There are already several fine performances of the C minor Mass in the catalogue, and here is another. This one is very much a concert-style performance, big and dramatic, without much sense of the ecclesiastical about it, not much odour of sanctity. Sir Neville Marriner's tempos tend to extremes: the slow movements rather slow, the fast ones decidedly fast. The dynamic range is large: in the Kyrie I found the soft music almost too hushed if the loud was to be comfortable. The choral contribution is strong and precise, firm and focused in tone, with some splendid singing in the ''Gratias'' and the ''Qui tollis'', a noble account of the fugue (''Cum sancto Spiritu'') that ends the Gloria, its counterpoint vividly put across, and a stirring Credo—the remarkable originality of the music struck me afresh. But I do not much like the way Marriner leads, with a long acceleration, from the Benedictus into the second ''Osanna'', which seems to me in unsure (and unMozartian) taste.
There is an excellent team of soloists, singing together impressively in the ''Quoniam''; clearly Dame Kiri Te Kanawa and Anne Sofie von Otter enjoy their duetting in the ''Domine Deus''. I was a good deal less happy in the ''Et incarnatus'', however, truly the heart of the work: it is taken very slowly and Te Kanawa is distinctly heavy in tone and manner, with excessive vibrato and some moments in the divisions where the intonation is just marginally flawed. Still, this remains a performance of unusual vigour and passion, well played and well sung, and one that fully captures the grandeur of the music.'