New Release Round-up,
Christmas New Releases 2023
Written in 1694 and based on the melodies of ten French Christmas carols, the Messe de Minuit is possibly Marc-Antoine Charpentier's best-known work; its individual movements are interspersed with shorter seasonal pieces by the composer, including the 'Noëls sur les instruments' Joseph est bien marié and Laissez paître vos bêtes. The album opens with Sébastien de Brossard's Elevatio O miraculum! and also includes Charpentier's motet In nativitatem Domini canticum.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Described in the latest edition of BBC Music Magazine (who awarded it five stars) as 'a meticulously executed, heartwarming recital', Armonico's second festival album for Signum mixes new carols by Toby Young, Bob Chilcott, Jonathan Dove and Jonathan Roberts with established favourites by Elizabeth Poston, Harold Darke, John Rutter and Franz Gruber.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
The third volume of this popular advent series from John's includes Cheryl Frances-Hoad's 'Lo! The Desert-Depths are Stirr'd', Helen Grime's 'Telling' (composed especially for this choir), Francis Pott's 'There is No Rose', Judith Weir's 'Drop down, ye heavens, from above', and two carols by Philip Ledger: 'Adam Lay Ybounden' and 'Advent Calendar'. Now Director of Music at Westminster Abbey, Nethsingha writes: 'By the time this album is released it will nearly be time to enjoy Christopher Gray’s first Advent Carol Service broadcast, as the next chapter of this wonderful choir’s history is beginning'.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
The German horn-player's programme includes arrangements of two arias from JS Bach's Christmas Oratorio (a work which regularly earned him Christmas shopping funds as a student!), an excerpt from Telemann's Advent cantata Machet die Tore weit, 'Tochter Zion, freue dich' (on a melody from Handel's Judas Maccabeus), and traditional carols such as 'Deck the Halls', 'Adeste Fideles' and 'Stille Nacht'. All arrangements are by Wolfgang Renz, who worked with Klieser on his previous album Beyond Words.
Available Format: CD
A new work by Cecilia McDowall receives its first recording on this album from the Arizona-based choir: the Trinity Triptych, which was commissioned to mark the centenary of Phoenix's Trinity Episcopal Cathedral in 2020. The programme reflects Arizona's location on the border of Mexico through the inclusion of Hispanic carols such as 'El niño querido' and 'Claro abril resplandeció', and also features festive evergreens 'Chestnuts roasting on an open fire', 'Winter Wonderland' and 'Jingle Bells'.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC, Hi-Res+ FLAC
The title-work on this collection of new seasonal music by Hawes is a sequence of six carols for unaccompanied choir on texts by his brother Andrew, a poet and priest; the programme also includes four Christmas motets on Latin texts, and settings of 'Lullay My Liking', William Wordsworth's 'Minstrels', and William Chatterton Dix's 'What Child Is This?'.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
The Berlin-based early music ensemble present traditional German songs and music by composers including Hammerschmidt, Schütz, Senfl, Praetorius and Erlebach in freewheeling new arrangements by Bo Wiget; BBC Music Magazine singled out the 'yearningly beautiful' account of Senfl's ‘Ach Elslein, liebes Elslein mein’ and the 'aptly tender and intimate' performances of two carols by Hammerschmidt.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Comprised entirely of premiere recordings, this album from the choir of St Martin-in-the-Fields takes its title from a triptych of carols by American composer Reena Esmail, setting new texts by Rebecca Gayle Howell; other highlights include Bob Chilcott's twenty-minute suite Mary, Mother, a setting of Queen Elizabeth’s Winchester Carol by Roderick Williams, Yshani Perinpanayagam's When God made Eve, and Cecilia McDowall's There Is No Rose.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC, Hi-Res+ FLAC
Poston: Carols & Anthems
St. Albans Cathedral Girls Choir, Lay Clerks of St. Albans Cathedral Choir, Tom Winpenny
The centrepiece of this album is The Nativity: a 'Sequence for Christmas' from 1950, which incorporates Herefordshire folk-carols collected by Vaughan Williams Individual carols include the ever-popular 'Jesus Christ The Apple-Tree', a traditional Cornish tune, and carols from medieval manuscripts held in Chester, London, Cambridge and Oxford. Individual carols include the ever-popular 'Jesus Christ the Apple-Tree', plus 'The Dormouse Carol, 'In Bethlehem Town, 'The Queen of Sheba's Song' and the Two Carols in Memory of Peter Warlock.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Not everything on this delectable collection of the British pianist and polymath's sacred choral music is seasonal, but the lovely December sequence (comprising 'Advent Calendar', new settings of 'Hark, the Herald Angels Sing' & 'Silent Night' and 'The Gate of the Year') deserves to win new friends amongst enterprising choirs, and a fresh take on 'Ding Dong Merrily on High' also works beautifully.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC, Hi-Res+ FLAC
Published in 1823, the French organist's collection of 34 Christmas carols was inspired in part by the work of his predecessors at the Église Saint-Roch in Paris (where he had been employed since 1805). This recording was made on the grand organ of the Chapelle Royale de Versailles, which was installed in 1710 and inaugurated by François Couperin.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Recorded on the pipe organ at the Sono Luminus studio in Boyce, Virginia, this recital of Baroque organ music includes JS Bach's 'Nun komm, der Heiden Heiland' and 'In dulci jubilo', Buxtehude's 'Wie schön leuchtet der Morgenstern', Zipoli's Pastorale, Pachelbel's 'Vom Himmel hoch', excerpts from Dandrieu's Livre de noëls and Daquin's Nouveau livre de noëls, and a transcription of the Pastoral Symphony from Handel's Messiah.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Katherine Cooper - Head of Editorial
