Tallis Choral Works
View record and artist detailsRecord and Artist Details
Composer or Director: Thomas Tallis
Label: Argo
Magazine Review Date: 12/1990
Media Format: CD or Download
Media Runtime: 60
Mastering:
DDD
Catalogue Number: 425 199-2ZH
Tracks:
Composition | Artist Credit |
---|---|
Spem in alium |
Thomas Tallis, Composer
King's College Choir, Cambridge Stephen Cleobury, Conductor Thomas Tallis, Composer |
Lamentations of Jeremiah |
Thomas Tallis, Composer
King's College Choir, Cambridge Stephen Cleobury, Conductor Thomas Tallis, Composer |
Videte miraculum |
Thomas Tallis, Composer
King's College Choir, Cambridge Stephen Cleobury, Conductor Thomas Tallis, Composer |
Dum transisset Sabbatum |
Thomas Tallis, Composer
King's College Choir, Cambridge Stephen Cleobury, Conductor Thomas Tallis, Composer |
Honor virtus et potestas |
Thomas Tallis, Composer
King's College Choir, Cambridge Stephen Cleobury, Conductor Thomas Tallis, Composer |
Loquebantur variis linguis |
Thomas Tallis, Composer
King's College Choir, Cambridge Stephen Cleobury, Conductor Thomas Tallis, Composer |
Composer or Director: Thomas Tallis
Label: Argo
Magazine Review Date: 12/1990
Media Format: Cassette
Media Runtime: 0
Mastering:
DDD
Catalogue Number: 425 199-4ZH
Tracks:
Composition | Artist Credit |
---|---|
Spem in alium |
Thomas Tallis, Composer
King's College Choir, Cambridge Stephen Cleobury, Conductor Thomas Tallis, Composer |
Lamentations of Jeremiah |
Thomas Tallis, Composer
King's College Choir, Cambridge Stephen Cleobury, Conductor Thomas Tallis, Composer |
Videte miraculum |
Thomas Tallis, Composer
King's College Choir, Cambridge Stephen Cleobury, Conductor Thomas Tallis, Composer |
Dum transisset Sabbatum |
Thomas Tallis, Composer
King's College Choir, Cambridge Stephen Cleobury, Conductor Thomas Tallis, Composer |
Honor virtus et potestas |
Thomas Tallis, Composer
King's College Choir, Cambridge Stephen Cleobury, Conductor Thomas Tallis, Composer |
Loquebantur variis linguis |
Thomas Tallis, Composer
King's College Choir, Cambridge Stephen Cleobury, Conductor Thomas Tallis, Composer |
Author: mberry
To take part in a performance of the 40-part motet, Spem in alium, is a unique experience and must be a high point in the life of many generations of English singers. Boris Ord with the Cambridge University Music Society, in the late 1930s, started the ball rolling. David Willcocks followed in the 1960s. More recently, in 1986, Peter Phillips and The Tallis Scholars made their breathtaking Gimell recording with its bell-like clarity in Merton College, Oxford, and now there is a whole spate of recordings, dating from the summer of 1989: Andrew Parrott with the Taverner Consort and Choir in St John-at-Hackney in East London (EMI); David Hill in Winchester Cathedral with the Cathedral Choir and the College Quiristers (Hyperion); and finally, this King's recording, also on home ground. Parrott raises the pitch a semitone, and Phillips a whole tone (to A), possibly to make it easier for the ear to follow the movement of the lower parts. Cleobury and Hill keep to the written pitch, in spite of the problems of resonance in both their buildings. The Taverner performance has the distinction and advantage of using a single voice to a part, which clarifies the counterpoint but at the same time lays bare a certain imbalance between the choirs and reveals a hint of strain in some of the men's voices. It seems, however, quite unnecessary to double the bass line with instruments, and it is unlikely that Tallis ever intended this.
Of the four, Hill adopts the slowest tempo, a speed judged essential for the vast cathedral. The impression of remoteness and depth is almost overwhelming and this Winchester performance gains, from such distancing, a quite remarkable spiritual quality. Cleobury opts for a slightly faster tempo than the other three, at the price of a certain loss of definition in the fuller sections. But this is an impassioned and moving account with an immediacy that brings the text of Judith's prayer well to the fore. It is performed with a sure grasp of every detail of Tallis's monumental motet, with an inner understanding, too, perhaps, of the composer's motivation, as suggested in JM's excellent insert note.
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