June 25, 2008

Concordia Choir - Evocations

Pride of Moorhead MN's Concordia College for more than 80 years, the renowned, prolific Concordia Choir has been consistently adding beautiful CDs to the best choral recordings in the PAC catalog, 21 titles to date. Well-known composer/arranger Rene Clausen has been conducting the group for over 20 years. "Evocations" features 20 sacred selections, favorites are Eric Whitacre's "Lux Aurumque," David Childs' unpublished "Purge Me From My Sin," Paul Christiansen's "Vidi Aquam," Knut Nystedt's "Be Not Afraid," Sergei Rachmaninoff's "Come, Let Us Worship" and "Bless the Lord, O My Soul," Felix Mendelssohn's "Psalm 2," and "Psalm 50, Movement 2 and 3," by former Choir director F. Melius Christiansen. Beautiful, soaring music from one of the great choirs of all time! 8871 CD 15.95
Listen to "Psalm 50, Movement 3"

Posted by acapnews at 12:52 AM

June 14, 2008

King's Singers - Simple Gifts

"Simple Gifts" is a very rare and special gift to us, as it represents the first full a cappella studio album by the legendary King's Singers in 10 years. Arguably the most popular a cappella group of all time, whose flawless harmonies grace over 30 finely-crafted CDs and a slew of songbooks in the Primarily A Cappella online catalog, we will assume that you know how good these six British men really are. So let's talk about some of the 16 carefully-selected songs: Billy Joel's classic "She's Always A Woman," James Taylor's sublime "You Can Close Your Eyes," the traditional joyous round "The Gift to Be Simple," Stephen Stills' harmonic CSN&Y gem "Helplessly Hoping," some wonderfully-arranged spirituals, "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot," "Deep River," "The Water is Wide" and "Steal Away," all of which feature some sweet deep bass leads. Randy Newman's poignant "When She Loved Me," Sting's "Valparaiso," Paul Simon's "April Come She Will"…these are some of our picks for the most beautiful songs of all time. They are arranged by group member Phillip Lawson, Bob Chilcott and Peter Knight, and then sung as beautifully as you can imagine by the King's Singers. The King’s Singers incredible blend and tuning goes to ensure that this is probably their finest recording in a long time. Enough said! 8907 CD 16.95
Listen to "April Come She Will"

Posted by acapnews at 12:58 AM

May 24, 2008

Netherlands Chamber Choir - Bach: Motets

For the conductor Peter Dijkstra, “these works are among Bach’s greatest compositions for vocal ensemble. The rhetorical power of Komm, Jesu, komm, the thrilling double-choir passages in Singet dem Herrn ein Neues Lied, the musical signature B-A-C-H at the end of Fürchte dich nicht, every one of these demonstrates Bach’s mastery and his ability to bring a text to vivid life.” This analysis of the relationship between text and music is of great importance to Dijkstra, who leads The Netherlands Chamber Choir in thrilling new performances of the six Motets 8911 SACD 24.95

Posted by acapnews at 1:06 AM

May 23, 2008

I Fagiolini - Monteverdi, Fire & Ashes

Monteverdi’s madrigals are a theatre of the senses: touches, glances, scents, the textures of fabrics, of lips and skin, the shining gold of hair, the deep blue of eyes, the sounds and vistas of nature, the coolness of water, the sun’s warmth, the ecstatic agony of fire and ice. The second volume in I Fagiolini’s Monteverdi conspectus allows us to trace this evolution from the early Mantuan a cappella madrigals that made his reputation to the late concerted madrigals of the 1630s written for the Viennese court – styles seemingly worlds apart, yet both forged by the same desire, to confront and master afresh in each new work the ever-present tension between mere art and real life.
8913 CD 18.95
Listen to "Batto, Qui Pianse Ergasto"






Posted by acapnews at 12:02 AM

May 16, 2008

Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir - Scattered Rhymes

On this fascinating recording, Paul Hillier leads the Orlando Consort and the Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir in the world premiere recording of Scattered Rhymes – a vibrant and powerful new work by Tarik O’Regan (born 1978). O’Regan, a two-time British Composer Award winner, was educated at Oxford University and completed his postgraduate studies at Cambridge, where he was subsequently appointed Composer in Residence at Corpus Christi College. O’Regan now divides his time between Trinity College, Cambridge and New York City, where he has held the Fulbright Chester Schirmer Fellowship in Music Composition at Columbia University and a Radcliff e Institute Fellowship at Harvard. In Scattered Rhymes (2006), the composer combines two fourteenth-century texts that toy with the ambiguities of intertwining sensuous and divine love. To reinforce the work’s medieval connections, Scattered Rhymes is designed to be framed or paired with Guillaume de Machaut’s Messe de Notre Dame (circa 1364). This seminal work is brilliantly performed here by the Orlando Consort. Completing this inventive program are two motets: Ave Regina Coelorum by Guillaume Dufay (c. 1400–1474) and the haunting Super Flumina by Gavin Bryars (born 1943). 8882 SACD 19.95

Posted by acapnews at 12:03 AM

May 13, 2008

Ensemble Amarcord - Album Francais

After three extremely successful CDs with vocal music of the Middle Ages and Renaissance, amarcord turns this time to the wonderful French vocal music of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The exquisite singers from Leipzig once again demonstrate their amazing versatility. Starting in the second half of the 19th century, amarcord present some less well-known facets of the works of Rossini and Saint-Saëns. Meanwhile the 1920s with their pioneering spirit are represented by compositions by Cras, Milhaud, and the young Poulenc, whose entire works for male voices recorded here stretch into the post-war period. But one thing that all the items in this album have in common is their deep rootedness in France and the French: in for instance tradition, dialects, dances, incidents, feelings and savoir vivre. In a nutshell, this album is ‘très français’! 8917 CD 16.95
Listen to "Clic, clac, dansez sabots"

Posted by acapnews at 2:29 AM

May 9, 2008

Holst Singers - Tormis

The Holst Singers are acclaimed as one of England’s greatest non-professional choirs. The talent and commitment of the individual members and the leadership of their mercurial conductor, Stephen Layton, ensure that their performances are always of the very highest standards. Veljo Tormis (born 1930) is - along with Arvo Pärt - Estonia’s most famous living composer, holding an almost mystic status in his home country. He is also the passionate and practical torch-bearer for folk-singing revival, and the integration of an ancient cultural inheritance into thoroughly modern, post-Soviet lives. Interestingly, he trained at the Moscow Conservatory and was steeped in Soviet instruction during his early musical life. His music is almost all written for choirs; few other composers have been so committed to one genre. Tormis’s choral specialization marks him out from Bartók, Kodály, Vaughan Williams and Grainger, whose pioneering interest in folksong was ultimately limited to the use of textless tunes in instrumental or orchestral works. For Tormis, the words and the music are inseparable. The Holst Singers have recently been invited to Estonia to perform Tormis’s music - a great honor, and a mark of their mastery of this repertoire. 8910 SACD 19.95

Posted by acapnews at 1:29 AM

May 6, 2008

Saint Mary's College Women's Choir - Across The Bar..

On the leading edge of the choral art, The Saint Mary's College Women's Choir, under the leadership of conductor Dr Nancy Menk, have assembled a program featuring fine new music from many of the most talked-about new choral composers. American composers William Hawley, Michael Sitton, Frank Ferko and Gwyneth Walker, and Finnish composer Jaakko Mantyjarvi, are just some of the names we'll be hearing about in fine choral music for this generation and the next. The works of these composers, as well as some classics, are assembled and presented here by one of the finest collegiate women's choirs in the U.S. 8906 CD 15.95

Posted by acapnews at 10:59 PM

Choir of New College, Oxford - Nicholas Ludford

The deeply expressive music of Nicholas Ludford (c. 1485-1557) has been re-discovered only relatively recently. Few composers of his stature - comparable to that of John Taverner - have been so comprehensively and so unjustly ignored for nearly fi ve centuries. Recorded in the glorious acoustic of Saint-Martin de Hoff, Sarrebourg - a perfect environment for this extraordinary music - the disc features the Missa benedicta et venerabilis, one of Ludford’s most accomplished festal Masses, with its plainsong propers, and two of his extended votive antiphons: Domine Jesu Christe and Ave cuius conceptio. Under the leadership of Edward Higginbottom, the Choir of New College, Oxford, has gained a worldwide reputation and is known particularly for its stylish performances of Renaissance and Baroque music 8909 CD 18.95

Posted by acapnews at 1:26 AM

April 28, 2008

Notre Dame Glee Club - Beautiful Rain

The Notre Dame Glee Club is a music tradition that began at the University in 1915. Since 1993, Daniel Stowe has led the Glee Club in world-wide tours with great success. Today, Glee Club repertoire is not just football songs, sea shanties and the alma mater theme. In recent years, the choir has been trimmed in numbers to 55 select singers, and their repertoire now focuses upon a wider range of styles: from German art songs, American spirituals, Russian Orthodox, Baroque and Renaissance sacred music, to Barbershop harmony and folk music from nations of the world. The Glee Club's versatility is showcased in the wide variety of genres on this disc.. The musicianship of the Glee Club is all the more remarkable when considering that the Glee Club is a volunteer ensemble, operating independently from music degree programs. Recorded in spring 2007, in the finely-tuned acoustic of Leighton Concert Hall in the newly-finished DiBartolo Performing Arts Center on the campus of University of Notre Dame. 8905 CD 15.95

Posted by acapnews at 11:49 PM

April 5, 2008

Polyphony - Poulenc: Gloria and Motets

Stephen Layton and Polyphony continue to blaze a trail as dazzling interpreters of a wide range of choral music. Here they turn to some of the most bewitching and distinctive choral works of the twentieth century. Francis Poulenc (1899–1963) imbued this well-loved music with a deep expression of his faith and unique personality. Each motet, with its own delightfully etched character, echoes the composer’s study of Bach, Monteverdi, Palestrina, or Gabrieli, but remains stylistically progressive, containing Poulenc’s ingenious chord progressions. The Gloria is one of his most enduringly appealing works. In some ways straightforwardly pious, it is also tinged with mischievous irreverence and a sense of rollicking enjoyment – facets which are deftly captured here by the soprano soloist Susan Gritton, Polyphony, the Choir of Trinity College, Cambridge, and the Britten Sinfonia, all led by Stephen Layton. 8881 CD 18.95

Posted by acapnews at 12:35 AM

March 29, 2008

Stile Antico - Heavenly Harmonies

Grammy-nominated vocal ensemble Stile Antico returns with its second recording for harmonia mundi. Heavenly Harmonies juxtaposes the highly expressive Latin motets of William Byrd (c. 1540–1632) with the austere, homophonic psalm tunes of Thomas Tallis (c.1505–1585) in a performance notable for the British group’s “staggeringly beautiful singing” (The Sunday Times) and recorded in a fittingly majestic acoustic. At the heart of the religious disputes which ravaged 16th-century England, the towering figures of the Catholic Tallis and Protestant Byrd embody two opposing tendencies. What is sometimes overlooked is how much the motets from Byrd’s Cantiones sacrae I and II (1589 and 1591) owe to the concise and expressive language pioneered by Tallis a generation earlier, when he also contributed the nine psalm tunes to a new psalter by Archbishop Matthew Parker (1567) – printed but regrettably never offered for sale. The program also includes Byrd’s Mass Propers for Pentecost from his Gradualia of 1607. 8880 CD 18.95

Posted by acapnews at 12:08 AM

March 21, 2008

BBC Singers - Man I Sing, Choral Music of Bob Chilcott

The world-renowned choral composer and conductor Bob Chilcott leads the BBC Singers, as well as the internationally recognised soloists Simone Rebello and Paul Silverthorne, in these new performances of some of his best and most loved choral works. The choir is renowned as an expert ensemble and here they sing splendidly under Chilcott's direction. The selection of music on this disc has been well made to give a good variety of perspectives on Bob Chilcott's choral output - a resourceful composer and one who writes exceptionally well for voices and he is superbly served here by the virtuosity of the BBC Singers. This is a glorious showcase of one of the finest choral composers at work in Britain today. 8883 CD 15.95

Posted by acapnews at 11:49 PM

March 15, 2008

University of Utah Singers - If Music Be the Food of Love

The Singers proudly present their first 2-disc set! Disc 1 features music from the University of Utah Singers triumphant 2006 European Concert Tour, during which they won the European Grand Prix for Choral Singing in Tolosa, Spain! Reminisce with “I Have Had Singing”, “Daemon Irrepit Callidus”, “A Boy and a Girl”, “Cloudburst” and “Ah, El Novio”. Disc 2 offers an engaging program of your favorites from the 2006-2007 season, including Selections from “Into the Woods”, “One of Those Moments”, “Prayer of St. Francis”, “J’entends le Moulin”, “Stars I Shall Find”, “Conversion of Saul”, “How Can I Keep From Singing” and “Didn’t My Lord Deliver Daniel?” Packed with a delightful variety of music, this album has something everyone will love! 8872 2CDs 24.95

Posted by acapnews at 3:55 AM

March 4, 2008

St. Olaf Choir - Where Peace and Love and Hope Abide

F. Melius Christiansen, founder of the Music Department at St. Olaf College in Northfield, Minnesota, planned and directed the first St. Olaf Christmas Festival in 1912. Over the next 96 years the Festival has grown to include, as individual groups and as a massed ensemble, the St. Olaf Choir, the St. Olaf Orchestra, the St. Olaf Cantorei, The Manitou Singers and the Viking Chorus and Chapel Choir. The result of the coming together of all this huge and joyous talent easily fills two CDs, 30 pieces with some narration that tell the story of Christmas, beginning with the all-instrumental "Messiah, Prince of Peace" and ending with F. Melius' gorgeous "Beautiful Savior." It's hard to pick favorites, but "For Unto Us a Child is Born" from Handel's "Messiah," Steven Sametz' "Noel!," Carl Schalk's "Before the Marvel of This Night," Donald Fraser's "This Christmastide" (Jessye's Carol), the 6-part medley "Carols for the Choirs" arranged by John Ferguson, F. Melius' lovely "Lullaby on Christmas Eve" and Arthur Honegger's "And God Said: One Day Shall Dawn" (King David) come easily to mind. The recordings from this powerful event never fail to touch and move us. Magnificent! 8703 2CDs 24.95

Posted by acapnews at 12:04 AM