Sung Mass

The Electric Prunes are an American rock band who first achieved international attention as an experimental psychedelic group in the late 1960s. Their song Kyrie Eleison featured on the soundtrack of Easy Rider. After a period in which they had little control over their music, they disappeared for thirty years, reforming as a recording and touring band in 2001. Mass in F Minor is a 1968 album by the The Electric Prunes, consisting of a musical setting of the mass sung in Latin and arranged in the psychedelic style of the band. At the time of its release it was seen as innovative and adventurous, and it was subject to further interest in 1969 when the song "Kyrie Eleison" appeared in the movie Easy Rider.

Four albums in 15 years is not exactly prolific when it comes to making records. But Annie Lennox has never been one to rush things, and her recorded output as a solo artist in life after the Eurythmics has been stellar. The last time she issued a recording in 2003 with Bare, a collection of deeply committed emotional songs that set a new standard for her artistically, though they were written in the turmoil following her second divorce. Perhaps the reason she hasn't had the time to record is her activism. She's involved herself in causes that range from her primary concern, raising awareness about AIDS/HIV (and she refers to this in the album's notes), to the environment and poverty. But Songs of Mass Destruction isn't a political album by any means, unless the personal is – and often it is. This is another album of love songs; dark love songs. These are breakup ballads, statuesque embers of pain and rage that have simmered down to the traces of that dull ache of emptiness that always exists in the aftermath of something profound.

With the Mass op. 54 for five solo voices and two five-part choirs and the Three Psalms op. 85, we present Spohr's sacred a cappella choral music. Spohr has also achieved something new and extraordinary in this field In the 1821 mass, for example, there are echoes of the Russian Orthodox liturgy which Spohr had become acquainted with during an early trip to Russia. Nothing academic adheres to the works collected here; it is rather expressive music of the highest content, and only Mendelssohn and Brahms were later to write choral music of similar perfection It is sung by the Rundfunkchor Berlin under the direction of Michael Glaeser and Dietrich Knothe.

Under the heading of "old business," someone a while back asked for opinion on the B Minor Mass of Robert Shaw. It is a performance I like a lot. Actually I prefer HIP treatment for Bach, but I think that Shaw goes a long way to give a dynamic life to this music. He has fine singers…..One of my favorites in the mass is the "Laudamus te" and you will go a long way to hear it sung any better than Delores Ziegler sings it….and the opening long phrase in one breath…..in a tempo more relaxed than one hears in other readings. Julianne Banse (Rilling) can also do it in one breath, but at a faster tempo. Veronica Gens (Herreweghe) can make you think that she does it in one breath, but she doesn't quite. She is very clever in this.

Without doubt, the selecction of ones favourite recording within the vast sellection of interpretations of Bach's Mass in B-Minor is a difficult task. I have sung this mass and heard more than ten different recordings of this "miracle of mighty mountain range in the planet of music". For me, Hengelbrocks recording is by far the best one: first of all, Hengelbrocks interpretation is very inspired, with convincing and sometimes innovative tempi, as for instance in the opening Kyrie which, for the first time, I could sense as a funeral march; second, the chorus is brillant, for me even better than the international "stars" as for example the Monteverdi Choir; third, the Soloists wich are members of the choir, integrate perfectly in the whole picture of this master piece; fourth, the balance engineers have done an exceptional work which allows you to hear every detail of the orchestra, soloists and choirs in perfect balance.

The b minor mass is truly one of the cultural pillars of Western civilization. Whether it is a complete patchwork or put together from pieces of a design (most musicologists suggest the latter), this music is- certainly metaphorically and possibly literally- divine! Franz Bruggen chooses to use tempos, not even matched by Gardiner.

Of all the liturgical reconstructions that Paul McCreesh has been offering over the past decade, this is easily the most elaborate. It's astonishing to think that Bach's parish church would have celebrated Epiphany (the 12th day of Christmas, January 6, usually a weekday) as elaborately as this program, and it's fascinating to think of the congregation of the Thomanerkirche anticipating the event around 1740. The entire service is included in the recording, much like the Catholic Masses on record that include the celebrant's prayers and Preface before the Sanctus (chanted in Latin even here), the Scripture chanting (in German here, of course), and all the odd versicles. The sermon is only six minutes long, just a hint of a longer discourse (it would have been at least an hour long, according to the notes).

Bruckner is one of those composers you either love or loathe. The trouble is, most people make up their minds only after hearing his symphonies. But Bruckner also composed some of the most original and profound church music after Bach, and although there are clear connections between the symphonies and the liturgical works, the musical voice is quite distinct. The connections with Rococo and Renaissance choral styles are much clearer – it’s surprising how well the shades of Haydn, Wagner and Palestrina get on with each other – and yet the music never sounds derivative or nostalgically archaic.