Vaughan Williams - Serenade to Music · Five Mystical Songs ·

Vaughan Williams: Fantasies; The Lark Ascending; Five Variants Marriner's evergreen 1972 recording of favorite shorter works by Vaughan Williams has yet to be surpassed for warmth of conception and smoothness of execution. The soloists in these accounts (among them William Bennett in the Greensleeves Fantasia and Iona Brown in the Lark Ascen...	Vaughan Williams: Dona Nobis Pacem/Four Hymns/Toward The Unknown Region/O Clap Your Hands/Lord, Thou Hast Been Our Re Vaughan Williams's contribution to 20th-century choral music is substantial, but several of his works inexplicably remain in relative obscurity, one of them being the unabashedly Brahmsian (and a little Wagnerian) "Toward the Unknown Region." This "song" for chorus and orchestra,...	Vaughan Williams: Serenade to Music; The Lark Ascending; Fantasia on Greensleeves; English Folk Song Suite; In the Fen Country; Norfolk Rhapsody No. 1	Hodie / Fantasia on Christmas Carols	A Vaughan Williams Hymnal English composer Ralph Vaughan Williams not only was the esteemed author of symphonies, choral masterpieces, chamber works, and songs, but he also was the major force behind the compilation of the 1906 English Hymnal, a task that put the composer in touch with "some of the best--...
Requiem & Magnificat/Rutter, Cambridge Singers Two of John Rutter's most popular large-scale choral works are paired in this bargain-priced CD. Requiem, his first composition written without being commissioned, is a convincing affirmation of Christian doctrine on death and eternal life. It is also a substantial and sincere wo...	Vaughan Williams: Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis, In the Fen Country, Norfolk Rhapsody No. 1 in E Minor, The Wasps Overture, Variations for Orchestra, Five Variants of Dives and Lazarus This 1993 digital recording is not likely to be surpassed for warmth of conception and smoothness of execution. Sir Neville Marriner is at the top of his form, the interpretations are first rate, and the strings of the Academy of St. Martin-in-the-Fields play with polish and grea...	Vaughan Williams: Over hill, over dale Even without his highly regarded symphonies, various instrumental works, and monumental and influential work on the revision of the English Hymnal, Vaughan Williams would have made a major impact on 20th-century music with his many original choral works and his folksong arrangeme...	Vaughan Williams: Mass in G minor; Motets	Vaughan Williams: The Nine Symphonies

Fantasia on Christmas Carols
I only listened to the Fantasia on Christmas Carols in depth at this moment in time. Sir Thomas Allen is superb in his interpretation of this choral masterpiece. He lives up to his reputation as one of the great British baritones of all times. He is able to express the baritone solo with superb musicianship and nuance. This is a challenging piece for choruses. It demands a level of musicianship which should not be attempted by amateur choirs. The choir is also superb and follows the composers dynamics respectively. I highly recommend the CD if you are only interested in this work. It's worth it. Tim Kennedy

what a setting of Shakespeare!
How sweet the singers weave in and out of Serenade to Music! In line after line, Vaughan Williams amazingly goes from low register to high climax in short spans and phrases. 'How many things by season seasoned are' is a hair raising vocal line, while the pianissimos on 'harmony' are pure musical genius, and stunningly performed by the soloist. This is great composing given a definitive performance. I enjoy the other pieces on this recording, but I must confess that Flos Campi goes over my head like a low flying plane, and I just don't get it. But you must not go through life without listening to the Serenade - it ranks with his Lark Ascending and Tallis Fantasia for sheer beauty.

Small, endearing masterpieces from the twilight of empire
English society was still so secure in the imperial twilight (1910-40) that native composers could afford to ignore the revolution mounted by Schonberg, Webern, Berg, and Stravinsky, not to mention lesser modernists. Vaughan Williams is too lovable a compser to criticize for being a musical reactionary, and here we get some of his most endearing works for solo voices and chorus. The intent behind this Serenade to Music was to duplicate, as much as possible, the 16 stellar soloists for whome V-W wrote the work. That was already done, in truth, by Leonard Bernstien at the opening of Philharmonic Hall in 1962 with the likes of Jon Vickers, George London, Richard Tucker, and Eileen Farrell, to thrilling effect. Best's reading is quite low-key, mellifluous, and gentle by comparison. His one world-class singer is Thomas Allen, who appears to splendid effect in V-W's haunting Five Mystical Songs to texts by George Herbert, which he sets as wonderfully as he set Shakespeare in the Serenade. The Corydon Singers have nothing to do in the Serenade but are vigorous and expert in the rest of the program, which includes the 12-min. Fantasia on Christmas Carols, again with Thomas Allen in great form, and Flos Campi with Nobuko Imai as the expressive viola soloist. The Christmas carols mostly sound serious and religious, in keeping with the Five Mystical Songs. In all, Allen is the star here; the works themselves are essential V-W, each a small masterpiece that deserves to be better known in the U.S. Four staars for the Serenade, five for Allen's work.

There'll always be an England!
The best thing about this recording is the composite selection of this music on a single disc. The Corydon Singers, and particularly Thomas Allen (he of legendary career!) are quite fine, though quirkily I prefer John Shirley-Quirk's version of 'Five Mystical Songs' with Kings College Choir, especially his 'Love Bade Me Welcome' with its magnificent rendering of the last words "and I did sit and eat", which once heard will never forsake your memory. The spare yet intensely textured sound of the Corydon Singers is best suited to the diaphanous 'Serenade to Music'. Vaughan Williams' ability to set a text like no one else is a perfect partner to Shakespeare's arching mastery of the English language! It's a superb piece basically ignored in this country, as are most of VW's symphonies except for the ubiquitous No. 2. When have you heard an American orchestra perform the inventive Eighth or the redemptive Fifth? I agree that Boult's recordings of VW's music are a fine standard, &his 'Serenade' is especially fine, but this recording flourishes. Matthew Best gives space and reason to the beautiful ambience of the score. Flos Campi is well done here with Nobuko Imai's viola playing free of affectation as always, displaying an unpretentious mastery of the score. The 'Fantasia' (one of VW's favorite musical motives, even when not properly so called!) demonstrates Vaughan Williams' true veneration of the English hymn tune, a fetching gift that annointed all of us throughout his composing career, and perhaps more than anything secured for him a place in the pantheon of great composers. This is a successful disc of masterworks of an often misunderstood and certainly under-performed composer. The English Chamber Orchestra enjoys one subtle triumph after another in this recording - the strings are beautifully recorded, as is the singing. If it had been designed as a 2-disc effort and included 'Benedictus', the 'Mass in G', 'Sancta Civitas', and 'The Lark Ascending', we'd have close to a set of VW's essential choral and smaller orchestral works in one package!

Some of the finest of English vocal music
Of this collection, only the "Five Mystical Songs" will be familiar to most listeners. It is a treat to discover the remaining works all available in one package, and especially good to hear them."Serenade to Music" (with words by Shakespeare) is quintessential Vaughan Williams: a beautifully crafted piece echoing the height of Romanticism, with a unique and fascinating story behind it. The work was written for a Promenade Concert - more specifically, it was written for sixteen solo singers, who are identified by name in the published score and were amongst the best of their time. Not only was the piece a triumph for them at the concert, it also caught the attention of the composer Rachmaninov, who was moved to tears by the music. The piece is rarely performed because of the fact that it was specially composed for the first performers; as stated in the notes for this recording, it only works if the performers are of as high a standard as the originals. Hence, the "cast" of this CD includes some celebrated names from the world of vocal music: John Mark Ainsley, Thomas Allen, Maldwyn Davies, Anne Dawson, Martyn Hill, Diana Montague, Alan Opie and Jean Rigby are particular standouts. Their rendition is spell-binding and rivetting, although I find that there are moments when their more operatic traits get the better of them and ruin the tuning and clarity of melodic and harmonic details. I don't mean to say that it is a bad recording, but I have heard better ones (Sir Adrian Boult's will probably remain untouchable for a long time to come). Still, a pleasure to hear, and extremely moving - it's not hard to see why Rachmaninov was so deeply affected by the piece.Thomas Allen also serves as baritone soloist for the "Five Mystical Songs" and the rarer "Fantasia on Christmas Carols." As a choral singer, I have had the pleasure of performing these works myself, and this recording conveys them as stirringly as I remember them. In the former work, the bulk of the music is carried by the baritone; the chorus comes into its own for the final movement, "Let all the world in every corner sing" but is otherwise a background force. In the latter work, based on carol tunes collected and arranged by Vaughan Williams as part of his work as editor of the English Hymnal and Oxford Book of Carols, the music is shared more substantially by soloist and chorus. These performances give the music a wonderful 'glow,' just as they ought to have. In the case of the "Fantasia," it's well worth saving that track until Christmas...The last work on the disc is "Flos Campi," in which Vaughan Williams breaks with many tonal conventions in a stunning display of orchestration, filled with achingly beautiful melodic twists and lucious harmonies, hinting very strongly at the erotic. Nobuko Imai provides a characteristic viola solo, whilst the chorus is confined to textless vocalisation. The effect is pondered in much detail in the programme notes; suffice it to say, it is a work that will leave itself etched on the mind as one of the most haunting and mysterious ever written.Throughout this recording, the English Chamber Orchestra plays to perfection with Matthew Best at the helm. His Corydon Singers prove their considerable strength as a choral group with effortless control. This is a wonderful document - whatever the season.