Hear My Prayer: Choral Music of the English Romantics

Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com
The first new recording of Vaughan Williams's magnificent Mass in G Minor in more than 10 years, this version from the Chicago-based His Majestie's Clerkes ensemble goes to the top of the list for its exceptional sound and for its solid, thoroughly musical performances. The program is filled out with first-rate renditions of Sir Charles Villiers Stanford's exquisite Op. 38 motets--favorites of choirs and audiences from the minute they were written-- and Hubert Parry's six Songs of Farewell, whose superbly crafted part- writing combines perfectly with the romanticized spirituality of the texts. Except for a brief lapse of intonation in the Vaughan Williams--not unusual even for the finest choirs--these are exemplary performances that make a good case for tempos generally more brisk than we may have heard before. --David Vernier

Tracks:

Mass In G Minor: Kyrie
Mass In G Minor: Gloria
Mass In G Minor: Credo
Mass In G Minor: Sanctus
Mass In G Minor: Agnus Dei
Three Motets Op. 38: I. Justorum Animae
Three Motets Op. 38: II. Coelos Ascendit Hodie
Three Motets Op. 38: III. Beati Quorum Via
Songs Of Farewell: I. My Soul, There Is A Country
Songs Of Farewell: II. I Know My Soul Hath Power To Know All Things
Songs Of Farewell: III. Never Weather-Beaten Sail
Songs Of Farewell: IV. There Is An Old Belief
Songs Of Farewell: V. At The Round Earth's Imagined Corners
Songs Of Farewell: VI. Lord, Let Me Know Mine End

Amazon.com

The first new recording of Vaughan Williams's magnificent Mass in G Minor in more than 10 years, this version from the Chicago-based His Majestie's Clerkes ensemble goes to the top of the list for its exceptional sound and for its solid, thoroughly musical performances. The program is filled out with first-rate renditions of Sir Charles Villiers Stanford's exquisite Op. 38 motets--favorites of choirs and audiences from the minute they were written-- and Hubert Parry's six Songs of Farewell, whose superbly crafted part- writing combines perfectly with the romanticized spirituality of the texts. Except for a brief lapse of intonation in the Vaughan Williams--not unusual even for the finest choirs--these are exemplary performances that make a good case for tempos generally more brisk than we may have heard before. --David Vernier

Album Description

The mixed choir His Majestie's Clerkes takes listeners to the heights of tonal beauty on this CD of rarely recorded, a capella music by three English Romantic composers of the early twentieth century -- Vaughan Williams, Stanford, and Parry. Best known to most concertgoers as a symphonist, Vaughan Williams is represented by a large-scale work for chorus, his Mass in G Minor (1922). The Chicago Tribune described the Clerkes' 1997 concert performance of this work as "rapt, strikingly beautiful . . . a genuinely moving experience." Sir Richard Terry, director of the Westminster Cathedral Choir and leader of the English a capella revival, called Vaughan Williams' mass "one of the greatest choral works of the century" for its fiery intensity and devotional spirit. Stanford's complete Three Motets, Op. 38, includes the beloved, oft-performed Beati quorum via, familiar to choral audiences and singers alike. On the new CD, listeners have the rare opportunity to hear the Beati along with its companion works, Justorum animae, and Coelos ascendit hodie. Parry's six searching, elegiac Songs of Farewell "represent his art at its deepest," notes The Penguin Guide to Compact Discs -- especially the poignantly intense and beautiful harmonies of At the round earth's imagined corners. The songs, based on Biblical psalms and English poems, are considered Parry's most inspired works. In the CD notes, Anne Heider, the Clerkes' artistic director, observes, "The motets have a crescendo of texture, from four parts in the opening work to five, six, seven, and finally eight parts in the last, and a concomitant crescendo of emotional intensity, culminating in the anguished searching of Psalm 39 ["Lord, let me know mine end"]."

Customer Reviews:

Hear this Prayer.......2000-06-28

This CD entralled me. I was skeptical of a twenty-four member ensemble being able to effectively hold together the intricacies of Vaughan William's Mass in G minor, assuming that the work was more fit for 40 or 50 member groups. However, His Majesty's Clerkes do an excellent job of conveying the reverence and solemnity of the mass through their depth and tone and produce a volume greater than the sum of their parts. Even their tonality, which is a difficult function that most choirs have trouble meeting, is very well done. The same can be said of the rest of the works on this CD. Most musicians are familiar with the splendor of the Stanford works and His Majesty's Clerkes are certainly up to the task of confronting a set of works so well known and scrutinized. The Songs of Farewell are works I was previously unacquainted with but now find tremendous pleasure in listening to. Being that Vaughan Williams is my favorite composer, however, I always revert to the mass, for it is there that I believe the true essence of the title of this CD comes forward and makes itself known and prominent. A wonderful buy.