Britten: The Sacred Choral Music
New College Choir Oxford, Edward Higginbottom
Awards:
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Presto Recording of the Week, 14th January 2013
The two outstanding features are the high quality of the choral singing and the fairly relaxed pace throughout. Higginbottom has said that he finds some of Britten's metronome markings on the...
Britten: The Sacred Choral Music
New College Choir Oxford, Edward Higginbottom
Purchase product
Awards:
-
Presto Recording of the Week, 14th January 2013
The two outstanding features are the high quality of the choral singing and the fairly relaxed pace throughout. Higginbottom has said that he finds some of Britten's metronome markings on the...
About
Britten's sacred music is among the most engaging and original music of its kind composed in the middle years of the 20th century. New College Choir was among the first to recognise its quality, and continues to sing it with passion and panache. This newly recorded anthology is released by New College Choir to mark the centenary of Britten's birth.
The 2 CD set offers an overarching view of his work in this domain, featuring favourites such as Rejoice in the Lamb and the Hymn to St Cecilia alongside settings more rarely heard, the Hymns to St Peter and of St Columba, and the wedding anthem Amo ergo sum. Overall, it offers a definitive panorama of Britten's sacred music from the 1930s to the 1960s in exemplary performances by one of the world's leading choirs.
Contents and tracklist
Spotlight on this release
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Little Britten
14th Jan 2013
Cellist Matthew Barley marks the centenary of the composer’s birth with a recital centring on the Third Cello Suite, whilst Edward Higginbottom and The Choir of New College Oxford bring a vital, pleasingly rough-round-the-edges approach that recalls Britten’s own children’s choirs to the scared choral music.
Awards and reviews
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Presto Recording of the Week14th January 2013
May 2013
The two outstanding features are the high quality of the choral singing and the fairly relaxed pace throughout. Higginbottom has said that he finds some of Britten's metronome markings on the fast side...yet they use their time well, finding a depth of colour and expression that yields its own rewards.
14th January 2013
[the trebles] at New have a vital, pleasingly rough-round-the-edges quality that put me very much in mind of the sound which Britten conjured from the children’s choirs on his own recordings.
24th February 2013
The Choir of New College, Oxford has a long association with this ever varied repertoire. They give fresh, confident readings – steered with firm authority by director Edward Higginbottom – of A Ceremony of Carols, Rejoice in the Lamb, Missa Brevis and shorter works. The Hymn to St Cecilia, to words of Auden, has particular joy and verve.
