They are nearly 30 strong and go for a particular type of effect - full-bodied, monumental, and replete with the best type of churchy, echoey sound, designed to transfigure a large building.

Each syllable and inflection has been obviously been painstakingly prepared; the complex 'Gloria' of the Missa Surge propera is as streamlined and faultless a rendering as one could hope to hear. But there's a chilly churchy reserve about a performance that herds everything towwards the emotional central reservation...but of course, there are many listeners for whom those criticisms are in fact positives.

The Choir of Westminster Cathedral is on good form here...[the recording] distances the choir to such an extent that details are sometimes lost, and the lush vibrato of some lower voices (the basses in particular) adds a further halo of imprecision. Those who prefer to view the High Renaissance through this particular prism will not be disappointed; but those for whom Victoria is a passionate animal...may have wished for soemthing more focused.

Martin Baker has a lovely way with the musical phrases, letting them emerge from the dark recesses of the cathedral...It creates a sense of great timelessness and awesome splendour which does the music far greater service than something more focused on specific details...generally Baker's tempos are sufficiently measured to avoid too much being cast into the acoustic melting pot at the same time.

a few moments of unruliness apart, the performances of both the masses here are thoughtful and beautifully shaped, and neither the plainchant-based Missa de Beata Maria Virgine nor the parody mass Missa Surge Propera, based upon a Palestrina motet, has been recorded many times before.