In Praise of St Columba: The Sound World of the Celtic Church
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TRADITIONAL
In Praise of St Columba: The Sound World of the Celtic Church
Barnaby Brown (triple pipes, lyre) / Choir of Gonville & Caius College, Cambridge, Geoffrey Webber
[ Delphian / CD ]
Release Date: Tuesday 20 January 2015
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This groundbreaking programme from Geoffrey Webber's consistently inventive choir seeks to recreate three distinct sound-worlds: 7th-century hymns from Iona, 10th-century chants from Celtic foundations in Switzerland, and 14th-century Columban antiphons from the Inchcolm libellus. As well as the evidence of early notation and of drawings and other indications of instrumentation, the performance styles - developed in an exciting extended collaboration with scholar and piper Barnaby Brown - are informed by oral traditions from as far afield as Sardinia and the Outer Hebrides.
The Choir have often specialised in the rediscovery of forgotten choral repertories, including previously unpublished music from within the English choral tradition and beyond, and their five recordings on Delphian reflect this. Among the accolades their previous releases have received, their 2011 recording of music by the leading British composer Judith Weir (Delphian DCD34095) was BBC Music Magazine's Choral and Song Choice in December 2011. The choir has also joined together with the Choir of King's College London in two recording projects.
'As Geoffrey Webber freely admits, since most of the source manuscripts predate modern notation, these performances are "imaginative speculations, based as much on intuition as on reason". They are certainly none the worse for that in terms of musical conviction and beauty of tone.' BBC Music Magazine: Choral & Song Choice - October 2014
"Who can say whether these interpretations of chants and hymns from the early Celtic church are authentic, but they have been done with intelligence, musicality and enthusiasm…[the choir] give a bracing vigour and unusual freedom to this ancient music." (Observer)
"quite exceptional on every level … [Brown, the Caius College Cambridge Choir and Simon O'Dwyer] bring to life seventh century monastic life… an utterly compelling disk; I might single out the prayer Noli Pater as a particularly magical moment; young voices working at an extraordinarily high level of commitment and interpretation." (Five Stars Early Music Today)
"Webber and his choristers have produced a generously filled disc that seeks to recreate three distinct sound worlds...Everything is performed with a missionary zeal...hauntingly beautiful." (Gramophone)
"What with improvisation, vocal imitations of traditional singers, unusual instruments and scholarly delving, Geoffrey Wheeler, Barnaby Brown and Delphian have produced a generously filled and decidedly ambitious disc. These qualities are matched by the choir and the rest of the performers who have prepared and performed both immaculately and with imagination." (MusicWeb)
Tracks:
Os mutorum, lux cecorum
Loquebar de testimoniis tuis
River Erne horn duet
Adiutor laborantium
Sanctorum piissime Columba
Lauda anima mea Dominum
Noli Pater
Carne solutus pater Columba
Amen dico vobis
Liberasti nos Domine
Cantemus in omni die
Altus prosator
Volens Ihesus linire
Laudate Dominum (Psalm 150)
The Desperate
Battle of the Birds
