Sacred Songs

Anybody who has entered into the cosmos of Medtner’s music, and especially of his songs, will be aware of its introvert, secretive, sometimes even hermetic character. His mixture of Russian and German philosophy and art, indebted to the bicultural upbringing in his family, was unique. Yet the outstanding quality of his songs does not lie in their stylistic singularity, but in their resistance to cliches of the genre and their musical and psychological insights.

James Thurston Nabors was an American actor, singer, and comedian. "The Complete Columbia Christmas Recordings" combines Jim Nabors' two holiday albums for Columbia – 1967's Jim Nabors' Christmas Album and 1972's Merry Christmas – adding a couple of seasonal religious tunes from 1968's The Lord's Prayer & Other Sacred Songs and 1971's How Great Thou Art for good measure (as it happens, these bonus cuts include two different versions of "Ave Maria." Of the two albums, the 1967 set is slightly stuffier – there's a reliance on old-fashioned carols and the string arrangements are a bit stiff – but 1971 conjures just a bit of the spirit of Hollywood holiday specials, its strings feeling slightly snazzy, not starchy. His sensibility belongs in an era that was bypassed when these records were recorded, so this release functions as dual nostalgia: pining for pining for days of Christmas past.

SOMM RECORDINGS announces a major new recording of songs by Charles Villiers Stanford including the first complete recording of Songs of Faith and 12 first recordings of other distinctively vital songs.

Garuta's songs, despite being written almost a century ago, only now see their release world premiere in a studio album - carefully selected and recorded by Garuta's former student pianist Maris Skuja and his brilliant stage partner soprano Julija Vasiljeva.

This album was West's first Christian/Inspirational music album. The album featured all Christian-music songs, that had been well-known and well-acknowledged. Songs like "How Great Thou Art" and "His Eye is on the Sparrow" were featured on the album. The album received critical acclaim at the time, and nominated West for a Grammy Award for Best Sacred Performance, her first for that category.

How moving it can be to hear the crystal-clear voices of a boys’ choir. The Schola Cantorum of the Cardinal Vaughan Memorial School, London, has a tradition of fine choral singing that dates back over a hundred years.

Feel your spirit soar and your heart touch depths of peace as the healing sounds, enveloping melodies and layers of orchestral harmonies weave a delicate and rich tapestry of sound that reverberate through every cell. "Sacred Alliance" is an instrumental journey through mountains, forests and sacred lands, carrying the energy of the sacred alliance that grows as we come into alignment with the Divine and the essence of our soul.

Sacred Love is the seventh studio album by Sting. Sacred Love arrives over four years on from Brand New Day and demonstrates that Sting–an artist often criticised for serving up slick yet soulless coffee-table precision–is now positively galvanised by soul.

Following Tallis and Byrd’s first publishing venture of Cantiones Sacrae of 1575, Byrd waited some 13 years to again wake the presses with his compositions. His 1588 Psalmes, Sonets, & songs of sadnes and pietie was his first solo publication, for which Elizabeth’s Lord Chancellor (and notable favourite), Sir Christopher Hatton, acted as patron.

The new recording from Magdalena Kožená features deeply-felt interpretations of sacred songs from the Baroque to the 20th Century.