Music for Remembrance
View record and artist detailsRecord and Artist Details
Composer or Director: Philip Moore, Ralph Vaughan Williams, Herbert Howells, John Tavener, Maurice Duruflé
Genre:
Vocal
Label: Hyperion
Magazine Review Date: 11/2014
Media Format: CD or Download
Media Runtime: 75
Mastering:
DDD
Catalogue Number: CDA68020
Tracks:
Composition | Artist Credit |
---|---|
Requiem |
Maurice Duruflé, Composer
Britten Sinfonia Christine Rice, Mezzo soprano James O'Donnell, Conductor Maurice Duruflé, Composer Robert Quinney, Organ Roderick Williams, Baritone Westminster Abbey Choir |
Lord, thou hast been our Refuge |
Ralph Vaughan Williams, Composer
Britten Sinfonia James O'Donnell, Conductor Ralph Vaughan Williams, Composer Robert Quinney, Organ Westminster Abbey Choir |
(3) Prayers of Dietrich Bonhoeffer |
Philip Moore, Composer
Britten Sinfonia James O'Donnell, Conductor Philip Moore, Composer Robert Quinney, Organ Westminster Abbey Choir |
Take him, earth, for cherishing |
Herbert Howells, Composer
Britten Sinfonia Herbert Howells, Composer James O'Donnell, Conductor Robert Quinney, Organ Westminster Abbey Choir |
The peace that surpasseth understanding |
John Tavener, Composer
Britten Sinfonia James O'Donnell, Conductor John Tavener, Composer Robert Quinney, Organ Westminster Abbey Choir |
Author: Caroline Gill
Loosely connected by commemorations marking the centenary of the First World War and 75th anniversary of the Second, the programme seems a bit of a hotchpotch; and, recorded in two different locations on several different occasions, there is a certain unevenness about the disc as a whole. The choir is at its very best in the unaccompanied works (recorded in the headier environment of St Alban’s Church, Holborn), relishing the rhythmic and harmonic immediacy of Philip Moore’s three unaccompanied Prayers and the lush, luminous textures of Herbert Howells’s moving tribute to President Kennedy.
The spacious acoustic of Westminster Abbey certainly comes to the rescue of Vaughan Williams’s rambling arrangement of the hymn tune St Anne, and it swarms around the ethereal harmonies of Tavener’s powerfully atmospheric setting of words from St Paul, gracefully swallowing up the choir’s extended final syllable to close the disc with a pretty convincing vision of eternity.
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