This 2007 Chandos CD is actually a digital remastering of recordings made by Richard Hickox in 1975, with the St. Margaret's Westminster Singers. Maybe Hickox, having finished his cycle of the Rubbra symphonies, decided these needed to be back in print as a supplement; if so, I approve the decision! The two major works here are the Missa cantuariensis op.59 (Canterbury Mass) and Missa in honorem Sancti Dominici op.65 (St. Dominic Mass). For postwar masses (they date from 1946 and 1948) they're unexpectedly cool-not exactly somber, but with the austerity of Frank Martin, and modal rather than Major/minor in their harmony. It's more music of aftermath than of victory, but it's affecting and beautiful (two works I use a lot when describing Rubbra pieces), feeling ancient in a way quite different from Arvo Pärt's music. In between come two short choral carols, far warmer than the language of the masses. I grew up with one of them (Dormi Jesu) on a reel-to-reel tape of Christmas music I played every December, along with Jingle Bells and Winter Wonderland. I had no idea there was such a thing as 'serious' and 'popular' music; I just knew I loved listening to this piece -- and until playing this CD for the first time I never knew it was Rubbra. Thanks, Edmund! From the MusicWeb review:
This is music of undemonstrative seriousness diffusing light but without the ecstatic radiance of Howells. The choir is mixed in each of the four works. These are essentially the two 1940s masses framing two short carols. The music is inward. There's nothing at all garish; no pomp and little feeling of ceremony. On the technical side, only for an instant or two do we hear a suggestion of analogue distortion in the wildness and antiphonally bounced bell-evocations of the Gloria in Excelsis from Miss Cantuariensis. Chandos displaying their accustomed integrity warn us that this recording was taken from LP and that there may be distortion. In fact the warning is hardly needed. The singing of the St Margaret's Singers is smooth, spiritual and intellectually engaged. The two brief carols are atmospherically done. Of the two masses the Missa in Honorem Sancti Dominici (a cappella) is the most constantly rewarding, right from its swaying Kyrie to its gothic-dark Agnus Dei. In this work one cannot help but wonder if Rubbra had been influenced by that least religious but most mystical of composers, Arnold Bax in his masterpiece, the motet Mater Ora Filium. Beside the op. 66 work the op. 59 seems almost 'penny plain' despite the presence of the organ. The Latin words are reproduced in full and translated into English, French and German. The background notes are fulsome and are contributed by the composer and by Timothy Storey and Richard Hickox. Design details are well up to Chandos's gold standard. Their choices are pretty much unerring. --Rob Barnett
Disc, booklet, and case are in very good condition.
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