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JANSMUSIC RECOMMENDED RECORDING

Songs of Springtime
City Chamber Choir of London

British Music Society BMS417CD
Partsongs for unaccompanied chorus by: Moeran, Benjamin, Bainton, Heward

This was a last minute choice: since it was suddenly April and springtime it seemed appropriate to choose this CD.  I was initially in two minds about it though.  It is a very dry recording, as if you were sitting on the front row of a small concert listening to the choir.  But then I decided that it actually works best that way.  These songs need to be presented right in front of you, rather than in some airy wispy acoustic, in which they would lose their precision.  

On top of that you can't fault the singing on this recording, the choir are absolutely together and respond to every nuance of the text and the music as if it were no effort at all.  In fact the Moeran Songs of Springtime are not that easy, the shifting harmonies catching you unawares at every turn. This is a very natural performance - as if the engineer just turned on the mics and the choir just started singing, such is their skill.  These are traditional works, but written using quite adventurous harmonies.  There is a lovely rendition of The River God's Song, and of "Love is a sickness", and the words are crystal clear in "The Sailor and Young Nancy" which is one of my favourites to sing. "Good Wine" is given the appropriate jolly spirit for a drinking song.

There are also some new works on this CD for me, including the works by the other 3 composers.  The rest of the programme is a little more serious, if not sacred: 3 mystical pieces by Benjamin and 2 pieces by Bainton, including "Night" which is almost my favourite, which just embodies the country scene of peaceful fields, nature retiring for the night, and the sun gently sinking below the horizon, casting its golden glow.  But my favourite comes last and is the Witches' Sabbath by Leslie Heward  which to me is very Brittenesque - think of "for I must consider my cat Geoffrey" and you'll get the picture - in the passage about owls, bats and toads.  Such a wonderful choice of closing piece, with words taken from Ben Jonson's The Masque of Queens, since the end is "to die for" - the final lines "she's come! oh now she's come" are preceded with a pause of such anticipation, and the sense of resolution and the shimmering chords on those words make the ending oh so worth the wait.