Reviewed by Tony Cummings

Ernest Lough of the Temple Choir in London was the Aled Jones of his age, a choir boy whose other-worldly soprano voice wrenched him from the obscurity of the church choir to international recording acclaim. In 1927 HMV, having invested in its very first mobile unit, sent it to record the Temple Choir and one of the designated soloists was 15 year old Lough. The rest, as they say, was record industry history. The 78 of Mendelssohn's "Hear My Prayer (Oh For The Wings Of A Dove)" went on to sell a million copies, if you count the re-recording of the song made the following year. This classic and the other recordings here from the repertoire of Handel, Schubert (the far from sacred "Who Is Sylvia" and "Hark Hark The Lark") and Brahms are all enjoyable. The ethereal beauty of Master Ernest's voice still shines through on this lovingly compiled CD (which includes a newly discovered test pressing of his huge hit). When his voice broke Ernest returned to the choir as a baritone and made many broadcasts. But it's the timeless beauty of those first recordings that will be always loved by a generation.

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