Claims to create ‘a new and fresh perspective’ in the pre-release publicity for this St Matthew Passion are bold. We are led to expect ‘raging choirs, intimate chorales and emotionally…
Author: David Truslove
Rewarding performances from Philippe Herreweghe in three of J.S. Bach’s choral works
Every freshly minted disc from Philippe Herreweghe’s Collegium Vocale Gent prompts a rapturous fanfare. We take for granted the quality of each recording venture from this 74-year-old Belgian, but how…
Lucile Richardot – a class act in Berio To Sing
This recent disc of Luciano Berio’s vocal music showcases the talents of the French mezzo-soprano Lucile Richardot and the vocal and instrumental ensemble Le Cris de Paris. It begins with…
The music of celebrated American organist/choirmaster Gerre Hancock
This recent recording from New York’s Saint Thomas Choir of Men and Boys is an affectionate tribute to the work of Dr. Gerre Hancock (1934-2012). The Texas-born musician was a…
Bartók’s Bluebeard’s Castle, impressively shaped by Susanna Mälkki
According to Oscar Wilde’s 1891 essay The Decay of Lying, ‘Life imitates Art far more than Art imitates Life’. While this is not the occasion to argue with that proposition,…
First class performances from the Choir of St John’s College, Cambridge
This new disc is the second volume of Evening Canticles from the Choir of St John’s College, Cambridge under Andrew Nethsingha. It presents nine settings of the Magnificat and Nunc…
Atmospheric performances from the choir of Trinity College Cambridge enhance the music of Cecilia McDowall
Coinciding with Cecilia McDowall’s 70th year, this recent Hyperion disc crowns an already impressive series of recordings from Dutton Epoch that, with her keen sensitivity to text and grateful melodic…
A new recording of Buxtehude and Schütz from Ensemble Correspondances
More often associated with the French Baroque, Ensemble Correspondances shifts its gaze to 17th-century German music to focus on contrasting Passion settings by Dietrich Buxtehude and Heinrich Schütz. Through its…
Lyric soprano Sandrine Piau takes flight in late-Romantic repertoire
The premise for this new issue from Alpha is supposedly the tension between light and dark, suggested in the French term ‘clair-obscur’, and explored through orchestral songs inclined towards a…
Proud Songsters: a luxury CD from alumni of King’s College, Cambridge
Compiled by nine former choral scholars of King’s College, Cambridge and recorded just before the worldwide pandemic transformed our lives, this anthology is a marvellous century-plus traversal of familiar and…