Your top 5 Choral works?

[James]

x

[Justin Ignaz Franz Bieber]

too many to choose but here are a few
- palestrina pope marcellus mass
- cipriano de rore praeter rerum serium mass
- tallis spem in alium
- rachmaninov all-nite vigil

[Don]

My Top Five:

Bach - Mass in B minor & St. Matthew Passion
Mozart - Great Mass in C minor.
Beethoven - Missa Solemnis.
Brahms - German Requiem.

That's about as mainstream as it gets.

[BachQ]

LvB Missa Solemnis
Mozart Requiem
Bach St Matthew Passion
Bach Mass in B Minor
Brahms Ein Deutsches Requiem

[Bonehelm]

LvB Missa Solemnis
LvB 9th
Mahler 8th
Mahler 2nd
Mozart Requiem in D minor

[Mark]

Rachamaninov: All-night Vigil

Brahms: A German Requiem

Faure: Requiem

Mozart: Requiem


... and I'm having THREE final choices, as they're so short they barely constitute ONE work.


Stanford: The Blue Bird

Elgar: The Shower

Pearsall: Lay A Garland

[AnthonyAthletic]

Beethoven : Missa Solemnis
Brahms : German Requiem
Handel : Messiah
Liszt : Christus
Rachmaninov : Vespers

[Bogey]

Rachmaninov "Les vêpres"op.37. Messe Chœur National de l'URSS/Alexandre Svechnikov

Beethoven Choral Fantasy Op. 80 Arnold Schoenberg Chor/Harnoncort/Aimard-Piano

Mozart Requiem Vienna State Opera Concert Choir/Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra /Bohm

Handel "Zadock the Priest"-"The King Shall Rejoice" Academy and Chorus of St. Martin-in-the-Fields/Marriner (and all the other Coronation Anthems by the same ensembles)

Haydn Missa Sancti Bernardi de Offida Chorale Franco-Allemande de Paris/Orchestre Jean-François Gonzales/Lallement*

*Yet to hear a Haydn mass that I did not enjoy.

[Choo Choo]

Yet to hear a Haydn mass that I did not enjoy.

Amen to that.  At least 3 of my top 5 could easily be Haydn masses.  Restricting the choice to just 1 representative per composer gives something like :

Haydn : Paukenmesse
Schnittke : Requiem
Stravinsky : Symphony of Psalms
Bruckner : Fm Mass

plus - if I'm allowed a Bach cantata:

Bach : Ein' feste Burg ist unser Gott BWV80

and if I'm not:

Prokofiev : Alexander Nevsky

[Anne]

Haydn - The Creation (Karajan)
Haydn - The Seasons (Rene Jacobs)
Beethoven - Missa Solemnis (Bohm)
Verdi - Requiem (Riner)
Bach - Christmas Oratorio - (Rene Jacobs)

[Bogey]

Amen to that.  At least 3 of my top 5 could easily be Haydn masses.  Restricting the choice to just 1 representative per composer gives something like :

Indeed.....I have shelved the masses I have from him for a few months and now it is time to enjoy them again.  

[not edward]

These three stand alone, I think.

Beethoven: Missa solemnis
Bach: Mass in B minor
Stravinsky: Symphonie des Psaumes

To throw in a couple of less conventional choices to fill it out:

Ockeghem: Missa prolationum
Gerhard: The Plague

[knight66]

Stanford: The Blue Bird

That is a tiny ecstatic little masterpiece. I have a version with the Cambridge singers and the solo soprano line is beautifully taken.

My top five have almost all been mentioned above. The big guns really, though the Monteverdi Vespers of 1610 should not be left out. Such a rich tapestry of sound and texture. Handel's Theodora would have to be saved from any house fire, a long string of jaw-droppingly beautiful arias.

Mike

[Lethevich]

With questions like this, there is an unfortunate urge to make the most for my money, and therefore I skip a lot of small motets which I otherwise love, but...

Tallis - Spem in Alium
Machaut - Messe de Notre-Dame
Poulenc - Laudes de Saint Antoine de Padoue
Bruckner - Helgoland
Palestrina - Laudate Pueri (motet)

Some ridiculous personal choices. To pick more normal ones:

Monteverdi - Vespro della Beata Vergine 1610
Berlioz - Requiem
Haydn - Theresienmesse (as others mentioned, it could be many)
Josquin - Missa Hercules Dux Ferrariae
Duruflé - Requiem

[Sergeant Rock]

My five plus favorite performances (I am not considering symphonies that employ choruses or oratorios/masses that have a high ratio of solo to choral parts):

Bruckner - Te Deum  Celibidache/Munich Phil

Berlioz - Requiem  Davis/LSO

Bernstein - Chichester Psalms  Bernstein/NY Phil

Janáček - Glagolitic Mass  Mackerras/Czech Phil

I'm going to pull a Mark for my last pick. Three short works:

Fauré - Pavane  Barenboim/O de Paris

Tallis - Why fum'th in sight  Tallis Scholars (tune was used by RVW in his Tallis Fantasia)

Brahms - 13 Kanons Op.113 #13  Chamber Choir of Europe (a six-part canon for female choir, using Schubert's Leiermann melody, lyrics by Rückert)

Here's a 6mb mp3 file of the Brahms' Canon:

http://rapidshare.com/files/41832991/op.133_no13.mp3.html

Sarge

[Xenophanes]

Bach: Magnificat

Brahms: German Requiem

Handel: Messiah

Mozart: Requiem

Prokofiev: Alexander Nevsky Cantata

Beethoven: Symphony No. 9--I know, it's only 12-13 minutes of choral singing but we did it recently and it was great fun once I practiced it enough to get all the high notes in my voice.

I haven't mentioned great works such as Bach's St. Matthew Passion and B minor Mass, Beethoven's Missa Solemnis, Rachmaninov's Vespers and Bells, and other works simply because they aren't my favorites.  it's no reflection on their quality.

[PSmith08]

The winners:

1. J.S. Bach, Matthäus-Passion (BWV 244), McCreesh '03
2. J.S. Bach, Gott der Herr ist Sonn und Schild (BWV 79), Gardiner '05
3. Gustav Mahler, Das klagende Lied, Boulez '70
4. Anton Bruckner, Te Deum, Von Karajan '60
5. Franz Schmidt, Das Buch mit sieben Siegeln, Welser-Möst '98

The honorable mentions:

Stravinsky, Symphonie des psaumes; Lili Boulanger, Psalm 130; Prokofiev, Alexander Nevsky

Note on Mahler:

I would, necessarily, list the 2nd and 8th way above Das klagende Lied, though I do like the cantata, but I'm not sure whether or not to consider those two symphonies "choral works" in the same way that Das klagende Lied clearly is.

[val]

DUFAY: Missa Ecce Ancilla Domini

BACH: Mass in B minor / St Matthew Passion

BEETHOVEN: Missa Solemnis

BRAHMS: Ein Deutsches Requiem

[Mark]

That is a tiny ecstatic little masterpiece. I have a version with the Cambridge singers and the solo soprano line is beautifully taken.

Indeed, Mike. I heard the young soprano, Eloise Irving, sing 'The Blue Bird' live with Oxford Camerata at St. Johns Smith Square two years ago, and her flawless projection of those solo lines was spellbinding. Shame she hasn't recorded it.

[Greta]

Many ones I love mentioned, Alexander Nevsky surely, St. Matthew's Passion, the LvB. Definitely the Mahler. Nice to see Chichester Psalms with a mention.

I'll go ahead and throw out:

Jean Sibelius - Kullervo
Gustav Holst - The Hymn of Jesus
Carl Orff - Carmina Burana (somebody had to  )
Francis Poulenc - Gloria
Eric Whitacre - Cloudburst (so clever!)

John Rutter also worth a mention, his Requiem and Magnificat (City of London Sinfonia conducted by composer) my pick there.