Release Date: 04 January 2000
Label: Naxos - Ex Select Products / Naxos Classics
Packaging Type: Jewel Case
No of Units: 1
Barcode: 636943479124
Genres: Classical
Composer/Series: BRITTEN
Description
Benjamin Britten(1913-1976)Choral WorksBenjamin Britten could occasionally be disparaging about pre-twentiethcentury orchestral and operatic composition in the British Isles, but he alwaysmade a careful exception where choral music was concerned. In opera he regardedit as a life's ambition to establish a genre largely missing from his nativecountry, but in the choral sphere he chose instead to work within a tradition,one for which he had the deepest knowledge and respect.Nonetheless, no tradition touched by Britten's towering musicalimagination could fail to be renewed and revitalised, and he left behind acorpus of work which has already embedded itself deeply into the choral andliturgical culture of all Anglophone countries. Choral music, he acknowledged,formed the very bedrock of British musical life in centuries past, frommadrigal groups to cathedral choirs, from small professional groups to largeamateur choral societies. The selection on this disc has been chosen torepresent the breadth and imagination of his musical genius in choral music.The first work, Rejoice in the Lamb, was commissioned in 1943 byan indefatigable champion of new music for the Anglican church, the ReverendWalter Hussey, in celebration of the 50th Anniversary of his church, StMatthew's, Northampton. Britten chose to set the then recently-published'Jubilate Agno', written by Christopher Smart in the mid-eighteenth centuryfrom his eyrie in a lunatic asylum. Even by Britten's own standards it was adaring choice which few could bring off with such dazzling aplomb.This endearingly eccentric poem explores the wonder of creation from avariety of unusual perspectives - a pre-echo of contemporary magical realism -and allow, Britten a virtuoso display of word settings. A lyrical tenor solosees the wonder of God in flowers; in a plaintive treble solo the poetconsiders his cat Jeoffrey, whose morning worship consists of 'wreathing his body seven times round withelegant quickness'. In its many-faceted exploration of the wonder of God'screation, the work celebrates music's power to heal, its restorative innocenceand its capacity to bring unalloyed delight. His contemporaries may havedismissed Smart as insane, it seems to say, but there is a fundamental truthand sanity which we can all access through our childlike selves. The musicitself is possessed of radiant wit and childlike simplicity but is never lessthan thrilling, especially in the glorious catalogue of musical instrumentswhich makes up the climax to the work.The Te Deum in C was written in 1934 for the choir of St Mark'sin London's North Audley Street, and was among the composer's very first to beaccepted for publication - albeit by Oxford University Press rather thanBritten's later publishers Boosey & Hawkes. It is in one sense at leastremarkably daring: in the opening pages it adheres steadfastly to a chord of Cmajor in the choral parts, and builds its musical interest without traditionaluse of harmonic progression, but by us
Tracklisting
Dariia Lytvishko
Baltimore Symphony Orchestra; Marin Alsop
Alice Di Piazza; Basel Sinfonietta; NDR Bigband; Titus Engel
Anna Alas i Jove; Miquel Villalba
David Childs; Black Dyke Band; Nicholas Childs
Various
Various
Lully
