Hymn to St Cecilia : choral dances from Gloriana & choral works

"This collection of Britten choral works performed by a German choir under a British director is most welcome. It has been a number of years since such a programme has appeared ... I must say they pass with flying colours, as their diction is excellent with the words clearly understood overall. The choir has a very fine balance of voices with an especially solid bass foundation ... The RIAS Kammerchor superbly characterizes these settings and well demonstrates their vocal abilities ... If the particular programme appeals, then you should not hesitate to add this to your collection".

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"St Cecilia is best known as the patron saint of music, but ... no one is complaining if she stimulates visions as wonderful as WH Auden's text, which Benjamin Britten (who was born on St Cecilia's Day) set as his Hymn to St Cecilia in 1942 ... It's the centrepiece of a fine new all-Britten disc from the RIAS Kammerchor under Justin Doyle (Harmonia Mundi): idiomatic readings in a quite resonant acoustic, more secure in its full-voiced choruses than in its solos".

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"The Berlin-based RIAS Chamber Choir with their British conductor Justin Doyle ... respond brilliantly to the many challenges of AMDG (Ad majorem Dei gloriam) ... The sonorous weight and burnished tone of the RIAS ensemble (recorded with appropriate spaciousness and clarity of focus in Berlin's Jesus-Christus-Kirche) bring out the dramatic power and lyric intensity of Britten at his most imaginative".