Prices shown exclude VAT. (UK tax is not payable for deliveries to United States.)
See Terms & Conditions for p&p rates. | |  | Howells: Hymnus Paradisi & Sir Patrick Spens
Howells: | Hymnus Paradisi Sir Patrick Spens The world premiere recording of Sir Patrick Spens provides the coupling, a Scottish ballad for huge forces – very large orchestra, choir and baritone soloist. It was written around 1922 when the composer was around 30 years of age |
“Crippling numbness of loss' was the effect on Herbert Howells of his young son Michael's death from meningitis. The composer eventually confronted his bereavement in Hymnus Paradisi… David Hill… sensitively presents the emotional nerve-ends of Howell's moving work. Notwithstanding explicitly dramatic moments, the pervasive feel of the performance is one of intimate serenity, the 'light and warmth of consolation' which Howells wanted for himself, and for the listener. The coupling is of major interest to Howells specialists - Sir Patrick Spens, a maritime cantata with solo baritone (the excellent Roderick Williams)…” BBC Music Magazine, Proms 2007 **** “Hymnus Paradisi is the composer's most widely acknowledged masterpiece. Choral and orchestral forces are well balanced and precise… Claire Rutter sustains her long phrases and has the right consolatory warmth in her middle range, while tenor James Gilchrist sings with grace and fine diction. Sir Patrick Spens, recorded now for the first time, is strong in its own merits. In this setting of the old Scots ballad Howells is at his most vigorously imaginative; it is difficult to understand the neglect.” Gramophone Magazine, August 2007 | | | (also available to download from $6.00) | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
|
|
| |  | Howells: Hymnus Paradisi
This re-release of Herbert Howells’s Hymnus Paradisi and A Kent Yeoman’s Wooing Song forms part of the new commemorative Hickox Legacy series on Chandos Records, leading up to (and continuing beyond) the fifth anniversary, in Nov 2013, of the conductor's untimely death. The recording is released on the Classic Chandos label at Mid Price. The reputation of Herbert Howells has reached new heights in recent years, no doubt helped by recordings such as this one of Hymnus Paradisi. Howells wrote the work in memory of his young son Michael who had died of polio at the age of nine. It is not a conventional requiem, in that it does not contain the whole text of the Requiem Mass. Instead it sets Psalms 23 and 121 with ‘I heard a voice from heaven’ and words from the Salisbury Diurnal, ‘Holy is the True Light’. It is an intense and powerfully emotional work – the composer’s attempt to come to terms with personal tragedy. BBC Music Magazine wrote of Hickox’s performance of Hymnus Paradisi: ‘[He] brings passionate commitment to his performance and shapes Howells’s long lines lovingly. He is aided by the fine playing of the BBC Symphony Orchestra and sensitive choral singing.’ The secular cantata A Kent Yeoman’s Wooing Song was intended as a wedding present for the baritone Keith Falkner and his bride, Christabel – although they had to wait two decades for the work to be presented to them. ‘No two people ever received a more delayed wedding present’, Howells wrote to them, adding that it came ‘with apologies and affection’. The Wooing Song features Howells in an unusually extrovert mood, in music set to texts dating from the 1600s. Words from Thomas Vautor’s sprightly madrigal Mother, I will have a husband (sung here by Joan Rodgers) provides the girl’s side of the story, while ‘I have House and Land in Kent’ (sung by Alan Opie), a text adapted from the composer Thomas Ravenscroft’s Melismata, gives the suitor’s perspective on courting. “The performance is extremely successful, conveying the dynamism and energy very well...There have been a number of highly recommendable recordings of Hymnus Paradisi and there’s no doubt that this one is prominent among them. Hickox’s years as a choral trainer held him in fine stead for those many undertakings on disc and with him he has a responsive BBC Symphony and Chorus to work with.” MusicWeb International, January 2013 | | | (also available to download from $10.50) | Usually despatched in 2 - 3 working days. (Available now to download.) |
|
|
| |  | Howells: Hymnus Paradisi & A Kent Yeoman's Wooing Song
| |
|
| |  | Howells: Hymnus Paradisi
“The Hymnus Paradisi is music awash with ecstasy, and the listener may resist becoming part of this swimmingly coloured dream. But further listening proves this is not so: that is, the better you know it, the more you see in it of form, energy and pain. The pain is real enough, as biographical facts attest. Howells wrote it as a method of escape from 'the crippling numbness of loss', as he described the effect upon him of his son's death from polio at the age of ten. The work was so full of the emotion of that time that for many years it had to remain private, and it was only with the approach of the 15th anniversary of the death that he showed it to Vaughan Williams and arrangements were made for its inclusion in the Three Choirs Festival of 1950.
A strong performance helps, and Vernon Handley brings real intensity: there is a feeling for the dramatic quality in the score, the crises and relaxations, without losing sight of the essential lyricism. The soloists on the recording sing with sensitivity and pleasing tone.” Gramophone Classical Music Guide, 2010 | | | Usually despatched in 2 - 3 working days. |
|
|
| |  | Delius, Howells & Hadley
Delius: | A Mass of Life Heather Harper (soprano), Helen Watts (contralto), Robert Tear (tenor), Benjamin Luxon (baritone) London Philharmonic Orchestra, London Philharmonic Choir, Sir Charles Groves Songs of Sunset Dame Janet Baker (mezzo-soprano, John Shirley-Quirk (baritone) Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, Liverpool Philharmonic Choir, Sir Charles Groves An Arabesque John Shirley-Quirk (baritone) Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, Liverpool Philharmonic Choir, Sir Charles Groves String Quartet (1916) Britten Quartet | Hadley, P: | My beloved spake James Lancelot (organ) Choir of King’s College, Cambridge, Sir David Willcocks I sing of a maiden Francis Grier (organ) Choir of King’s College, Cambridge, Philip Ledger The Hills Felicity Palmer (soprano), Robert Tear (tenor), Robert Lloyd (bass) London Philharmonic Orchestra, Cambridge University Musical Society Chorus, Philip Ledger | Howells: | Phantasy String Quartet, Op. 25 Britten Quartet In Gloucestershire, (String Quartet No. 3) Britten Quartet Hymnus Paradisi Heather Harper (soprano), Robert Tear (tenor) New Philharmonia Orchestra, Choir of King’s College, Cambridge, Bach Choir, Sir David Willcocks Concerto for string orchestra Dennis Simons & Robert Growcott (violins), John Chambers (viola), Alexander Cameron (cello) London Philharmonic Orchestra, Sir Adrian Boult |
A 5CD set containing titles from the acclaimed EMI British Composers series, based around the music of Frederick Delius and his contemporaries; Herbert Howells and Patrick Hadley. | | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
|
|
| |
|
