Elephantine musical masterworks, common in the Baroque period, are an increasing rarity as time goes on, and recordings of relatively new ones are rarer even still. In recording Sandström: The High Mass, Deutsche Grammophon has rendered a tremendous service in presenting one such gigantic contemporary work in a top-drawer performance led by Herbert Blomstedt with the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, a distinguished cast of soloists and a chorus well trained by Howard Arman. For composer Sven-David Sandström, The High Mass ...
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Elephantine musical masterworks, common in the Baroque period, are an increasing rarity as time goes on, and recordings of relatively new ones are rarer even still. In recording Sandström: The High Mass, Deutsche Grammophon has rendered a tremendous service in presenting one such gigantic contemporary work in a top-drawer performance led by Herbert Blomstedt with the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, a distinguished cast of soloists and a chorus well trained by Howard Arman. For composer Sven-David Sandström, The High Mass represents the culmination of a phase where he began to reject formalistic methods of composition in order to move to a more personal, eclectic, and emotional style. When it was unveiled in 1993, audiences hailed the work, but the local critical community widely condemned it as "a compilation of audience flattering effects," leaving one to wonder if the hearers are broken among critics in Sweden. The High Mass is still tough-sounding stuff at times, but is rhythmically very exciting,...
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