Top 11 Favourite Sacred Works

[knight66]

Well, if you have not heard it kyjo, I am surprised you would be so firm about it and wonder if others would give credence to your opinion.

Mike

[Sammy]

A very fine composer but one I could do without.

You're so smug about this.  You express a "who cares" attitude about Brahms, Strauss and a host of other famous composers.  At the same time, you praise dozens of obscure composers and works that deserve their obscurity.  Personally, I put no faith in your extreme opinions on these matters.

[TheGSMoeller]

I really am keen to know how people find the Strauss.

Mike

I'm struggling to decide if I should just purchase the Amazon MP3 of the Accentus disc for $4 so I can listen to it tonight, or just go ahead and order the disc. Considering how much Struass' music means to me I really should have a hard copy in my collection.

[knight66]

I'm struggling to decide if I should just purchase the Amazon MP3 of the Accentus disc for $4 so I can listen to it tonight, or just go ahead and order the disc. Considering how much Struass' music means to me I really should have a hard copy in my collection.

That is certainly the version I recommend. There was a new one very recently that has very young voices and was reviewed kindly rather than enthusiastically. The Accentus disc is virtuosic.

Mike

[Karl Henning]

Thanks, gents!

[AnthonyAthletic]

One of my recent discoveries, mentioned several times in the past weeks: Franz von Suppe's Requiem.

Now this does sound interesting, Suppe does Requiem!  I don't or rather haven't listened to much Suppe over the years as through my ignorance I've got him down totally typecasted as a half time Superbowl composer....oh, the shame on me.  All those years of listening to Alan Keith on the BBC's Your Hundred Best Tunes....(great show but Keith=Suppe=Marches)...

This is one I feel I must investigate 

[Karl Henning]

Terribly unfair, Tony;  von Suppé's music has not been played at a football game since that notorious Yale VS. Rutgers contest of 1907!

[AnthonyAthletic]

Terribly unfair, Tony;  von Suppé's music has not been played at a football game since that notorious Yale VS. Rutgers contest of 1907!

Have you heard his Requiem Karl?  I hadn't heard of it until a couple of days ago.  Definately going to buy a copy but there's not much choice out there; Amazon UK looks restricted to 6 versions one looks like vinyl so that's a no go since my amp with the phono stage packed in last year.  I have appx 300 vinyls so the outlay on a phono amp isn't worth it...but I do like to look at them...sadly.

[Karl Henning]

Have you heard his Requiem Karl?

Not yet. Tony, but I Cato has my interested piqued . . . and the late surge in the topic has me thinking that it is time.

[Cato]

Have you heard his Requiem Karl?  I hadn't heard of it until a couple of days ago.  Definitely going to buy a copy but there's not much choice out there

This is the one I bought and am more than satisfied: the notes mention Brahms praising von Suppe's sacred music most highly, so that should be the ultimate recommendation!

[asin]B00ARWDRVU[/asin]

I also mentioned the Psalm 150 by Cesar Franck, a work often sung by the parish choir when I was a child, and a marvelous little piece.

Unfortunately, there are few recordings of this available...at least via Amazon.

[Brahmsian]

All this talk of von Suppe makes me miss Mr. Operetta himself, Harry Tchaikovsky. 

[TheGSMoeller]

Josquin des Prez: Missa La sol fa re mi
Thomas Tallis: Spem in alium
Monteverdi: Vespro della Beata Vergine 1610
Heinrich Ignaz Franz Biber: Requiem in F minor
Hector Berlioz: Grande Messe des morts, Op. 5
Berlioz: L'Enfance Du Christ
Elgar: The Dream of Gerontius
Poulenc: Stabat Mater
Britten: War Requiem
Henryk Górecki: Miserere
Zbigniew Preisner: Requiem for my Friend

I just realized I made a HUGE omission here, I must add Berlioz: L'Enfance Du Christ to my list. The Flight to Egypt overture, the trio movement for flutes and harp, and the final tranquil moments between the tenor and choir. This is pure beauty.

[knight66]

Scrolling, My eye caught 'Josquin des Prez' and a shiver ran down my back......then I realised it was the composer! As you were folks.

Mike

[DaveF]

My pleasure for both of you who [Strauss's Deutsche Motette] may have hooked. Do let me know how you get along with it. heady stuff with a soprano soloist arcing across the top of it.....enjoy.

I am encouraged by the number of people who mention the Berlioz Te Deum. It really sweeps along. I have been lucky to sing in it several times, it feels like flying.

I think I made a wrong listening choice with the Strauss first time - a group called The Esoterics - so wasn't overly impressed, despite its obviously being full of gorgeous Strauss-isms.  Then heard the Danish Radio Choir under Stefan Parkman, also on Spotify, and it sounded like a completely different piece.  Despite taking almost two minutes less than The Esoterics, the Danes manage to sound relaxed where The Esoterics sound frantic - and I'm not even sure they're singing the right notes in some of the denser bits, which sound more like [fill in avant-garde composer of your choice - I'm not sticking my head over the sandbags] than Strauss.  The fugue particularly came like a slap in the face, whereas Parkman makes it flow naturally out of what has preceded.

As to the piece itself, I didn't hear much Spem in alium in it - at least no more than any large multi-part vocal piece has a particular generic sound.  Pure Strauss, in fact - Metamorphosen for voices, almost.  A small disappointment was down entirely to my shaky German grammar - I'd thought that Motette was plural, so expected more than one of them... Altogether dangerously seductive - I must go and listen to some plainchant now to sober up.

I've sung the Berlioz a couple of times too - Bass I on both occasions, and I appreciate the "flying" description, especially of the 8-part choruses (Tu Christe Rex gloriæ for example), where all sorts of different layers are moving at different speeds.  And are those Sanctuses in the Tibi omnes the most beautiful thing ever, or what?  The heavenly choirs can sing them in the unlikely event of my ever getting there - after some Byrd, of course.

DF

[knight66]

Dave, Thanks so much for getting back. I hope you will go back to the piece, I found it a slow burner, then.....suddenly on about the third hearing, i began to get it. I agree it does not sound like Tallis, but it has the density of texture and the full score is about as large....i saw it, I did not read it.

I would love to have another bash at the Berlioz, it is a favourite of mine and within that fast exciting ride I experienced something very rare for me, a feeling that nothing could go wrong, like being locked securely into that flight, a kind of ecstasy which I only ever experienced about four times in all the years I sang.

Mike 

[Karl Henning]

I just realized I made a HUGE omission here, I must add Berlioz: L'Enfance Du Christ to my list. The Flight to Egypt overture, the trio movement for flutes and harp, and the final tranquil moments between the tenor and choir. This is pure beauty.

Aye. If I were pressed, Greg, chances are excellent I should nominate that as my favorite Berlioz score.

[Karl Henning]

Scrolling, My eye caught 'Josquin des Prez' and a shiver ran down my back......then I realised it was the composer! As you were folks.

Mike

Glad I had finished swallowing my tea before reading that . . . .

[knight66]

Glad I had finished swallowing my tea before reading that . . . .

It was a nasty moment when I saw that name; and then relief flooded me when I realised it was just a wife murderer, not an ex-member of our site, phew.

Mike

[North Star]

It was a nasty moment when I saw that name; and then relief flooded me when I realised it was just a wife murderer, not an ex-member of our site, phew.

Mike

That's Gesualdo  -or did every Renaissance composer kill their spouses 

[knight66]

Yes, yes....I almost looked it up and then convinced myself I had the right one, thanks.

Mike