Category: Recordings

In a tribute essay to Kodály in the 1965 Aldeburgh Festival programme Benjamin Britten suggested, ‘There can be no composer of our century who has done more for the musical…

This recent compilation for solo voice, harp and organ is a delightful tour d’horizon of songs referencing the Virgin Mary, with works written by those associated with the French organist-composer…

Known by his contemporaries as ‘El cantor de Maria’, Francisco Guererro (1528-99) was a much-travelled musician and composer whose career bridged the gap between Cristóbal de Morales and Tomás Luis…

This recent Marian-themed disc from the French record label Aparté brings together a trio of works by two composers four centuries apart: a single offering by the Renaissance Clément Janequin…

Signum’s latest release of 21st-century choral music is a hugely rewarding survey of anthems and organ music from living composers, many of whom are graduates of Cambridge University.  With eight…

In its century-spanning traversal of sacred music, this recent issue from Hyperion and the Choir of Westminster Abbey – the last recording from the recently retired Director of Music James…

Composer-pianist Nikolai Medtner (1880-1951) has sometimes been labelled, like his compatriot and friend Sergei Rachmaninov, as being ‘born too late’.  The late-Romantic idiom in which they both wrote, well into…

The English Tenor might seem a rather odd title for a disc which is sung by a tenor who was born in Australia, trained at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music…

A disc of commissions and premieres may seem a bold decision for a record company wishing to maximise on sales potential.  But this is the choir of New College, Oxford,…

During his tragically short life, Peter Warlock – the pen name used by Philip Heseltine (1894-1930) – composed around 119 solo songs, 23 choral works (some unaccompanied and others with…