In 1935, the son of the composer Herbert Howells died at the age of nine, of polio. The event was a formative one in Howells' life, and he returned to it repeatedly in his music as late as the Stabat Mater of 1959-1965. This is an especially anguished work that should put to rest the reputation of English music as cool and unemotional. In seven movements, it opposes an ethereal solo tenor, here the gorgeous-voiced Benjamin Hulett, to the sweeping imagery in the choir. Hulett appears once again in the wordless Sine nomine of ...
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In 1935, the son of the composer Herbert Howells died at the age of nine, of polio. The event was a formative one in Howells' life, and he returned to it repeatedly in his music as late as the Stabat Mater of 1959-1965. This is an especially anguished work that should put to rest the reputation of English music as cool and unemotional. In seven movements, it opposes an ethereal solo tenor, here the gorgeous-voiced Benjamin Hulett, to the sweeping imagery in the choir. Hulett appears once again in the wordless Sine nomine of 1922, at the other end of Howells' creative life. The Bach Choir and Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra under David Hill seem uncannily idiomatic in this work, so full of Impressionist harmonies and yet totally English, and in the Stabat Mater, performed here for the first time with some manuscript alterations in Howells' hand, they achieve a genuinely moving performance. The Te Deum, whose 1977 orchestral version is also rarely performed, is a more festive piece and here serves as an...
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Add this copy of Howells: Stabat Mater-Sine Nomine / Te Deum to cart. $23.45, new condition, Sold by Revaluation Books rated 4.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Exeter, DEVON, UNITED KINGDOM, published 2014 by NAXOS.
Add this copy of Howells: Stabat Mater, Te Deum & Sine Nomine to cart. $28.97, new condition, Sold by newtownvideo rated 4.0 out of 5 stars, ships from huntingdon valley, PA, UNITED STATES, published 2014 by Naxos.