Recordings of Frank Martin’s Requiem are not exactly abundant, so this one is very welcome, particularly since this coupling places it in the company of another outstanding choral work of the 20th century that is probably only slightly more frequently performed. There are 70 years between the two pieces but they are linked by a similarly ambiguous attitude to religious faith on the part of composers. Janáček was famously one of those who would have liked to believe but could not; Martin in the Requiem engages in a dramatic dialogue with death.

Martin’s work might indeed be considered, like Verdi’s setting of the text, to be an unstaged opera. It abounds in changes of mood and colour. There is much dramatic questioning given to the soloists, and much earnest entreaty to the choir, with recourse to fugato writing and rigorous counterpoint. It is a work that strikes one as episodic, but the episodes are of such interest that one is compelled to follow the composer on his journey. Much the most episodic section is the Dies irae, which contains some stunning orchestral writing and some disturbingly evocative choral writing, including Sprechstimme. From the Offertorium (which manages to suggest the Britten of the War Requiem while at the same time sounding completely different), the work takes on a more luminous tone. One wonders why the Agnus Dei, for alto solo and organ, superbly rendered here by Ria Bollen, is not in the repertoire of more solo contraltos (or countertenors). Lux aeterna stretches the Viennese sopranos somewhat, but coming at the end of such an incident-filled journey this is of little moment, and the performance of the work as a whole is deeply engaged, alive to the dramatic aspect of the writing and superbly balanced.

Janáček’s Otčenáš, a multi-movement setting of the Lord’s Prayer as a mini-oratorio, presents us with a very different vocabulary, though it shares a certain serenity with the later movements of the Martin Requiem, as well as the ear for orchestral colour that one expects from the composer of the Glagolitic Mass. Heinz Zednik is the tenor soloist, and has exactly the right tone quality for this music, as well as the ability to weave a coherent musical narrative, something that may also be said of the inestimable Leif Segerstam, whose direction makes these works come alive in no uncertain terms.