comentarios deGeorge Richford
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What continues to amaze me in the music of Herbert Howells is how such a simple idea is manipulated and transformed to create the most vibrant, reflective and thouroughly engrossing music within the Church music genre. Howells' setting of the evening canticles for King's College, Cambridge, is the most beautiful evocation of the biblical text uplifting the words in the most seemingly effortless mannor with strikingly iridiscent results. How he avoids sentimentalism and the predictablility of his more draconian predecessors is a sheer master-stroke, fusing the worlds of tudor church music with contemporary harmony and counterpoint. This is real church music at its very best; accessible to most whilst still maintaining an unrivaled degree of integrity which is still revered nationwide in churches today.
This anthem shows Kenneth Leighton at his most reserved but nevertheless he captures the true character of a lilting, melancholic lullaby. A bouyant treble solo 'narrates' much of the setting with more refined and colourful choral writing, flowing underneath. The dazzling 'Herod the King...' line momentarily unnerves an otherwise very placid and expressive piece.
I have just recently heard this work performed at Canterbury Cathedral for the first time, and I must say it took my breath away. David Flood did a fine job in the execution of this peace, which, with its echos of african chant and rousing counterpoints, has to be the best Magnificat written for many many years. Difficult, maybe but any choir worth its sort should attempt this work. You will not be disappointed.
Howells completed the Gloucester Service at a time of great personal unrest and could maybe account for the more elegiac nature of this divine canticle setting. Moments of quite trancendental stature are achieved in the delicacy of acoustic writing and the restraint of inevitable climaxes. Most striking is the sumptuous explosion of a treble top 'A' from the meandering tenor entry in the lesser doxologies. This is quite magical music and maybe one of the very great Magnificat and Nunc Dimittis settings.
Full of rhythmic vitality and mercurial impetus, Let All the World in Every Corner Sing, is in my opinion one of the very finest of Kenneth Leighton's anthems. As in much of Leighton's work it is the 'augmented 4th' or 'Tritone' which is exploited here, in the most extroverted and unreserved manner. The dance-like organ accompaniment is indicative of his skill as an organ composer and the choral lines of writing display a mastery of counterpoint. The final strain of 'My God and King' cascades and reverberates like a carillon call and is the very best and fitting ending to the celebration which is Christ's resurrection. Perhaps not as 'organic' as some of his choral writing but it is certainly the most exuberant.
Although not the most accesible of pieces, Berkeley's setting of Psalm 23 still echo's the rolling pastoral imagery associated with the text whilst avoiding sentimentality or becoming contrived. The idyll presented in the opening bars of treble solo is compimented by luscious cascades of contrapuntal writing and more sombre chant-like reflections in the central sections. Chromaticism and dissonance is perhaps more refined than in some of Berkeley's other music which allows for a more fluid and congruent gesture.
Leighton's early attempt at the evening canticles resulted in this exhuberant little gem, which demonstrates as much his skill at contrapuntal writing as it does his ability to 'word-paint'. Full of the characteristic twists and turns in speed, tempi and mood that one comes to expect from this British composer, the only thing that prohibits this piece obtaining a '5 star' accolade is in my opinion, its relative complexity.
An intense and introspective setting to the text set previously by Orlando Gibbons and William Walton that maintains a sense of originality throughout. This hymn concludes the monumental 'Crucifixus Pro Nobis'
Although typical of the rhythmic drive and vitality one comes to expect of William Mathias, the predictability of structure and melody of this commission mars the overall cohesion of the piece. This said, the music is very enjoyable to perform, especially if one has access to a sufficient church organ.