I post these playlists weekly with the hope that you might find them useful as you plan your programs. All of my playlists are on Spotify for you to enjoy at your convenience.
GSM – September 9, 2018 https://spoti.fi/2Qoxbge
Don’t forget that we have more choral and organ music programmed
on Sunday evenings beginning at 10 p.m. eastern.
Rob Kennedy
WCPE The Classical Station
Web: TheClassicalStation.org
Facebook: www.facebook/theclassicalstation
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Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina: Nigra sum, sed formosa
Chanticleer, Joseph Jennings
Gabriel Faure: O salutaris hostia
Orchestra of the Toulouse Capitole, Michel Plasson
Roberto Alagna, tenor
John Taverner: Christe Jesu, pastor bone
Cambridge Singers, John Rutter
Our survey of the works of the Italian Renaissance composer Palestrina continues with a performance of “I am black but comely” from the Song of Solomon. Faure’s setting of “O saving victim” dates from 1887. John Taverner (c1490-1545) was the choirmaster for Cardinal College in the days when it enjoyed a rather grand choral establishment of some forty voices.
Gregorio Allegri: Miserere mei, Deus
Choir of Trinity College, Cambridge
H. Walford Davies: Psalm 130, “Out of the deep”
Choir of King’s College, Cambridge, Philip Ledger
Francis Grier, organ
J.S. Bach: O Mensch, bewein dein Sünde groß
Hans Fagius, organ
The Mats Arvidsson Organ, Mariefred Church, Sweden
Originally only heard in the Sistine Chapel during Holy Week, Allegri’s setting of Psalm 51 was introduced to the world by a young Mozart who heard it and copied it from memory. Walford Davies was Organist at London’s Temple Church where his assistant was none other than Leopold Stokowski. This setting of “O man, bemoan thy grievous sin” comes from Bach’s Orgelbuchlein or Little Organ Book, a collection of chorale-preludes for the church’s year.
GSM Commentary: The Very Rev. Amy McCreath
Dean, The Cathedral Church of Saint Paul, Boston, Massachusetts
Sir Edward Elgar, arr. John Cameron: Lux aeterna
Handel and Haydn Society Chorus, Grant Llewellyn
Morten Lauridsen: Ubi caritas et amor
Polyphony, Stephen Layton
Sir Charles Villiers Stanford: Ye Holy Angels Bright, Op. 135 No. 1
Worcester Cathedral Choir, Donald Hunt
This setting of “Let light perpetual shine upon them” is an arrangement of the tune of Nimrod from the Enigma Variations. “Ubi caritas et amor” (where charity and love are) is part of the text to the Antiphon sung on Maundy Thursday during the Washing of the Feet ceremony. Irish composer Sir Charles Villiers Stanford was educated at Queens College, Cambridge. He was a founding professor of the Royal College of Music. His anthem for the four verses of 17th-century author Richard Baxter’s text was composed for unaccompanied SATB choir.
J.S. Bach: Cantata 99, “Was Gott tut, das ist wohlgetan” II
Monteverdi Choir; English Baroque Soloists, Sir John Eliot Gardiner
Malin Hartelius, soprano; William Towers, alto
James Gilchrist, tenor; Peter Harvey, bass
If you are an oboe d’amore or flute fan, you will love the opening chorus. The flute part is especially beautiful. The German translates as “What God does, surely that is right”. This cantata was first performed on September 17, 1724, in Leipzig.
Francis Poulenc: Gloria
BBC Symphony Orchestra and Chorus, Sir Andrew Davis
Christine Brewer, soprano
Imagine a monk with a punk hair-do. That gives you an idea of the remarkable combination of molto religioso moods and flights of wild abandon which awaits you in Poulenc’s Gloria. The work dates from 1959 and was commissioned by the Serge Koussevitzky Foundation of Boston.
Franz Liszt: Fantasia and Fugue on B-A-C-H
Peter Hurford, organ
1978 Rieger organ in Ratzeburg Cathedral, Germany
Hungarian composer Franz Liszt composed his Fantasia and Fugue on B-A-C-H for the consecration of the Ladegast organ in the Merseburg Cathedral. English organist Peter Hurford plays the work on the very fine Austrian Rieger organ in Ratzeburg Cathedral.
Domenico Scarlatti: Mass for four voices
Prague Chamber Choir, Pavel Baxa
Italian composer Domenico Scarlatti is perhaps better known for the more than 500 keyboard sonatas which he composed as opposed to his choral music.
Tomas Luis de Victoria: Missa Pro Defunctis
Choir of Westminster Cathedral, David Hill
Some scholars think that Spanish composer Tomás Luis de Victoria (1548-1611) studied with Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina in Rome. In any event Victoria is considered to be one of the greatest composers of the 16th century.
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