Naxos Releases Rimsky-Korsakov's "Christmas Eve" Opera

 

Naxos Releases Rimsky-Korsakov's "Christmas Eve" Opera

RIMSKY-KORSAKOV, N.A.: Christmas Eve [Opera] (G. Vasiliev, Muzychenko, A. Popov, Shkoza, Tikhomirov, Frankfurt Opera Chorus and Orchestra, Weigle)

Rimsky-Korsakov’s Christmas Eve, based on a short story by Gogol, centres on the love of the blacksmith Vakula for the rich farmer’s daughter Oksana, who mockingly requires him to obtain for her the Tsarina’s shoes in order to win her hand in marriage. However, evil spirits are on the rampage imperiling their love – a witch on her broomstick gathers the stars and the devil steals the moon. Rimsky-Korsakov blends Christian and pagan elements, Ukrainian folk songs and carols, and atmospheric orchestral interludes in this vivacious and fantastical village romance.

https://www.naxos.com/CatalogueDetail/?id=8.660543-44

Vokalgruppen Concert Clemens releases Hugo Distler's Weihnachtseschichte

 

Vokalgruppen Concert Clemens releases Hugo Distler's Weihnachtseschichte

Description off of NAXOS:

Hugo Distler’s exquisite Christmas narrative draws inspiration from German Protestant sacred music of the early Baroque era, particularly the music of Heinrich Schütz. 

Following Schütz’s example, Distler composed his Christmas story exclusively for vocalists – soloists and a 4-8-voiced ensemble. In Distler’s own words, it is described as an ‘Oratorium mit kammermusik-alishem Charakter’ (an oratorio with a chamber music-like character). 

The composition also incorporates sections of the beautiful choral piece "Es ist ein Ros entsprungen," which makes seven appearances throughout the narrative, each time presented in a new harmonic colour. 

Distler’s exquisite Christmas narrative draws inspiration from German Protestant sacred music of the early Baroque era, particularly the music of Heinrich Schütz. 

https://www.naxos.com/CatalogueDetail/?id=6.220684

https://www.concertclemens.dk/english/

Naxos releases Elizabeth Poston "Carols and Anthems" Album by the St. Albans Cathedral Girls Choir and Lay Clerks

 

Naxos releases Elizabeth Poston "Carols and Anthems" Album by the St. Albans Cathedral Girls Choir and Lay Clerks

Elizabeth Poston’s long and distinguished career included significant work for the BBC during the Second World War, where she performed as a respected pianist and later composed scores for numerous radio and television productions. 

Describing herself as ‘a littlemonger’ who never wanted to write big pieces, Poston’s supreme talent for composing vocal and choral miniatures is fully represented in this recording, the first to be dedicated entirely to her work. 

Poston’s music reveals timeless melodic charm, a great sensitivity of word setting and her profound appreciation of ancient folk-song traditions.

https://www.naxos.com/CatalogueDetail/?id=8.574576

Choir of St. John's College, Cambridge Releases Advent Live 3

 

Advent Live Volume 3, Choir of St. John's College, Cambridge is out

Releases Nov. 24, 2023

The third album in our series of live recordings from our Advent Carol Services, including commissions by Cheryl Frances-Hoad and Helen Grime.

Release Nov. 24, 2023

Signum Classics

1. Lo! The desert-depths are stirr’d

2. Advent Calendar

3. Telling

4. There is no rose

5. Herr Christ, der ein’ge Gottes-Sohn, BWV 601

6. Pan fo’r stormydd garwa’n curo

7. Hymn – O come, O come, Emmanuel!

8. Nowel, nowel. Owt of your slepe

9. Drop down, ye heavens, from above

10. Nun komm, der Heiden Heiland

11. There is no rose

12. Hymn – Come, thou long-expected Jesus

13. O virgo virginum

14. One star, at last

15. Antiphons – O Dayspring; O King of the Nations

16. Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme

17. Adam lay ybounden

18. Gottes Sohn ist kommen

19. Hymn – On Jordan’s bank the Baptist’s cry

20. Antiphon – O Emmanuel

21. Adam lay ybounden

22. A Gallery Carol 

https://signumrecords.com/product/advent-live-volume-3/SIGCD768/

Disclaimer: Regarding the photos and descriptions used above, we do not know whom the owners of these are, and infringement is not intended. Photos and descriptions are used for educational purposes only. We will gladly oblige any take down under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). Photos and descriptions are used under the allowance made for "fair use" under Section 107 of the Copyright Act of 1976 for the purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing. We will oblige any takedown request of any photo on this blog in compliance with the DMCA.

Choir of King's College Cambridge Releases Rutter Orchestral Carol Album

 

Choir of King's College Cambridge Releases Rutter Orchestral Carol Album

Britten Sinfonioa

Label Description: 

The Choir of King’s College, Cambridge, releases a selection of arrangements and original works for choir and orchestra by John Rutter under the direction of Daniel Hyde, featuring Britten Sinfonia. RUTTER ORCHESTRAL CAROLS includes beautiful orchestral arrangements of well-known favourites such as Silent Night and Sans Day Carol as well as

Rutter’s original carols All bells in paradise and All the stars looked down, which is dedicated to the late Sir Stephen Cleobury.

“It was a pleasure to record a handful of John’s carols, some old, some new, in these colourful orchestrations. Both John Rutter and the Britten Sinfonia are long term friends and partners with King’s College Choir; hopefully these new tracks will add a bit of magic to people’s Christmas this year.” – Daniel Hyde, Director of Music, King’s College

1. Silent Night - Gruber

2. All the Stars Looked Down - Rutter

3. Child in a Manger - Traditional Celtic - arr. Rutter

4. Sans Day Carol - arr. Rutter

5. Blake's Lullaby - Rutter

6. All the Bells in Paradise - Rutter

https://www.chandos.net/products/catalogue/KG%200069

Disclaimer: Regarding the photos and descriptions used above, we do not know whom the owners of these are, and infringement is not intended. Photos and descriptions are used for educational purposes only. We will gladly oblige any take down under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). Photos and descriptions are used under the allowance made for "fair use" under Section 107 of the Copyright Act of 1976 for the purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing. We will oblige any takedown request of any photo on this blog in compliance with the DMCA.

Christmas Touched Upon in New Collection of Jonathan Rutherford's Works by the London Voices

 

Christmas Touched Upon in New Collection of Jonathan Rutherford's Works by the London Voices
Ben Parry Leads the London Voices on New Orchid Classics Album


Editor's Note: This recording has Rutherford's 1998 song cycle 3 Advent Carols and the work The Star Child and some carols.

"Isaiah 35: Three Advent Carols (1998) was written for my brother Christian when he was music director of the choir of Little St Mary’s Church, Cambridge. I was asked, by Little St Mary’s Church, to set the words of Chapter 35 of Isaiah, from the Old Testament.


At first, I could see no convincing way of setting the prose to music, and so I asked Jennifer Thorn, who had written the poem sung at the end of my piece "An Intake of Breath," to adapt it into verse.


She gave me the words which I have made the first of these three carols. While I was waiting for Jenny to write the verses, I found and read the lovely words, spoken by the character Isaiah, that open The Shearmen and Tailors’ Play (the Coventry Mystery Play) written probably between 1400 and 1425.


This became the second carol. While composing these two settings, it then became obvious to me how I should make the music for a setting of the original words in the Bible, and provide a group of pieces that made a satisfactory whole.


Magnificat and Nunc Dimittis (1985) come from the last scene of the opera, The Star-Child (1979-85), which combines the stories of two of Oscar Wilde’s fairy tales, The Young King and The Star-Child. I


I combined the two stories because they had so many similarities of plot, and had scenes which yearned for music and theatre. Both of the stories concerned the disparity between those living with opulent wealth, and those in miserable poverty.


“Better that we had died of cold in the forest, or that some wild beast had fallen upon us and slain us” is a phrase which one of the woodcutters utters in the first scene of The Star-Child. In the action, the eponymous hero, having become narcissistic, feels guilty of cruelty, for he has rejected his mother, who is now a lone beggarwoman who has pleaded with him to come back to her.


In the second act, he has recognized through dreams, that in the making of his magnificent coronation robes, poverty-stricken slaves have died (“given their lives” is the euphemism).


He subsequently chooses to go to his coronation in rags, to the shame of everyone, the public alike. The Magnificat and Nunc Dimittis are heard near the end of the final act, as the Young King, arriving for his coronation, in rags, having argued fruitlessly outside the cathedral with the Lord Chamberlain who has tried to dissuade him, storms into the cathedral, only to have a further argument with the Bishop, who sings his reproachful aria “My son, I am an old man, and in the winter of my days”. As the Young King opens the doors of the cathedral, we hear the opening of the Magnificat in full voice.

Pilgrim’s Song (1984) is a setting of John Bunyan’s words from Pilgrim’s Progress which I used in the 2nd act of The Star-Child, which presents the dreams of the Young King, in which slaves’ lives have been sacrificed to make him rich and powerful.


The Star-Child, burdened by guilt, and choosing to reject the wealth he is to inherit, becomes a pilgrim as two monks, representing the Star Child’s dreaming soul, sing the poem in searching two-part counterpoint, expressing a sense of searching, while also evoking a sense of humility.


I have used John Bunyan’s original words, not Percy Dearmer’s famous and desecrated hymn version, which not only changes words altogether, but confuses 1st and 3rd persons.


"Rejoice! Rejoice! "(2010) was written for the Jubilee Opera Chorus production of Beatrix Potter’s The Tailor of Gloucester. It was to be sung at the moment Beatrix Potter describes, that in the old story “all the beasts can talk in the night between Christmas Eve and Christmas Day in the morning (though there are very few folk that can hear them, or know what it is that they say)”.


"In the Bleak Midwinter" (2015) is a setting of Christina Rosetti’s poem first published in January 1872. Without their asking, my setting was written for Seraphim, the amateur female singing group in East Anglia founded by Vetta Wise. In choosing a text, I thought it would be nice to set Christina Rosetti’s words, one of which is the gentle word: Seraphim.


Because there was no prospect of Seraphim performing the work, I chose to allow myself intervals difficult for amateurs to sing. But, the members of Seraphim were very brave, and liking the music in rehearsal, were determined to sing it. They performed it in 2017 with flute (Anna Noakes) and harp (Gabriella Dall’Olio) helping them. There is no doubt that the piece should be sung unaccompanied as it is in this recording. There are two poems on this CD album which are more famous as hymns or carols, with tunes designed to comfort the listener.


John Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Song better known as the cheerful hymn He Who Would Valiant Be. The other is In the Bleak Midwinter made famous in the deeply comforting musical settings by both Gustav Holst and Harold Darke.


In the cases of both poems, I wanted to find a more challenging and poignant meaning in the words than the famous tunes would suggest. In Christina Rosetti’s carol I was keen to set the freezing words “snow on snow” in such a way that they would express bleakness and coldness.


Britten had done just this in his setting of "In the Bleak Midwinter" within his choral work, A Boy is Born.


Perhaps regretfully, I used a version of the poem found in a traditional anthology. Sadly, and primly, the anthology left out the beautiful verse about ‘a breastful of milk’. I have found it impossible, in retrospect, to insert a new setting of the verse, as the structure of the musical journey can only be damaged by doing so.

"Blessèd is the Man who Finds Wisdom" (2015) (words from Proverbs chapter 3: verses 13-18) was written for Maggie Beale in memory of her husband John, to be sung by the Orford Benefice Choir (of which he was a member). Maggie chose various possible words to set to music, including some by Shelley, but we settled on these. In reply to a solo female phrase, the anthem finishes with a tenor solo voice, representing John, for he was a tenor in the choir, and he may be said to have the last word, surrounded by a choir of angels.

For "Behold, I Create New Heavens and a New Earth (2019) was written for Graeme Kay and the Orford Benefice Choir, who performed it on the occasion of the Easter 2019 dedication of the newly acquired Peter Collins organ.


To date, it is the only piece specifically written for that instrument since it came from Southampton to take its place in Orford. It is a setting of Isaiah 65: verses 17-25. Having discovered that the biblical reading for the day of performance was Isaiah 65: verses 17-25, I was immediately inspired by the interesting words, and I set them to music very quickly and confidently.


I was already familiar with the literary style and prophetic voice of Isaiah, as in 1999 I had set words from Isaiah 35 in my piece, Isaiah 35: Three Advent Carols. I am very pleased with my liberal choice of keys and modulations in this work.


I enjoyed briefly quoting Britten’s Old Abram Brown at one point. I have discussed tonality and modulation elsewhere in this booklet, as it is a fascinating and important subject.


Good Friday Music (Seven Last Words) (2015) was written for liturgical use, to enhance Good Friday services, and vigils, by the use of thoughtful and contemplative music and silences.


I was somewhat impatient with the lack of these qualities in a Good Friday service I had recently experienced, when the string quartet which performed Haydn’s Seven Last Words received applause from the congregation. The focus was on the activity of the musicians, and English politeness was observed.


The spirit and poignancy of the occasion should have invoked silence. Words can be so beautiful when given focus of mind and thoughtful expression; and so, the music throughout the composition develops not at all, because the important thing is how the words turn to silence, and meditation.


The music is full of phrases which become familiar by repetition and recognition. And then there are passages completely free from leitmotifs, such as the setting of “Greater love hath no man than this: That a man lay down his life for his friends” which was originally written for a Taizé service in a church local to me; as there seemed to be no existing Taizé chant for those words. In my setting, I took no trouble to find different music for the words “This is my commandment: That ye love one another, as I have loved you” as I was specifically avoiding development. In my setting – after the final words “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life” I wrote a final, paused, bar of silence and the indication that “This bar is everlasting peace; the congregation leaves in silent contemplation”.



Isaiah 35 – Three Advent Carols (1998)
1. Rejoice, you barren land
2. The Sofferent thatte seeth evere seycrette
3. The Wilderness and the Solitary Place


Magnificat & Nunc Dimittis & Pilgrim’s Song
from “The Star Child” (1979-1985)
4. Magnificat & Nunc Dimittis
5. Pilgrim’s Song
6. Rejoice! Rejoice! (2010)
7. In the Bleak Midwinter (2015)
8. Blessèd is the Man who Finds Wisdom (2015)
9. For Behold, I Create New Heavens and a New Earth (2018)


Good Friday Music (Seven Last Words) (2015)
10. The First Word
11. The Second Word
12. The Third Word
13 . The Fourth Word
14. The Fifth Word
15. The Sixth Word
16. The Seventh Word

https://www.orchidclassics.com/releases/orc100268-rutherford-the-wilderness/

Choir of Salisbury Cathedral releases "Salisbury Christmas"

 

Choir of Salisbury Cathedral releases "Salisbury Christmas"

Updated with description on Nov. 25, 2023.

Description from https://www.salisburycathedral.org.uk/salisbury-cathedral-launches-first-christmas-album-for-a-decade/ with changes for easier mobile viewing.

"On 15 November 2023, Salisbury Cathedral Choir is releasing its first Christmas album for over a decade on its own recently founded Salisbury Cathedral record label.

The album entitled Salisbury Christmas is a collection of Christmas carols old and new, sung by Salisbury Cathedral Choir, with John Challenger (organ), directed by David Halls. 

The album features the full Cathedral Choir, girl and boy choristers and adult singers, accompanied on the famous ‘Father’ Willis organ.

Many works on the album have a particular Salisbury link. Several carols are arrangements by the late Sir David Willcocks, Organist at Salisbury Cathedral in the 1940s and subsequently Director of the Choir of King’s College, Cambridge, famous for Carols from King’s on BBC television and radio each Christmas Eve. 

Herbert Howells, another former organist, is represented in the beautiful carol, Sing lullaby along with a new award-winning work, "Toccata on the Advent hymn ‘Wachet auf’", by David Halls, the Cathedral’s current Director of Music.

Across the decades there has been another change, with work by women composers included in the album line up. Amongst those is Errollyn Wallen, the award-winning composer named as one of the BBC’s 100 Women in 2018, who was commissioned by Salisbury Cathedral Choir to write "Salisbury Carol". Errollyn’s carol was first performed in Salisbury Cathedral on 22 December 2022 and is a tribute to Her late Majesty Queen Elizabeth II.

Other women composers include Cecilia McDowall, Sally Beamish and Jeanne Demessieux. There is also a carol by contemporary favourite composer, John Rutter.

As is fitting for a home-grown album, the cover image has been supplied by Salisbury photographer and ICU consultant Martin Cook.

David Halls, Salisbury Cathedral’s Director of Music, said:
'Christmas is a very special time of year at the Cathedral, and we welcome thousands of worshippers and concert goers over this very busy period. The selection of works on this album incorporates several old and well-known Christmas carols as well as newer works, and I’m delighted that, through this new album, we can share the joy of Christmas from Salisbury Cathedral with people at home.'

Physical copies of Salisbury Christmas are available to purchase from Salisbury Cathedral shop or online via the Cathedral’s website or streamed via this link.

Proceeds from sales of recordings released by Salisbury Cathedral continue to support the Cathedral’s music funds, continuing our rich tradition of music as well as enabling future projects."

1. God rest you merry - Trad. arr. Willcocks

2. In the stillness - Sally Beamish

3. Tocata: Wachet auf - David Halls

4. I sing of a maiden - Patrick Hadley

5. There shall a star - Felix Mendelssohn

6. Hymne a la Vierge - Pierre Villette

7. Rorate caeli - Jeanne Demessieux

8. Tomorrow shall be my dancing day - John Gardner

9. Before the paling of the stars - Cecilia McDowall

10. Candlelight Carol - John Rutter

11. In dulci jubilio (BWV 729) - J.S. Bach

12. Salisbury Carol - Errollyn Wallen

13. Sing lullaby - Herbert Howells

14 Hark the herald angels sing - Felix Mendelssohn

15. The Holy Boy - John Ireland

16. Susset Carol - Trad arr. Willcocks

Disclaimer: Regarding the photos and descriptions used above, we do not know whom the owners of these are, and infringement is not intended. Photos and descriptions are used for educational purposes only. We will gladly oblige any take down under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). Photos and descriptions are used under the allowance made for "fair use" under Section 107 of the Copyright Act of 1976 for the purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing. We will oblige any takedown request of any photo on this blog in compliance with the DMCA.