Installed on the Hyperion label with a multi-album contract, the Choir of Royal Holloway at the University of London is the up-and-comer among English chapel choirs. A 2010 recording of music by Lithuanian composer Vytautas Miskinis suggested the choir would try to focus on contemporary music without the obligatory Renaissance motets, and this 2014 release confirms that impression. The all-British program is novel in its way, avoiding most of the rich history of pieces dedicated to St. Cecilia, the patron saint of music. It ...
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Installed on the Hyperion label with a multi-album contract, the Choir of Royal Holloway at the University of London is the up-and-comer among English chapel choirs. A 2010 recording of music by Lithuanian composer Vytautas Miskinis suggested the choir would try to focus on contemporary music without the obligatory Renaissance motets, and this 2014 release confirms that impression. The all-British program is novel in its way, avoiding most of the rich history of pieces dedicated to St. Cecilia, the patron saint of music. It reaches back to Elgar and Vaughan Williams and forward to a pair of newly commissioned works by James MacMillan and Gabriel Jackson. Most of the music may be familiar to Britons who have sung in a choir at some point, but for others it will probably be somewhat obscure and contains several delightful finds. These include the remarkable, almost bitonal There is sweet music by Elgar (1907) and the compact and harmonically ingenious Silence and Music of Vaughan Williams. Within a...
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