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None of the music ... gets the spine tingling as much as the Schnittke choral music sung by the Holst Singers, conducted by Stephen Layton, on Hyperion CDA 67297. Minnesang, from 1981, features 52 voices surging ecstatically through medieval German love songs. In the 40-minute Concerto for Mixed Chorus, from the mid 1980s, Schnittke adopts the hieratic manner of the Russian Orthodox church: music...
From its very opening the Choir Concerto proclaims its affiliations to the Russian choral tradition. Completed in 1985, it is one of the most imposing of all Schnittke's later works - 40 minutes long, and setting passages from an Armenian book of lamentation - using a language that makes constant reference to the melodic shapes and diatonic harmony of the Orthodox liturgy. This superbly performed...
Polyphony met the Age of Enlightenment; they said “Handel’s oratorio ?”, the others said “Stephen Layton conducting “, the consequence was Emma Kirkby, Michael Chance, James Gilchrist and David Wilson-Johnson; and the world said “wow!”
'Other than to assure you that it works for me, need I say more?'
'Lovingly rendered by Polyphony under Stephen Layton, this should be a disc of choice not only for this year but as well as for the years to come'
Superb performances which are beautifully recorded