Reviews
Review Search
Latvian composer Ēriks Ešenvalds has not only become one of the most celebrated composers in Latvia, but his works are reaching and touching audiences all over the world. Particularly his choir music – his pieces have been performed by choirs not just in Europe, but North America, Africa, Australia, and many other places in the world. In recognition of the world wide resonance of Ešenvalds’ choir...
I first encountered the music of the Latvian composer, Ēriks Ešenvalds in 2011 when I reviewed a disc of his music conducted by Stephen Layton. On that occasion Layton was joined by his choir, Polyphony and the Britten Sinfonia; now he explores more of Ešenvalds’ choral music with the help of his Trinity College, Cambridge choir.
Two Oxbridge Colleges are closely linked to this programme. One is...
Born in 1977, Latvian Ēriks Ešenvalds is principally known as a composer of choral music. This album commemorates a two-year stint as Fellow Commoner at Trinity College, Cambridge, whose choir is here joined by Trinity Brass and harpist Sally Pryce. Ešenvalds’s style is resolutely tonal, at times harking to the Anglican tradition (in the Trinity Te Deum and the Merton College Service), and at...
When I initially heard and reviewed the first recording completely dedicated to the music of Latvian composer Eriks Esenvalds (b. 1977), I knew that I had stumbled upon a composer with a deep love and respect for music. He avoids the trap, that most of today's choral composers fall into, of over-manipulating his material or following trends. He allows the structural and harmonic progression of...
One critic has dubbed the music of Latvian composer Eriks Esenvalds "relentless rapture," and it's true that the choral pieces here, mostly unaccompanied (a harp is a nice addition in three of them), do not vary widely in mood. But one can't blame Esenvalds for moving into what is clearly a wide-open space in the market between Baltic holy minimalism and the harmonic and philosophical warm bath...