There Is Sweet Music: Part-songs By Sir Edward Elgar
Proteus Ensemble; Stephen Shellard
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Proteus Ensemble; Stephen Shellard
Description
There Is Sweet Music is the idyllic title of the first AVIE release by the eight-voice Proteus Ensemble and their conductor Stephen Shellard, which surveys a selection of relatively rare part-songs by Sir Edward Elgar.
Elgar maintained his dedication to composing part-songs throughout his life and imbued each of them with an inimitable character. Like the composer's celebrated "Enigma Variations", his part-songs bear an array of inspirations and dedicatees, including his wife Caroline Alice who penned the poem of the album's closer, "O Happy Eyes", shortly after she and Elgar were married. This early work became a companion to the song "Love," written eight years later and also dedicated to Caroline Alice. Elgar turned to famous poets and peers - Lord Byron for "Deep in my soul", Percy Bysshe Shelley for "O wild West Wind!", and Alfred Lord Tennyson whose poem "The Lotos-Eaters" provides the album's title track. English translations of Russian poems lend themselves to "Death on the Hills", "Love's Tempest" and "Serenade". Elgar frequently found inspiration in Italy, where he composed "Angelus', a song dedicated to his close friend Alice Stuart Wortley whom he called "Windflower" and whose spirit is enshrined in his Violin Concerto. Stephen Shellard's Elgarian epiphany began in 1990 when he joined Dr. Donald Hunt's choir at Worcester Cathedral as an Alto Lay Clerk. Dr. Hunt's inspired and devoted expertise in performances of works by Worcester's most famous musical son cast a life-long spell on Stephen that manifests itself in these beautiful performances with his Proteus Ensemble.
'Beautifully recorded in Pershore Abbey under the watchful supervision of producer Andrew Keener, there are splendidly alert and sympathetic performances from the Proteus Ensemble' – Gramophone
Featured on BBC 3's Record Review on 9th November: 'The album is the fruit of Stephen Shellard's long-standing enthusiasm for the music, and part of what is so exciting about it. […] This is definitely not background music.'
Tracklisting
Danbi Um; Juho Pohjonen
Christopher Tyler Nickel, Sarah Jackson
Choir of Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford
Bruce Wolosoff
Charles Owen
Proteus Ensemble; Stephen Shellard
Benjamin Hochman
Apollo's Fire; Jeannette Sorrell
Polina Pastirchak, Anke Vondung, Sungmin Song, Milan Siljanov, Chorwerk Ruhr, Bochumer Symphoniker,
Kammerchor Stuttgart; Barockorchester Stuttgart; Frieder Bernius; Hannah Morrison; Franziska Bobe;
Choralchor der St. Johannis-Kantorei Rostock
Capella Daleminzia, Capella Vocale Waldheim, Rene Michael Roder
Gewandhaus Children's Choir, Frank-Steffen Elster, Gewandhaus Youth Choir, Gewandhaus Choir, Gregor
Aukso - Chamber Orchestra Of The City Of Tychy, Camerata Silesia Katowice City Singers' Ensemble, Marek Mos
Herbert von Karajan; The Philharmonia Orchestra; Berliner Philharmoniker
Soloists, Netherlands Chamber Choir, Orchestra of the 18th Century, Frans Bruggen