John Sheppard, Choir Of St Mary's Cathedral, Edinburgh, Duncan Ferguson - John Sheppard: Sacred Choral Music

Published Tuesday 29th April 2014
John Sheppard, Choir Of St Mary's Cathedral, Edinburgh, Duncan Ferguson - John Sheppard: Sacred Choral Music
John Sheppard, Choir Of St Mary's Cathedral, Edinburgh, Duncan Ferguson - John Sheppard: Sacred Choral Music

STYLE: Choral
RATING 9 9 9 9 9 9 9 9 9
OUR PRODUCT CODE: 151120-
LABEL: Delphian DCD34123
FORMAT: CD Album
ITEMS: 1

Reviewed by Steven Whitehead

Duncan Ferguson and the Choir of St Mary's Cathedral, Edinburgh, have built up an excellent reputation which will only be enhanced by this new release. This is their fourth disc on the Scottish independent label Delphian and on it they return to the epoch of their first recorded triumph, the early 16th century. Their 2010 John Taverner disc won plaudits for its exhilarating freshness and panache, and the choir bring the same musical and liturgical integrity to music by Taverner's near-contemporary John Sheppard, Informator Choristarum at Magdalen College, Oxford (where Ferguson himself was a more recent organ scholar). Centred on Sheppard's most extended and ecstatic composition, the 'Missa Cantate', this wide-ranging collection also includes the rarely-heard 'Gaude Virgo Christiphera', Sheppard's only surviving votive antiphon (with a new reconstruction of the treble part), and the first recording of 'Adesto Sancta Trinitas II'. Most remarkable of all is the performance level to which Ferguson has now brought this choir, and the expressive force given to the music by the astonishing agility of voices in the vast cathedral acoustic, all of which is ably captured by producer/engineer Paul Baxter. It has to be said that Sheppard was not the greatest composer of Tudor England - that honour has to be fought over by Byrd and Tallis - but Sheppard was certainly among the best of the rest and Ferguson's informative CD booklet notes give his full context and explain just how innovative he was. This is well worth further investigation.

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