Vaughan Williams Choral Works
View record and artist detailsRecord and Artist Details
Composer or Director: Ralph Vaughan Williams
Label: Nimbus
Magazine Review Date: 6/1989
Media Format: Cassette
Media Runtime: 0
Mastering:
DDD
Catalogue Number: NC5166
Tracks:
Composition | Artist Credit |
---|---|
(An) Oxford Elegy |
Ralph Vaughan Williams, Composer
Christ Church Cathedral Choir, Oxford English String Orchestra Jack May, Wheel of Fortune Woman Ralph Vaughan Williams, Composer Stephen Darlington, Conductor |
Flos campi |
Ralph Vaughan Williams, Composer
Christ Church Cathedral Choir, Oxford English String Orchestra Ralph Vaughan Williams, Composer Roger Best, Viola Stephen Darlington, Conductor |
Te Deum |
Ralph Vaughan Williams, Composer
Christ Church Cathedral Choir, Oxford English String Orchestra Ralph Vaughan Williams, Composer Stephen Darlington, Conductor |
O clap your hands |
Ralph Vaughan Williams, Composer
Christ Church Cathedral Choir, Oxford English String Orchestra Ralph Vaughan Williams, Composer Stephen Darlington, Conductor |
(The) Old Hundredth Psalm Tune - 'All People that on Earth do Dwell' |
Ralph Vaughan Williams, Composer
Christ Church Cathedral Choir, Oxford English String Orchestra Ralph Vaughan Williams, Composer Stephen Darlington, Conductor |
Composer or Director: Ralph Vaughan Williams
Label: Nimbus
Magazine Review Date: 6/1989
Media Format: CD or Download
Media Runtime: 52
Mastering:
DDD
Catalogue Number: NI5166
Tracks:
Composition | Artist Credit |
---|---|
(An) Oxford Elegy |
Ralph Vaughan Williams, Composer
Christ Church Cathedral Choir, Oxford English String Orchestra Jack May, Wheel of Fortune Woman Ralph Vaughan Williams, Composer Stephen Darlington, Conductor |
Flos campi |
Ralph Vaughan Williams, Composer
Christ Church Cathedral Choir, Oxford English String Orchestra Ralph Vaughan Williams, Composer Roger Best, Viola Stephen Darlington, Conductor |
Te Deum |
Ralph Vaughan Williams, Composer
Christ Church Cathedral Choir, Oxford English String Orchestra Ralph Vaughan Williams, Composer Stephen Darlington, Conductor |
O clap your hands |
Ralph Vaughan Williams, Composer
Christ Church Cathedral Choir, Oxford English String Orchestra Ralph Vaughan Williams, Composer Stephen Darlington, Conductor |
(The) Old Hundredth Psalm Tune - 'All People that on Earth do Dwell' |
Ralph Vaughan Williams, Composer
Christ Church Cathedral Choir, Oxford English String Orchestra Ralph Vaughan Williams, Composer Stephen Darlington, Conductor |
Author:
The narrator on this disc is Jack May, whose robust delivery steers the work well clear of sentimentality. Of course, if you are an ''Archers'' addict as I am, you will think it is Nelson Gabriel who is narrating, but why not, for he is intellectually a cut above most of Ambridge anyway and would appreciate this fusion of music and poetry as much as May obviously does. With the poem's reference to ''the line of festal light in Christ Church hall'', it was appropriate to have Christ Church Cathedral Choir to sing with the English String Orchestra (augmented, of course) under Stephen Darlington. I am not particularly keen on the substitution of boy's voices for women's in this music, but this recording just about gets away with it, as more surprisingly it does in a fine performance of Flos campi where women's voices really ought to be essential to convey its full erotic message. Roger Best is a splendid solo violist and the recording of both works is very satisfactory (although the chorus are rather backward in the Elegy).
The disc is completed by three examples of VW's celebratory church music. O clap your hands and the 1928 Te Deum are given excellent, sturdy performances but the marvellous Coronation setting of The Old Hundredth lacks the full panoply of brass and is taken too fast.'
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