Search - Schola Cantorium of Oxford, Mark Shepherd, Britten :: This Worldes Joie

About this CD (Informational)

Slobberer | Astoria, NY United States | 12/25/2008

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This Worldes Joie

Choral works by

Sir Arnold Bax, Benjamin Britten, Herbert Howells

Schola Cantorum of Oxford

Conductor Mark Shepherd



Guild Music #GMCD 7139



Contents:



1. Sir Arnold Bax (1883-1953): This Worldes Joie [6.32]

2. Benjamin Britten (1913-1976): Hymn to St. Cecilia [9.56]

3. Mark Blatchly (B. 1960): Idleness [2.33]

4. Mark Blatchly: The House Of The Mind [3.28]

5. Giles Swayne (B. 1946): Magnificat [3.52]

6. William Walton (1902-1983): Where Does The Uttered Music Go [5.37]

7. Francis Pott (B. 1957): Jesu, The Very Thought Of Thee [5.00]

8. Herbert Howells (1892-1983): The House Of The Mind [8.33]

9. Bernard Rose (B. 1916): Almighty God Who Art The Giver [3.41]

10. Philip Moore (B. 1943): Salutatio Angelica [9.10]

11. William Walton: The Twelve [11.06]



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DDD Total time = 70.12 - Recorded at Merton College, Oxford 1998



A Golden Age

If an anthology of choral music samples the Golden Age of English Music, it generally suggests work dating from the Tudor period; even though music by Byrd, and, still less, Tallis, Taverner, Tye etc. is identifiable primarily by those who have actually sung it - as cathedral or university choristers.



Surely, the first half of our own century was no less a Golden Age of English Music? Has there ever been a richer period here than that extending from Elgar to Britten? a period, moreover, in which a succession of composers each presented an easily identifiable musical physiognomy, recognisable to average music-lovers and not only to scholars or specialists. But has this Golden Age extended into the second half of the twentieth century, arguably the most fractured and transitional period of musical history?



The present anthology provides a fascinating selection of twentieth-century English choral pieces by composers, some familiar, some unfamiliar. It may perhaps enlarge the scope already established in the earlier part of the century by the well-known names - Lord Britten (1913-1976), three musical Knights - Bax (1883-1963) Tippett (b.1905) and Walton (1902- 1983), and Herbert HowelIs (1892-1983). The younger names are those of Bernard Rose (1916-1997) , Philip Moore (b.1943), Francis Pott (b.1957) and Mark Blatchly (b.1960).



1. Arnold Bax's "This Worldes Joie", motet for unaccompanied choir was completed on 13 March 1922 and published in 1923. Inscribed to W.G.Whittaker, it was first given by Charles Kennedy Scott and his Philharmonic Choir at the Queen's Hall on 5 June 1924.



2. Benjamin Britten's "Hymn to St. Cecilia" (op.27) for unaccompanied chorus, setting words by W.H.Auden, was completed at sea on M.S.Axel Johnson on April 2 1942. This and the dedication to Elizabeth Mayer, a hostess to Britten in the United States before his wartime return to England, places in context a score much loved ever since its first broadcast performance by the BBC Singers under Leslie Woodgate on 22 November, 1942.



Mark Blatchly (b.1960), presently Director of Choral Music at Charterhouse School, has sung, played or conducted at five cathedrals: Guildford, St. Paul's, Oxford, Gloucester and Bury. He began writing choral music as an organ scholar at St. Paul's.



3. Idleness



4. The House of the Mind. Of this pair of songs (dated July and August 1993) on lines by Joseph Beaumont D.D. (1616-1699) Master of Peterhouse, Cambridge, the composer writes: "... a fugal piece followed, paradoxically by a prelude, were written for Mark Shepherd and the Lichfield Chamber Choir. Shepherd had expressed delight in Howells' The House of the Mind and was curious to see what I made of the same text . Research in the Cambridge University Library revealed that Howells had slightly modified Beaumont's lines. I resolved to use HowelIs' version and to preface it with a setting of some more of the good Doctor's verse. His treatise on Sloth seemed directly to address the aspirant ensnared in the toils of organ and choral music.''



Giles Swayne (b.1946). Growing up in or around Liverpool, the composer's musical background began with piano lessons at eight; then with Gordon Green. Encouraged by his composer cousin, Elizabeth Machonchy, Swayne began to compose in his teens. His teachers at Cambridge included Raymond Leppard and Nicholas Maw; also, later at the R.A.M., Birtwistle, Alan Bush and, again, Maw and Gordon Green. After many years as a teacher himself, he now devotes himself to entirely to composition. His Op.75 (Chinese Whispers for organ and orchestra, a St. Alban's Festival commission) was first heard on July 15 1997.



5. His Magnificat Op.33, for unaccompanied eight-part choir, was written for Francis Grier and the Choir of Christ Church, Oxford who first gave it there on 4 July 1982.



6. William Walton's "Where does the uttered music go?" for unaccompanied mixed voices sets a poem specially written by John Masefield for the unveiling of the Memorial Window in St. Sepulchre's Holborn on 26 April, 1946, when it was first performed by the B.B.C. Chorus, conducted by Leslie Woodgate.



Francis Pott (b.1957), a Music Scholar at Winchester and Cambridge, studied composition with Robin Holloway and Hugh Wood. Now Lecturer in Music in two Oxford Colleges, he is also bass Lay Clerk in the Choir of Winchester Cathedral.



7. "Jesu, the very thought of thee" inscribed "for Jeremy and Elizabeth, 20.x.1990", sets the English version (by J.M.Neale) of the Latin Hymn Jesus dulcis memoria, for double choir unaccompanied.



8. Herbert Howells' "The House of the Mind" is a setting for chorus and organ of a poem by Joseph Beaumont. (See note on 4.)



9. Bernard Rose's unaccompanied setting (for SATB) of Samuel Johnson's prayer "Almighty God, who art the Giver of all wisdom'', is dated Appleton, 26.iii.84. This 'establishment'-trained organist, musicologist and composer's background included Salisbury Cathedral Choir School, and graduation from the R.C.M. and Cambridge before a long and distinguished career at Oxford University .



Philip Moore (b.1943) graduating from the R.C.M. and a Durham Mus.B., has progressed from teaching music at Eton to posts at Canterbury, Guildford and York where, after Francis Jackson, he became Organist and Master of the Music in 1983.



10. "Salutatio Angelica", commissioned from the 1985 Edington Festival, where it was first performed, is for two unaccompanied four-part choirs. The composer writes: "The work is in the form of a rondo. The rondo theme appears at the words Ave Maria, gratia plena, and is heard three times in different keys. Each appearance of this theme gives prominence to a different voice. The music of the sections that surround the rondo theme is taken from the opening, and is presented in a variety of ways, to suit the feeling of the words. Much use is made of imitation, both between choirs and between individual voices. Block harmony is used for moments of particular intensity, and the work builds to a climax at the words Ut digni efficiamur, before subsiding rapidly to a quiet ending.



11. William Walton's "The Twelve", `an anthem for the feast of any apostle', for mixed voices and organ, words by W.H.Auden, was composed in 1965 and first performed in Christ church Cathedral, Oxford at Evensong on Sunday 16 May of that year. It is inscribed "To Christ Church, Oxford, and its Dean, Cuthbert Simpson''.



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