In this so-called postmodern age (and in the case of Latvian composer Rihards Dubra, a post-Soviet age of religious freedom), the rediscovery of a numinous aesthetic inspired by the Middle Ages and the Renaissance has fuelled the creation of a new wave of tonally based church music, one that has ignited a popularity among choirs not only for its pragmatism but also for its exploration of new techniques and reinterpretations of older precepts (one thinks here especially of Tavener, Pärt and Gabriel Jackson). Simplicity is often central to Dubra’s structural conceptions of pieces such as Oculus non vidit, the luminously tonal Ave Maria III and the more baldy minimalist-conceived Gloria Patri. Much of Dubra’s harmonic world is transparently diatonic, as are many of his progressions, but his most profound effects are often derived from carefully placed moments of chromaticism, ethereal aleatoric passages, mantra-like repetitions, sonorous parallelisms, unusual chordal doublings, striking “sound moments” of rapturous texture (such as the word “Christ” in Hail, Queen of Heaven, by far the most substantial piece in this programme) and closely knit processes of suspension and resolution (take the Kyrie of the Missa de Spiritu Sancto). Dubra’s natural home is a mood of controlled meditation and lyrical clarity as in Felix namque es and the more overtly experimental rhythmical and textural techniques of Stetit Angelus but, at times, a more lively exuberance is evident in Duo Seraphim. This style is well handled by the Choir of Royal Holloway, whose clean-edged sound, under Gough’s sympathetic direction, warms to the generous acoustic of St Alban’s, Holborn.