This holiday season 2015 release lives up to its title, but it's a specific kind of Very English Christmas that's on offer here, and how you'll feel about it is likely to depend on your reaction toward the repertory as a whole. Signum bills the album as a collection of carols "old and new," but this is not the usual type of English Christmas album with Renaissance standards mixed in with big Romantic, English pieces and a few contemporary cathedral choir works. Instead you get the cathedral choir pieces exclusively, going ...
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This holiday season 2015 release lives up to its title, but it's a specific kind of Very English Christmas that's on offer here, and how you'll feel about it is likely to depend on your reaction toward the repertory as a whole. Signum bills the album as a collection of carols "old and new," but this is not the usual type of English Christmas album with Renaissance standards mixed in with big Romantic, English pieces and a few contemporary cathedral choir works. Instead you get the cathedral choir pieces exclusively, going back only as far as Peter Warlock (1894-1930), who influenced many of his 20th century successors in this style. The run of five sparse yet lively Warlock pieces in the middle of the program is the strongest thing here, and the nimble voices of Nigel Short's Tenebrae are ideal interpreters. Aside from these there are composers who are not household names outside of Britain, and perhaps even not outside British choral circles. An attractive feature of the program is that there are...
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