’ march, originally part of a symphonic work for brass band and organ.
 
The choral works are accompanied by piano or organ, the piano giving an entirely different colour and idiom to the music. Take the opening of ‘Caedmon’, the Children’s Cantata which concludes the programme, which has more of the impact of something by Benjamin Britten; at times even that of Carl Orff in the dark meanderings of Nr.6. The boys’ voices in this recording invite such comparisons, but both composers know how to create realistic and attractive but at the same time challenging repertoire for young voices. There is plenty of rhythmic fun, and unison writing which gives the piece an inclusive quality. It is certainly the kind of work which would do well in a variety of settings, from village concert to international competition.
 
There is a great deal of variety to be found here, and a very wide time-span. The earliest of the pieces, Ave Verum corpus, has a quiet sensibility which owes a little to the Agnus Dei in Duruflé’s Requiem. Pieces such as the Te Deum Laudamus are of practical use during church or chapel services, adding pungent harmonic qualities to an environment where the music might be expected to have more bland conformity. The Missa Brevis is one of the more recent works on the disc, having been written at speed for a celebration concert of the Auckland Boys’ Choir. Despite its brevity, it has some emotionally charged movements, such as the dramatic Gloria, a touching solo for the Lord’s Prayer, and a valedictory Agnus Dei.
 
This is a nicely presented CD with full texts included and notes on each piece by the composer. Like the previous Guild release of Arthur Wills’ organ music, called Wondrous Machine! I am however less than enthusiastic about twee titles like Full of Wills!, or indeed any title ending in an exclamation mark. It’s a choice one can make, but to me it has a feeling of misplaced modesty about music which can hold its own in almost any surroundings – Darmstadt excepted perhaps, but my work would be eaten alive there as well. The only weakness on this release is the quality of the voices. Young voices have a naturally vulnerable feel, and this is part of their attraction. There are many very nice moments in these pieces, and the choir does well for the most part, but don’t expect quite the same standard as King’s College Cambridge. Like the scruffy bunch pictured on the back of the booklet, they exude enthusiasm, enter fully into the spirit of the music and have clearly worked up a fine sense of ensemble and phrasing. If they lack the last ounce of refinement, then I would still have to compliment them on such results with a relatively compact group of 22 voices. Such an addition to the UK’s rich contemporary choral tradition is to be warmly welcomed, and I commend it to fans of fine church music everywhere.
 
Dominy Clements                                 
 



 


Advertising on
Musicweb


Donate and keep us afloat

 

New Releases

Naxos Classical
All Naxos reviews

Hyperion recordings
All Hyperion reviews

Foghorn recordings
All Foghorn reviews

Troubadisc recordings
All Troubadisc reviews



all Bridge reviews


all cpo reviews

Divine Art recordings
Click to see New Releases
Get 10% off using code musicweb10
All Divine Art reviews


All Eloquence reviews

Lyrita recordings
All Lyrita Reviews

 

Wyastone New Releases
Obtain 10% discount

Subscribe to our free weekly review listing

 

 


EXPLORE MUSICWEB INTERNATIONAL

Making a Donation to MusicWeb

Writing CD reviews for MWI

About MWI
Who we are, where we have come from and how we do it.

Site Map

How to find a review

How to find articles on MusicWeb
Listed in date order

Review Indexes
   By Label
      Select a label and all reviews are listed in Catalogue order
   By Masterwork
            Links from composer names (eg Sibelius) are to resource pages with links to the review indexes for the individual works as well as other resources.

Themed Review pages

Jazz reviews

 

Discographies
   Composer
      Composer surveys
   National
      Unique to MusicWeb -
a comprehensive listing of all LP and CD recordings of given works
.
Prepared by Michael Herman

The Collector’s Guide to Gramophone Company Record Labels 1898 - 1925
Howard Friedman

Book Reviews

Complete Books
We have a number of out of print complete books on-line

Interviews
With Composers, Conductors, Singers, Instumentalists and others
Includes those on the Seen and Heard site

Nostalgia

Nostalgia CD reviews

Records Of The Year
Each reviewer is given the opportunity to select the best of the releases

Monthly Best Buys
Recordings of the Month and Bargains of the Month

Comment
Arthur Butterworth Writes

An occasional column

Phil Scowcroft's Garlands
British Light Music articles

Classical blogs
A listing of Classical Music Blogs external to MusicWeb International

Reviewers Logs
What they have been listening to for pleasure

Announcements

 

Community
Bulletin Board

Give your opinions or seek answers

Reviewers
Past and present

Helpers invited!

Resources
How Did I Miss That?

Currently suspended but there are a lot there with sound clips


Composer Resources

British Composers

British Light Music Composers

Other composers

Film Music (Archive)
Film Music on the Web (Closed in December 2006)

Programme Notes
For concert organizers

External sites
British Music Society
The BBC Proms
Orchestra Sites
Recording Companies & Retailers
Online Music
Agents & Marketing
Publishers
Other links
Newsgroups
Web News sites etc

PotPourri
A pot-pourri of articles

MW Listening Room
MW Office

Advice to Windows Vista users  
Questionnaire    
Site History  
What they say about us
What we say about us!
Where to get help on the Internet
CD orders By Special Request
Graphics archive
Currency Converter
Dictionary
Magazines
Newsfeed  
Web Ring
Translation Service

Rules for potential reviewers :-)
Do Not Go Here!
April Fools




Return to Review Index

Untitled Document


Reviews from previous months
Join the mailing list and receive a hyperlinked weekly update on the discs reviewed. details
We welcome feedback on our reviews. Please use the Bulletin Board
Please paste in the first line of your comments the URL of the review to which you refer.