CD REVIEW
– AVE
REX ANGELORUM
The Choir of Keble College,
Oxford / Matthew Martin
CRD 3537 (63:03)
To complement our
normal Festive listening from
Leroy Anderson, Percy Faith,
Arthur Fiedler, Mantovani, André
Rieu et al, your thoughts may
turn to a vocal collection of
Christmas music and you might
like to consider this new release
from the Keble College Choir. One
of the leading mixed-voice choirs
in Oxford, on this album it
comprises eleven sopranos, seven
altos, seven tenors and eight
basses, who are either choral
scholars, volunteers or lay
clerks.
The album contains
an appealing eclectic mix of
well-known carols, 20th and 21st
century choral music, and other
arrangements. Four of these are
world premiere recordings. Among
its 20 tracks it has Lo! He
comes with clouds descending, Es
ist ein Ros’ entsprungen
(Lo, how a rose e’er
blooming), Cherry Tree Carol
arr. Stephen Cleobury, Richard
Rodney Bennett’s Lullaby
baby, I saw three ships
arr. Simon Preston, the
traditional Czech carol Rocking
sung a-capella, Unto us is
born a Son arr. David
Willcocks, and four pleasant
plainsong pieces as befits an
album recorded in a monastery:
Buckfast Abbey, Devon.
The very fine
acoustics in the building are
evident throughout the disc and
nowhere bettered than on John
Taverner’s closing title
track (Hail to the King of
Angels), which Jeremy
Summerly rightly describes in his
most helpful booklet notes as
"attention-grabbing".
All the words to the music are
also included.
Matthew Martin,
born 1976, is Precentor and
Director of Music at Gonville
& Caius College, Cambridge
and was DM at Keble from 2015-20
where he was also Artistic
Director of the annual Keble
Early Music Festival. Here he not
only conducts but has composed
four of the works, arranged
another and accompanies – he
had been an organ student in
Paris – on the classic hymn Of
the Father’s heart begotten.
The bulk of the first-rate organ
accompaniments are by Jeremy
Filsell with Benjamin Mills
playing on three tracks.
CRD, founded in
1965, is an independent company
based in Truro, Cornwall. This
album of uplifting classy choral
singing is widely available at a
good price of around £10.
© Peter
Burt 2020
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