Ho - Ho - Ho

 

Not quite Christmas fare.

Benjamin Britten's cantatas are always quirky affairs, and I slyly knew that when I listened to this recording last on December 23rd.

The 50-minute cantata is extremely characterful, focusing on sections of St. Nicolas life and the legends surrounding the religious figure. From the strange Pickle Boys incident, to the monumental congregational scene, where conductor Matthew Best pulls together seven regional choirs in addition to the Corydon Singers.

Oddly, Hyperion sponsored another recording a few decades later from Stephen Layton and the Holst Singers. Both recordings have positive qualities, but I hardly needed another recording of Ceremony of Carols from that newer recording. In this earlier performance, Best and Corydon offer the ever-delightful a cappella Hymn to St. Cecilia as a short extra.

A review from 2019

Benjamin Britten’s 10-minute, a cappella Hymn to St. Cecilia has been very well represented on disc, not to mention by English choral masters alone. Here, Matthew Best and the Corydon Singers give a swift reading, just under 10 minutes, traversing Britten’s odd tonalities deftly. The adult Corydon Singers have the little-to-vibratoless sopranos typical of English chamber and cathedral choirs, not my favourite sound, but well done here and typical of this work. My go to Hymn to St. Cecilia’s have been The Cambridge Singers under John Rutter on Collegium with a very similar sound to Corydon, and John Eliot Gardiner and the Monteverdi Singers on DG who are more symphonic in approach and give a little more bite than most, plus it is coupled with a characterful choral Spring Symphony that is also quite good.

On the flip side, Britten’s cantata St. Nicolas is relatively scarce on record: Stuart Bedford leads an adult-only chorus version on Naxos that shirks Britten’s request for boy’s and girl’s choruses (but shares the Gospel Oak recording venue) but has the late tenor Philip Langridge in attendance, a rival Stephen Layton also on Hyperion that pairs Ceremony of Carols with St. Nicolas, and this Hyperion Matthew Best performance, one of the earliest St. Nicolas’ I can remember outside of Britten’s mono recording, although this recording was only just performed in 1988. Oddly, Hyperion has a third St. Nicolas led by the late Stephen Cleobury from 2012, also with St. Cecilia, but it doesn’t have the clout of the previous three, Cleobury’s pairings, though, are generous.

The story of St. Nicolas is a colourful one, filled with unusual tales and a strong religious moral, but makes for a very quirky musical composition. Britten’s musical language is diverse and complex, the opening prologue and Nicolas in Prison are an example of Britten’s more challenging musical language. But Britten has always mixed in wit and grandeur alongside his modern sounds, the Birth of Nicolas with its upbeat jollity and odd percussion, the bold seafaring music for men’s chorus that accompanies Nicolas’ Journey to Palestine, the hoary congregational singing on making Nicolas bishop, and the odd stories of Nicolas’ various good-doings, including the pickled boys, are each given diverse and characterful musical settings. Britten’s compositions are never the most straight-forward to listen to, it requires attention and a decent iron constitution for musical innovation and complex musical language, but it is always interesting and rarely leaves the listener in a state of torpor.

It appears that Matthew Best has done his most to replicate the numbers of performers and types of performers that Britten had implicitly required, and also sees to the spatial relations of the performing forces as well, and this is where Matthew Best’s performance excels. You can really feel the full force of the sheer numbers during the Doxology and closing chorale, as well as the hauntingly distant singers in the pickled boys, for example, an aspect lost on the other recordings. That said the acoustic of Gospel Oak does put some distance on the main adult chorus, the Corydon Singers, which blurs a little of the diction and immediacy, an aspect that Layton and his Holst Singers combined with the Trinity College singers bring clear to the fore. However, here the English Chamber Orchestra, the piano duo, and an odd collection of percussion, all speak with clarity and are perhaps a little too forward in relation to the singers, but give plenty of energy and colour to the proceedings.

The tenor soloist is the late Anthony Rolfe Johnson who gives this performance his all, from mystery to heroism, and thankfully does not have the typical English tenor bleating quality that pervades many of these English recordings. Rolfe Johnson is pitch-perfect accurate in the angular leaps required of the part, and competing tenor Allan Clayton, who has youth and power on his side, cannot compete on Rolfe Johnson’s authority and wisdom of performing Britten’s unusual texts and moods. Rolfe Johnson’s opening utterance of "God is Glorified" is a stunning declamation that sets the pace of his performance. Boy treble Harry Briggs is fine, if not too set back in the sound. The Corydon Singers are always of the highest calibre, and even if their vibrato-less sopranos are not my favourite sound quality, it is pretty typical for traditional English music and the music of Britten, and they commit and tune exquisitely. Layton’s performance has a slight gain on Best for more immediate choral voices in the soundscape, if he doesn't show the spatial relationships of the voices and the mass sound of the congregational voices as well as Matthew Best does. Lastly, this Hyperion recording is at a very low level, and while I can turn up my sound system satisfactorily, not all digital devices allow you to crank recordings, an unfortunate bother for downloads.

The timing of this presentation is 60-minutes total, and so Stephen Layton’s lengthier pairing on Hyperion might be more enticing, although I need another Ceremony of Carols like I need another hole in my head, and the Trinity College women are a little too oddly emphatic with Ceremony for me. I will give the nod to the Layton performance for a more immediate choral sound and a youthful tenor soloist, but this Hyperion Matthew Best recording, including the Corydon Singers’ Hymn to St. Cecilia, Anthony Rolfe Johnson, and Best’s working of Britten’s performing instructions in St. Nicolas, all in committed performances, is very well done.

 

 

 

 

 

Works
Saint Nicolas, op. 42 (50.04)
Hymn to St. Cecilia, op. 27 (9.56)

Soloists
Anthony Rolfe Johnson, tenor

Performers
John Scott, organ
Corydon Singers
English Chamber Orchestra
Matthew Best, conductor

Label: Hyperion
Year: 1989
Total Timing: 60.16

 

 

 

I know not everyone enjoys the quirky cantatas of Benjamin Britten, but I love 'em!

Matthew Best & Co., really put on quite a production here, with tenor Anthony Rolfe Johnson on hand.

A wonderful program!