Recordings review April to June 2012

It has been a long time since phantomchoralsnake performed his blogging duties, so apologies for the delay (holidays, a generally busy schedule and all sorts of other feeble excuses). It will soon be time for the next quarterly review of recordings, but here's the batch worth checking out from Gramophone Magazine reviews between April and June this year.

To tell you the truth April wasn't actually that exciting so I've chosen one recording from May and two from June to make up for it.

May:
Vasks Plainscapes performed by the Latvian Radio Choir on Ondine. This is a marvellous selection of Vasks' a capella output written from 1978 to 2008. You should know by now how much I love Baltic music in general, but this recording is sublime, shimmering, spiritual, soothing, soaring and a bucketload of other s's big enough to keep any snake happy.

June:
Schnittke Penitential Psalms performed by the SWR Vokalensemble, Stuttgart (no, I'd never heard of them before either) on Hanssler Classic. Written in 1988 to mark the 1,000 year anniversary of Russia's Christianisation this is an interesting take on Russian Orthodox and Gregorian chant traditions. If you know some of Schnittke's more radical works, and you're worrying that this might be equally difficult to approach (although personally I like some of Schnittke's way out stuff quite a lot), don't panic, as this is very accessible, but with an interesting edge to it.

Chilcott Requiem performed by the Wells Cathedral Choir on Hyperion. Something firmly smack bang in the middle of the British choral tradition for those of you who feel more comfortable with that sort of thing. The music is mostly gentle and reflective in tone (no Verdian hystrionics here, more of a Faure Requiem part II) and this popular British contemporary composer has managed to come up with enough innovation and original input to distinguish his Requiem from its many predecessors and make repeated listening an enticing prospect.

That's it for now. Back again soon, I promise.

A brief history of the Passion Oratorio.

As early as the 4^th Century the story of Jesus’ death was being recited dramatically and partially sung during Holy Week services. By the Middle Ages a number of conventions had been established (the Evangelist was sung by a tenor, and Christ by a baritone or bass with one voice per part in choruses where these existed).

Gradually composers developed the structure of the Passion Oratorio based on these conventions, reaching a peak of musicality and popularity during the Baroque period. Johann Sebastian Bach took the levels of drama and emotional intensity several steps further than his immediate predecessors such as Schutz by incorporating a complex and blatantly operatic style in his three Passion Oratorios. Following this peak, however, the Passion Oratorio fell out of fashion. Even Bach’s greatest choral work, the St. Matthew Passion sank into obscurity until it was resurrected by Felix Mendelssohn in 1829.

Even with the re-acceptance of Bach very few 19^th century composers felt inclined to follow his example. One of the few who did use Bach as an inspiration for writing his own Passion Oratorio was Carl Loewe. This work, written in 1847, has rarely been performed and it failed to spark a resurgence but it remains a powerful and moving rendition of the Easter story. The U.K. premiere of Loewe’s Passion Oratorio will actually take place on 31^st March this year (next Saturday) in Oxford Town Hall in a performance by Oxford Harmonic Society.

The 20^th century saw an improvement in the fortune of the Passion Oratorio as composers such as Penderecki with his St. Luke Passion brought a strong national flavour into the mix. This trend has continued into the current century with an increasing number of contemporary composers such as Gubaidulina and Golijov producing an eclectic mix of sounds fusing traditional classical styles with folk and a variety of other elements. The future of the Passion Oratorio looks bright indeed.

Recordings review Jan to Mar 2012

I've got a trio of budget bargains for you this time round, all from Naxos:

January: Janocek Glagolitic Mass Warsaw Phil. / Antonio Wit. Up there with the best recordings of this choral masterpiece, so if you haven't already got a recording of this work go out and buy this one now.
February: Pott In the heart of things Commotio / Matthew Berry. Local choir Commotio strut their a capella stuff with a selection of works by contemporary (and relatively local) composer Francis Pott. Sublimely and spiritually luminous but not in a faffy way.
March: Brahms Choral works (incl. Ave Maria, Begrabnisgesang, Schicksalslied etc.) Warsaw Phil. / Antonio Wit (again). Mr. Wit was obviously having a highly productive period in the recording studios recently. This recording covers virtually all of Brahms' worthwhile choral work ouside of his German Requiem, and it's another cracker.

So, after saving you loads of dosh with those three bargains I reckon you're allowed to slip another recording into your shopping basket. Also featuring in the February edition of Gramaphone magazine was Tuur's Arkamine with the Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir / Sinfonietta Riga / Daniel Reuss on Ondine. You should know by now that Baltic music generally hits all of the right buttons for me, and the EPCC are one of my favourite choirs, so I could hardly pass this one by. Lots of moments of sublime beauty with plenty of bite inbetween.

More recordings worth having a listen to in three months time, just before I trundle off to Mongolia for a holiday. Perhaps I'll find some interesting vocal music out there on the steppes. You never know.

Ten classical music festivals within an hour's drive from Oxford (or so)

Before I get onto festivals I'd better wish you a belated Happy New Year (well it is still January, just), and tell you the answer to the quesion in my mini Christmas quiz. The Welsh Rhapsody writing English composer was Sir Edward German. Simples!

Here come the festivals in chronological order:

Winchester Chamber Music Festival - 19th to 22nd April
Chipping Campden Festival - 6th to 19th May
Salisbury International Arts Festival - 25th May to 19th June
English Music Festival - 1st to 5th June
Garsington Opera at Wormsley - 2nd June to 3rd July
Longborough Festival Opera - 9th June to 29th July
Cheltenham Music Festival - 4th to 15th July
Oxford Philomusica Piano Festival - 29th July to 5th August
Oxford Chamber Music Festival - usually late September, dates TBA
Oxford Lieder Festival - 12th to 27th October

You can hear a wonderful range of music at all of these, but I'd like to highlight one of the less obvious ones, namely the English Music Festival. It takes place in Dorchester Abbey and other venues near, but not actually in, Oxford, which means that the less adventurous souls living in Oxford are prone to giving it a miss. Also it's just English composers, so it's tempting to think that might be a bit limited. Have a look at this year's programme though and you might change your mind. It's an amazing mix of well known works along with rarely performed pieces. This year the unmissable concert from my viewpoint is at 7.30pm in Dorchester Abbey on Saturday 2nd June when the Joyful Company of Singers perform 19 short works by 16 different composers including Britten, Finzi, Vaughan Williams and Tippett. Don't blame me if you miss it.

Santa's jingling his bells!

Okay, this is definitely the last post before 2012.

I'm sure you're well aware it's no accident that Santa is an anagram of Satan, and if you play the original recording of 'Jingle Bells' backwards you hear the message "buy lots of unnecessary gifts for your friends and family this Christmas", but how can you break away from the over commercialised travesty that Christmas has become without becoming a po-faced prig or party bore? It's simple, just follow these two steps in the phantomchoralsnake guide to having an enjoyable and meaningful Christmas.
(1) Take part in this extremely short music quiz to get your brain active again after all of that boozing / eating / snoozing / TV watching (please delete as appropriate). There's only one question with a single word as the answer, no prizes and no answer until my next New Year post. Ready?
(Q) Sir Edward _______ was an English composer who wrote a Welsh Rhapsody in 1904, which has been recorded by the National Symphony Orchestra of Ireland and the Royal Scottish National Orchestra amongst others. What is the missing surname? If you really need another clue think about the theme plus a well established post lunch Christmas Day tradition which might help you out a bit.

(2) Talking of Christmas lunch, why not help some of the less well off members of the local community to eat well over Christmas, and all year round? Visit the Oxford Food Bank website and give them a donation towards distributing excess food from supermarkets and other food suppliers to over 30 charities who help feed the needy. Believe it or not, for every £1 you donate they deliver £25 worth of produce around the Oxford area! Amazing to think that a donation of just £14.60 now would result in £1 of food being distributed every single day in 2012!!! It's all run by volunteers (feel free to offer your help) and that food would otherwise just be dumped as waste. The criminal thing is that despite all of their efforts there is 10 times that amount or more still being dumped unnecessarily. All it needs is more donations and volunteers to change Oxford to a zero food waste area - now wouldn't that be a Christmas present well worth giving? So what are you waiting for?????

Enough of the preachy, touchy - feely, emotional stuff. I'm off for Christmas, and I know I'm going to enjoy my presents, grub and even the odd bit of booze. Just remember that useful biblical phrase though if it all starts getting a bit out of hand - "get thee behind me Santa!"