Macmian The Sixteen

The Sixteen, bright stars of the Baroque, have plenty to say on 20th-century repertoire (witness their excellent Britten series on Collins). Underpin them with the BBC Philharmonic and it might seem a magic formula. Ives’s unearthly The Unanswered Question holds few problems for instrumental players weaned on Maxwell Davies – no more than do the brilliant wind roulades of Stravinsky’s Symphony of Psalms. Deft BBC teamwork and a chamber articulation to woodwind and brass helps this Koussevitzky-commissioned masterpiece to shed its often hammy ‘big band’ sound, creeping closer to the subtle, leaner sonorities of his later choral works. It gains. The singing varies. Too many dynamic shifts sound prosaic or under-prepared; fortes are forced, with muddy results. The vocal blend (happier in lower voices) can seem haphazard and colours the Tippett, where the men’s roars – contrast the lovely, sensual soprano solo – seem crude. Get this disc, instead, for the rare, late Poulenc – his New York-commissioned Sept répons. It is a curiously under-recorded devotional work, bleeding with pathos yet pumping energy, its exoticism enhanced by slightly breathy, tender solos, and scintillatingly sung with just those crucial missing qualities of awe and freshness. A million times more refined than what goes before.

The Indian Queen was one of Henry Purcell's final works and may in fact have been left unfinished at his death. Defining the state of the text is complicated by the fact that the work is a so-called semi-opera, a defunct form that mixed spoken dialogue, singing, and dance; the function of the surviving music isn't always totally clear. For those reasons, the work hasn't often been recorded. Many of the individual numbers are splendid examples of Purcell's style, with his sparkling ensemble dances and exuberantly rhythmic major-key tunes that seem to shake off dour minor introductory sections.

What would singing be without words? When you combine wonderful poetry with exquisite music, the result is magical. In a rare break from the sacred collections they are famed for, this album from The Sixteen features a whole programme of secular music devoted to English partsongs. From Stanford’s cycle of Eight Partsongs based on the sparing yet infectious poetry of Mary Elizabeth Coleridge to Bridges’ lyrically descriptive writing in Finzi’s Seven Poems of Robert Bridges and Imogen Holst’s idyllic Six Part-Songs Welcome Joy and Welcome Sorrow using verses by John Keats, each setting captures the mood of the poem brilliantly.

At the royal court in 17th-century England, musicians were expected to perform at high days and holidays: the king’s birthday, New Year, and when the monarch returned to London from his summer break. Purcell adds his usual musical panache and genius for word setting to such miniature jewels as the 15-minute Welcome, Viceregent of the Mighty King and Fly, Bold Rebellion, a seven-movement ode celebrating the king’s return to the Palace of Whitehall after the quelling of a “disloyal crowd.” Harry Christophers assembles musical forces in line with Purcell’s own, and all perform with flair and elegance.

Once again The Sixteen and the Genesis Foundation have teamed up to bring premiere recordings of a fascinating selection of new choral commissions to audiences worldwide. The five new choral works on this album – by James MacMillan, Will Todd, Anna Semple, Eoghan Desmond and Lisa Robertson – all grew from a meditation by St John Henry Newman. Canonised in October 2019, Newman's writings represent a rich and thought-provoking legacy and, alongside the new works presented, are immortalized in three well-known hymns and Sir Edward Elgar’s exquisite elegy They are at rest. Also included are two of Elgar’s psalm settings – Great is the Lord and Give unto the Lord. These are monumental works for choir and organ, full of grandeur and drama, but also inherently simple. The album ends with a Bonus track by Bob Chilcott - also a Genesis Foundation commission - based on Psalm 139.