Berlioz: Grande Messe des Morts

Signum SIG 280

Berlioz: Grande Messe des Morts – Ensemble Wroc?aw, Gabrieli Consort and Players, Paul McCreesh

This is the first in a new series of releases from the conductor Paul McCreesh and his Gabrieli Consort. Recorded in Poland as part of the Wratislavia Cantans Festival (of which McCreesh is artistic director), this staggering performance of Berlioz’s Grand Mass for the Dead is delivered by a force of more than 400 performers, drawn from the Gabrieli Consort & Players, the Wroc?aw Philharmonic Orchestra and Choir, and students from Chetham’s School of Music.

Founded in 1982 by its Artistic Director, Paul McCreesh, the Gabrieli Consort & Players are world-renowned interpreters of a great choral and instrumental repertoire, spanning the centuries from the Renaissance to the present day. Their performances encompass virtuosic a cappella programmes, mould-breaking reconstructions of music for historical events, and major works from the oratorio tradition. They are regular visitors to the world’s most prestigious concert halls and festivals and have built a large and distinguished discography.

This is the first in a new series of releases from the world-renowned conductor Paul McCreesh and his Gabrieli Consort. Recorded in Poland as part of the Wratislava Cantans Festival (of which McCreesh is artistic director)this staggering performance of Berlioz’s Grand Mass for the Dead is producted by a force of over 400 performers - drawn from the Gabrielle Consort and Players, the Wroclaw Philharmonic Orchestra and choir and students from Chethams School of Music. Future releases with McCreesh will include Mendelssohn’s lijac, Haydn’s The Seasons, Brittens War Reqiuem and re-recording of their famed disc ’A Venetion Coronation’.

Founded in 1982 by Artistic Director Paul McCreesh, Gabriele Consort & Players are world-renowned interpretators of great choral and instrumental repertoire, spaning from renaissance to the present day. Their performances encompass virtuosic a cappella programes, mould-breaking reconsructions of music for historical events, and major works from the oratorio tradition. They are regular visitors to the world’s most presigious concert halls and festivals and have built a large and distinguished discography.

"... the stereo sound is excellent - and the whole production is handsome. This certainly stands at the top of the catalog ..."

Peter J. Rabinowitz - Fanfare - September/October 2012

"...A triumph of performance and scholarship ...

Dan Morgan - musicweb-international.com - 5 May 2012

Recording of the Month
"This thrilling new recording of the Berlioz Requiem is the product of painstaking research as well as some indefatigable hard work on the part of the conductor. paul Mc Creesh ... He has based his numbers and approach on the circumstances of the work’s premiere, including the importance of the scale of the building - vast forces in a vast space - and the positioning of the players in relation to the acoustical venue. So this performance is ’authentic’ to the core and the results are thrilling ... First class."

Simon Thompson - musicweb-international.com - 6 December 2011

"...this is a definitive recording of a staggering piec. Berlioz’s dramatic sense and canny pacing make this vast work as entertaining as it is moving."

Graham Rickson - the Arts Desk.com - 12 November 2011

"...Taken as a whole, this is an intelligent and suprememly memorable reading. As well as offering a musically limpid interpretation, constantly sensitive to the Requiem text as liturgy, not merely as an aural spectacular, the recording is a model of engineering. The young, supple-voiced choirs are enveloped in a rich acoustic bloom, atmospheric without being recessed, and the vast arrays of instrumentalists ... are heard with individuality yet cohesion... mcCreesh reflects on every bar and inflects each nuance, with taste and good judgement... this Grande messe de morts is a thing of unexpected delicacy and beauty. There’s a new quality, too, that shines out from this much-maligned epic: devotional integrity."

Mark Valencia - Classical Source.com - 2 November 2011

"...Anyone in search of a transformative listening experience, Berlioz agnostics among them, should make this release a priority purchase. Expect to hear terrific choral singing and an uncommonly close corporate involvement in the ritual of making music." *****

Andrew Stewart - Classic FM Magazine - December 2011

Editor’s Choice
"...this is the first in a series of choral recordings from these forces, collectively known as Ensemble Wroclaw. McCreesh draws together the vast, disparate forces with aplomb, pacing the more dramatic passages skilfully yet finding great beauty and repose in this most complex of scores. Warmly recommended." *****

Guy Weatherall - Classical Music Magazine - 5 November 2011

*****

P Faulds

Berlioz: Grande Messe des Morts

Ensemble Wroclaw

Wroclaw Philharmonic Orchestra

Paul McCreesh

Robert Murray

Gabrieli Consort

Gabrieli Players

Cheetham's School of Music Symphonic Brass Ensemble

Nicholas Parker

Andrew Halifax

Choir

HECTOR BERLIOZ

Grande Messe des Morts (1837)