Cambridge Choir Of St John's College, Kenneth Leighton, Frank Martin - Masses For Double Choir

Published Monday 22nd July 2019
Cambridge Choir Of St John's College, Kenneth Leighton, Frank Martin - Masses For Double Choir
Cambridge Choir Of St John's College, Kenneth Leighton, Frank Martin  - Masses For Double Choir

STYLE: Choral
RATING 8 8 8 8 8 8 8 8
OUR PRODUCT CODE: 176637-
LABEL: Delphian DCD34211
FORMAT: CD Album

Reviewed by Steven Whitehead

In the 1920s Frank Martin (1890-1974), a Swiss Calvinist by upbringing, created a numinous setting for double choir of the traditional Latin Mass. However, he decided not to publish it, considering it to be "a matter between God and myself." It was finally released for performance 40 years later, around the same time that the Edinburgh-based composer Kenneth Leighton (1929-1988) made his own double-choir setting. Both pieces will be of interest to choral singers although I suspect that only the most confident of choirs will tackle them. You will notice that I am speaking of the two settings as though they are one. There are, of course, similarities. The texts, for example, are almost identical and both settings are sung very well by the Choir of King's College, London under Director Joseph Fort and with notable contributions in the Leighton setting from Mimi Doulton (soprano), Caitlin Goreing (alto), William Hester (tenor) and Joseph Edwards (bass). For this listener Kenneth Leighton's Mass (Opus 44) rather passed me by. I listened, felt neither hot nor cold beyond recognising that there was some good singing going on, and had almost forgotten it before it had finished. Frank Martin's "Mass For Double Choir" thrilled me and I was ready to press repeat as soon as it finished. Why? I do not know and concede that this is a feeble response in a review. Both settings are musically competent, both performed as well as one could expect, one left me cold and the other makes me want to find out what else the composer has written. Having the two Masses for double choir on one disc does make it a useful reference recording, aided by the excellence of the audio quality, thanks to the skill of producer/engineer Paul Baxter and the clear acoustic at the Church of St John the Evangelist at Upper Norwood. Whether I will return to both settings with the same frequency is unlikely but of course you, dear reader, may disagree and I would hate to put anyone off investigating this recording because I did not particularly like one of the settings. A short organ postlude by the teenage Jehan Alain (1911-1940), written on retreat in a monastery in 1930, follows like a voluntary concluding the liturgy. It is well played by James Orford but at six minutes is far too short to make it an essential purchase on its own. It does though sit well with what has gone before and takes the CD's total playing time beyond the hour mark.

The opinions expressed in this article are not necessarily those held by Cross Rhythms. Any expressed views were accurate at the time of publishing but may or may not reflect the views of the individuals concerned at a later date.

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