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LYRITA RELEASES RICHARD BLACKFORD, MIRROR OF PERFECTION AND VISION OF A GARDEN ON 6 MAY 2022 - Elizabeth Watts, Roderick Williams, Ikon Singers, Britten Sinfonia / Stephen Gadd, The Bach Choir, Philharmonic Orchestra, David Hill

24/3/2022

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Lyrita Records releases Richard Blackford's Mirror of Perfection, with soprano Elizabeth Watts, baritone Roderick Williams, the IKON Singers and Britten Sinfonia, and Vision of A Garden, with baritone Stephen Gadd, The Bach Choir and the strings of the Philharmonia Orchestra, both conducted by David Hill, on 6 May 2022 (SRCD.406 Dolby Atmos recording). This is the first recording of Vision of a Garden, and the second of Mirror of Perfection.
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Click above to download on iTunes or stream on Apple Music
Vision of a Garden was first performed by The Bach Choir, baritone Gareth Brnmor John and Philharmonia Orchestra conducted by David Hill, on 24 October 2021 at London's Royal Festival Hall, and recorded for Lyrita at St Augustine's Church, Kilburn. The work is based on Bach Choir member Professor Peter Johnstone's experience of serious illness with COVID-19.

Professor Johnson was the first COVID patient admitted to Cambridge's Addenbrokes Hospital's Neurosciences and Trauma Critical Care Unit. He remained in hospital, often unconscious, for 75 days, yet recovered and was able to sing in work's first performance. During his time in hospital, the nurses caring for Professor Johnson left messages of support in a series of 'ICU diaries': he describes these as
'the most heart-warming documents I’ve ever read.'


WATCH THE ICU DIARIES TRAILER

'I have a duty to tell the world what I went through':
how COVID-fuelled visions inspired a new choral work.
Ivan Hewett, The Telegraph


Richard Blackford profiled: Gramophone Magazine, April 2022

Robert Hugill interviews Richard Blackford about Vision of A Garden:Planet Hugill

'Cambridge Professor recovers to sing Choral Music': BBC News

'Eine ausdrucksstarke Interpretation, die ihren Eindruck auf den Hörer nicht verfehlt.'
Uwe Krusch, Pizzicato


Richard Blackford comments about re-recording Mirror of Perfection:

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Richard Blackford comments on Lyrita's new version of Mirror of Perfection:

'I was delighted when Lyrita agreed to make a new recording of
Mirror Of Perfection. Since conducting it myself for Sony Classical in 1997 with the Bournemouth Symphony Chorus and Bournemouth Sinfonietta I have heard it performed dozens of times around the world. Hearing different conductors’ interpretations, with both symphonic and chamber, amateur and professional choirs, I was intrigued by the prospect of Lyrita making a recording that was completely unlike the earlier one.

Encouraged by David Hill, who had already conducted and recorded many of my choral works, I decided that the new recording would be different by choosing a 24-voice professional chorus, the superb Ikon singers.  I heard the contrapuntal writing with a new transparency, luminosity and beauty. Whereas in the earlier recording the soloists had to be overdubbed because of scheduling issues, Roderick Williams and Elizabeth Watts were recorded live with the chorus and orchestra, as always intended. The resulting ensemble has a new vibrancy and immediacy - one really can imagine that Williams
is St Francis of Assisi, especially in his charming rendition of Canticle of The Birds. Elizabeth Watts brought a heightened sense of drama with her thrilling high notes in Movements IV and VI, when she soars effortlessly over the chorus and orchestra. The stormy third movement In foco l’amore mi mise is unlike anything I had heard previously: tenors and basses articulate their rapid quaver passages with exemplary diction and clarity. In many respects, however, the Lyrita recording is more intimate: the final movement's hushed “Beati quelli che sosterrano in pace” has a stillness and sense of peace that I had never experienced before. In the new recording I had a chance to slightly re-balance the orchestral score, especially the postlude.

Under David Hill, the Britten Sinfonia’s playing is breathtakingly beautiful, especially the interludes in the fifth and seventh movements. The exposed, closing three-horn coda was perfectly tuned and balanced. Hill’s choices of tempo are often a little brisker than those I chose in 1997, and the piece is better for it. The new Lyrita recording's success is the sum of many parts of its brilliant team of musicians and technicians. Hearing the final Dolby Atmos mix in Andrew Walton’s studio was one of the most thrilling aural experiences of my life.'


Mirror Of Perfection received a gala performance in Palma Cathedral, Mallorca by the Orquesta Sinfonica de Baleares conducted by Joan Company on 11 April 2022 in the presence of Queen Sophia of Spain.
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 Electronic press kit is available: for inquiries, click CONTACT US below.
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NIMBUS RECORDS AND ULYSSES ARTS ANNOUCE PRESS AND COMMUNICATIONS PARTNERSHIP FROM MARCH 2022

4/3/2022

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The Nimbus Records Group and Ulysses Arts are pleased to announce a press and publicity partnership, starting in March 2022. James Ross, Ulysses Arts' director, comments:

'I have been listening to recordings made by Nimbus, Lyrita and Prima Voce for many years with pleasure and admiration. It is a pleasure for Ulysses Arts to be working alongside Nimbus and its partner labels to maximise the visibility and appreciation of the imaginative recordings and meticulous work presented in its albums.'


Ulysses Arts will provide electronic press kits for Nimbus and Lyrita recordings, alongside press releases on our website.

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CRD Records launches Resurrexi! Easter in Vienna with Mozart and The Haydn Brothers - Choir of Keble College Oxford, Instruments of Time & Truth, Paul Brough on 1 April 2022

7/1/2022

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Stream on Apple Music or download with booklet from iTunes - click above
CRD Records are delighted to announce the release of Resurrexi! Easter in Vienna with Mozart and the Haydn Brothers on 1 April 2022. Recorded with the The Choir of Keble College Oxford and Instruments of Time & Truth, the album is conducted by Paul Brough. Resurrexi! is CRD’s third album with Keble, following Ceremonial Oxford (2017) and Ave Rex Angelorum (2020).

Resurrexi!, recorded in 2021 in the Victorian splendour of Keble College Chapel, celebrates Easter in music – a full mass sequence based around Mozart’s Spaurmesse K. 258, interspersed with plainchant and a treasury of Viennese classical sacred music by Joseph and Michael Haydn. The result offers an imaginary recreation of an opulent service that might have been heard at Vienna’s Stephansdom, or at the Prince-Archbishop of Salzburg’s court.

Ressurexi!’s soloists are Emily Dickens, soprano, Rebekah Jones, mezzo-soprano, Philippe Durrant, tenor and Graham Kirk, baritone and cantor.


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CRD is one of the world’s longest-running record labels, spanning more than five decades and 200 releases, including many first recordings. Following the passing of CRD’s founder, Graham Pauncefort, in late 2021, CRD now is directed by his son and daughter, Tom and Emma Pauncefort: Ressurex! is the first release under their management.

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‘Resurrexi! is an enticing opportunity to hear some rarely played music in eager and engaging performances. ... An immensely enjoyable recording.' David Threasher, Gramophone Magazine

'This celebration of Easter ... amply succeeds in giving both spiritual and musical satisfaction.'Brian Robins, Early Music Review


'So sweetly done that you’re immediately tempted to hit the replay button.'
Graham Rickson: The Arts Desk - April 2022


Resurrexi in Europadisc's 2022 Easter Highlights

RESURREXI ALBUM LINKS:

iTUNES

QOBUZ



SINGLE PRE-RELEASE FROM RESURREXI

MOZART, REGINA COELI


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JASON REBELLO AND OPUS ANGLICANUM - ADORNA

10/12/2021

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Jazz pianist Jason Rebello and English vocal ensemble Opus Anglicanum join forces on their album Adorna, released on 28 January 2022 (UA210140) on Apple Music, Spotify, HDtracks, Deezer, Amazon Music, Qobuz, TIDAL, YouTube and all main digital services, and on CD. The track bearing the album's title name was pre-released as a single on 31 December 2021.
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Adorna - album - released on 28 January 2022. Click above to download on iTunes with booklet or stream now on Apple Music.
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Adorna - single - released on 31 December 2021. Click above download on iTunes.

Candlemas is the winter day that all the Church’s candles for the year were blessed, and in pre-Christian times, was a festival of the first stirring of spring. In Adorna, ancient monastic chants, sung annually through the centuries in cathedrals and abbeys to mark this feast, are transformed to give a new interpretation of light dispelling darkness.

Stephen Burrows, alto
David de Winter, tenor
John Bowen, tenor
Roland Robertson, baritone
James Birchall, bass
Jason Rebello, piano


Recorded live in concert in Turner Sims Southampton, University of Southampton, 2020

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Jason Rebello and Opus Anglicanum started their professional career recording and performing in the late 1980s. Opus Anglicanum's world – which embraces a cappella Renaissance polyphony and Gregorian chant, folksong, music hall, contemporary classical vocal commissions and readings from literature and poetry, in fact almost everything but jazz - remained totally different from Jason's. Their home has remained great cathedrals, abbeys, stately homes, or tiny mediaeval parish churches. Then their director Roland Robertson booked Jason to compose major instrumental and choral work, and so came to understand the spiritual richness and artistic breadth of Jason's musicianship.

It was obviously immediately that Jason and Opus Anglicanum shared a common goal: to explore together a mysterious, austere and magical zone, following the ancient paths of ritual and procession, in modes ancient and modern, the piano illuminating and complementing the voices, and exploiting the space.  Together, with barless scores of square mediaeval notes, and tracts of Latin, they began to experiment. This developed into a concert programme  built on chants for the winter feast of Candlemas, first performed in Wells Cathedral. Standing around the nave, empty but for Jason at the Steinway, with five singers in fading January light, the content and setting 'clicked' perfectly. The result is 'Adorna', now enhanced by two original new compositions by Jason, and recorded in live performance.


LIVE PERFORMANCES

WELLS CATHEDRAL: SATURDAY 22 JANUARY 2022
ST MARTIN'S-IN-THE-FIELDS, LONDON: THURSDAY 3 FEBRUARY


The St Martin's-in-the-Fields concert is followed by a Crypt Late jazz performance by Jason Rebello and His Trio - Troy Miller, drums and Orlando Le Fleming, bass.

THAXTED FESTIVAL, ESSEX: 27 JUNE 2022, 7.30PM



LISTEN TO ADORNA


AMAZON MUSIC

DEEZER

QOBUZ

HDTRACKS



Click to follow JASON REBELLO and OPUS ANGLICANUM on Spotify

PRESS

London Jazz News - interview

London Jazz News - concert review

Jazz Journal, April 2022 (Matthew Wright)

Jazziz Magazine


Classical Music Daily

Jazzwise - April 2022 issue


ADORNA - Pre-Release Single links:

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Adorna on Apple Music's New in Classical playlist



Download or stream Adorna (single) from QOBUZ


ADORNA (SINGLE) ON DEEZER

Stream on AMAZON MUSIC



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CARITAS CHAMBER CHOIR AND BENEDICT PREECE RELEASE CROSSING THE BAR - MUSIC FOR REFLECTION AND HOPE

20/9/2021

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Released on 19 November 2021:
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Download on iTunes or stream on Apple Music - click above
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Crossing the Bar on Apple Music's Classical New Releases playlist
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O Nata Lux by Philip Stopford on Apple Music's Sacred Sounds playlist

LISTEN TO CROSSING THE BAR ON YOUTUBE

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Ulysses Arts released two singles from Crossing the Bar - Music for Reflection and Hope, performed by the Caritas Chamber Choir directed by Benedict Preece. The first single, O Nata Lux by Philip Stopford, releases on 1 October, followed by Crossing the Bar, by Benedict Preece, on 22 October, on Apple Music/iTunes, Spotify, Qobuz, HDtracks and all other major digital service providers.

O Nata Lux is a world première recording from Philip Stopford, one of the most celebrated contemporary choral composers. It is conducted by Benedict Preece, who featured on Ulysses Arts' 2020 J.S. Bach horn and organ album with Anneke Scott. This calm but powerful work takes us from darkness to light, a theme of Advent, when this piece would normally be sung. It has musical elements that hark back to the familiar version of the same text by Thomas Tallis.


Benedict Preece writes about his motet Crossing the Bar:

'Written in 2016 as a gift to Gothenburg's HagaMotettkör for collaboration with Caritas Chamber Choir, I chose to create deliberately simple hymnlike music to allow this most powerful poem to remain the listener's focus. The 'aw' section, sung by lower voices, is intended to represent the sea. The work builds to an almighty climax: “I hope to see my pilot face to face” before finishing with an echo of the “sea”, this time as a hum, which depicts crossing the bar from this life to what comes next.'


iTunes

Crossing the Bar (album)

O Nata Lux

Crossing the Bar (single)



High definition sound on Qobuz

Crossing the Bar (album)

O Nata Lux


Crossing the Bar (single)


HDtracks

Crossing the Bar (album)


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