ORCHESTRAL ANTHEMS
BAIRSTOW | ELGAR | IRELAND | STANFORD | WALTON | WESLEY
Choir of Merton College, Oxford
Britten Sinfonia
Benjamin Nicholas
Edward Elgar (1857–1934) Light out of darkness (from The Light of Life, Op. 29) [5:08]
Charles Villiers Stanford (1852–1924) Evening Service in A, Op. 12
Edward Bairstow (1874–1946) Lord, thou hast been our refuge *
Ralph Vaughan Williams (1872–1958) Prelude on ‘Rhosymedre’
orch. Arnold Foster (c.1898–1963)
Samuel Sebastian Wesley (1810–1876) Ascribe unto the Lord *
Delphian Records and the Choir of Merton College, Oxford gratefully acknowledge the generosity of Reed Rubin and The Reed Foundation in making this recording possible.
Recorded on 1-2 July 2024 in St Barnabas, Ealing
Producer: Paul Baxter
Engineer: Jack Davis
24-bit
editing: Jack Davis
24-bit digital mastering: Paul Baxter
Design: Drew Padrutt
Booklet editor: Henry Howard Cover: Norwich, LNER poster by Frank Newbould, 1930s / British Vintage Posters Session photography: William Coates-Gibson / foxbrush
Delphian Records Ltd – Edinburgh – UK www.delphianrecords.com
William Walton (1902–1983) The Twelve
Florian Stortz, Ruairi Bowen, Olivia Earl, Verity Sawbridge, , Harriet Twigger-Ross soloists
premiere recording in orchestral version
Elgar’s first oratorio, The Light of Life (or Lux Christi), Op. 29, was first heard on 8 September 1896 at the Worcester Three Choirs Festival and was dedicated to his friend, composer and chorus-master, Charles Swinnerton Heap. Having already enjoyed some acclaim with his choral symphony, The Black Knight, at Worcester in 1893, his ambitions had grown, though Worcester requested that the work be under an hour long. In this regard, it resembled the greater brevity of Parry’s Job, a work Elgar admired and performed in as a violinist under Parry’s direction. Based on the story of the blind man in St John’s Gospel to whom Jesus restored sight, Elgar’s work used a libretto devised by the Rev. Edward Capel Cure, a curate at Holy Trinity Church, Worcester and the author of numerous books on Christian meditation and the challenges of faith. The chorus Light out of darkness occurs directly before the scene in which Jesus anoints the eyes of the blind man with clay. It begins with a more animated reference to the theme of Light which formed the closing section of the oratorio’s orchestral prelude, the ‘Meditation’. In typically dramatic fashion, the orchestra, which plays such a central and independent thematic role, carries us from G major (the main key of the oratorio) to the Neapolitan, A flat. The strong declamatory entry of the chorus is contrasted with an imitative subsection, ‘Within the shadow of thy cross’, which carries us to the relative, F minor, a key which underpins a more serene idea, ‘Thou hast borne the sinner’s
sentence’. This sequence of thematic events is then developed in a second phase which moves flatward to G flat major and its relative, E flat minor, before closing more placidly with a final, becalmed choral statement (‘So let us answer sorrow’s cry’) in A flat.
The Festival of the Sons of the Clergy, according to the eighteenth-century music historian, Sir John Hawkins, had been a regular part of the calendar at St Paul’s Cathedral since the very end of the seventeenth century when a return to a newly constructed cathedral had been made after the great fire, though records suggest that such services went back as far as 1655. After Stainer’s appointment as organist in 1872, it became a feature of the festivals to commission new orchestral services and anthems and one of the most enduring of these has been Stanford’s Evening Service in A, Op. 12, commissioned in 1880. Buoyed up by the success of his symphonic Service in B flat, Op. 10 which he had composed in 1879 for use in Trinity College chapel, Cambridge, Stanford took the opportunity to infuse his new service with an even greater instrumental dimension. This is demonstrated abundantly in the motivic tautness of the Magnificat whose opening orchestral idea is constantly reworked throughout the ternary structure and the concluding ‘Gloria’ for double choir. More overtly and eloquently orchestral, however, is the masterly Nunc dimittis whose throughcomposed design is entirely shaped by the
elegiac cello ‘duet’ of the opening (in A minor), the Valhalla-like interjection of the trumpet at the climax (‘And to be the glory of thy people Israel’) and the reflective coda.
Edward Bairstow’s Lord, thou hast been our refuge proved to be one of the composer’s most substantial anthems and was again a commission for the Festival of the Sons of the Clergy, first sung in St Paul’s Cathedral on 10 May 1917. This was its original version though it is better known in its reduction for organ (as is its earlier counterpart, Blessed city, heavenly Salem of 1914). The full score lay among the papers of Francis Jackson, Bairstow’s successor at York Minster,* and has rarely been heard in what is a fine and colourful orchestration. Imparting a yearning sentiment engendered by the dark turbulence of war-torn Britain, the anthem drew its text from a combination of Psalms 90, 102 and 144. The first part takes the form of a sonata rondo in which the opening choral statement (‘Lord, thou hast been our refuge’), in A major, contrasts with secondary, more muscular material based on the words ‘Before the mountains’ and a further episode in F minor (‘Lord, what is man’). This paragraph culminates in a restatement of both ideas in the tonic key before yielding to a second sonata structure commencing with a fugue (‘Thou
*recorded by the Choir of Merton College, Oxford and Britten Sinfonia on Delphian (DCD34291).
shalt arise’), based in A major, and a celestial contrasting gesture (‘Comfort us again’) in a glowing F sharp major. This ethereal departure incorporates strains of the earlier rondo theme which continues as a more tonally fluid development, out of which A major is restored, marked by allusions to the fugue and ‘Comfort us again’, which brings the anthem to a pensive conclusion, full of Bairstow’s resourceful harmonic turns.
The tune ‘Rhosymedre’ first appeared in Original Sacred Music (1839–45) by the Welsh Anglican priest, John David Edwards. A student of Jesus College, Oxford, Edwards became vicar of the village of Rhosymedre in Denbighshire in 1843 and was a keen musician and adjudicator for the Eisteddfod. Vaughan Williams included the tune in the English Hymnal (1906) where it appeared with Charles Wesley’s words ‘Author of life divine’. While in uniform in the Royal Army Medical Corps, and stationed in Saffron Walden, Essex, he composed his Three Preludes Founded on Welsh Hymn Tunes in 1915 having enjoyed access to the organ in the town’s fine wool church of St Mary’s. The Preludes, seen by the organist Henry Ley (who played them over for the composer) in 1919, were published by Stainer & Bell in 1920, and perhaps the best known of them, the Prelude on ‘Rhosymedre’, was orchestrated by the composer and conductor Arnold Foster in 1938. An avid student of Bach, Vaughan Williams borrowed
Notes on the music
elements of the model of the Schübler chorale prelude ‘Wachet auf’, bwv 645 by introducing phrases of the hymn tune within a scheme of independent encompassing thematic material, itself derived from Edwards’ affecting melody. In the first verse, the tune appears in the tenor range before merging more assertively in the upper voice for most of the second. At the end, however, the final strain of the melody, wistfully repeated, once again drops down to the tenor to usher in a final refrain of the delicious polyphony of the opening. As A. E. F. Dickinson commented, ‘the serenity of this simply made piece remains indescribable, as the thousands who heard it in or from Westminster Abbey in September 1958 [at the composer’s funeral], must have observed.’
Although Samuel Sebastian Wesley became better known in his later career as an organist, his earlier life in London theatres brought him into contact with ballet and opera which reinforced his reputation as a composer connected more readily with orchestral and secular vocal music. An interesting and unconventional single movement of a symphony dates from around 1834, two years after he left London, and there is evidence of a lost concertante work for wind instruments of a year later. Not until 1852, however, did Wesley fully engage with the orchestra again, when he made a full score of his anthem, The Wilderness, composed at Hereford in 1832, for the Birmingham Festival. His time as organist at
Gloucester Cathedral between 1865 and 1876 also brought him into contact with the orchestra through the Three Choirs Festivals, though he was subject to a good deal of invective about his conducting technique. It was through the Three Choirs that he orchestrated his anthem
Ascribe unto the Lord (composed in 1851 during his time as organist at Winchester Cathedral) for the Hereford Festival in 1867.
With a text taken from Psalms 96 and 115, the message of Wesley’s anthem, essentially a short cantata shaped by the older concept of the verse anthem, is one of praise for God and his faithfulness towards his people. An opening section is characterised by choral declamation for the tenors and basses answered by the full chorus (‘Let the whole earth stand in awe’) abounding with the composer’s rich language of diatonic dissonance. This is followed by a verse ‘Quartett’ for three trebles and alto (‘O worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness’, here sung full), embellished with silken woodwind filigree (redolent of Weber), which leads to a more strident choral fughetta in the relative minor (‘As for the gods of the heathen’). A second passage of recitative (‘Their idols are silver and gold’), more jarring in sentiment, paves the way for a darker, chorale-like verse quartet for alto, tenors and bass (‘They that make them are like unto them’) in B minor. The final phase of the anthem continues the chorale style (‘As for our God, he is in heaven’) with even greater deference to Bach. Related thematically to the opening chorus, it yields to one of Wesley’s
characteristically lyrical choral conclusions (‘The Lord hath been mindful of us’) full of expressive suspensions and poignant melody.
The one significant anthem (or ‘motet’) Ireland produced while organist at St Luke’s, Chelsea, was written as a commission in 1912 for Charles Macpherson, the sub-organist of St Paul’s Cathedral. It was later orchestrated by the composer in 1924. Intended as a meditation for Passiontide, Greater love hath no man drew its text from a compilation of scriptural passages from Daily Light on the Daily Path, a series of booklets containing Bible readings which Ireland, a devout Anglo-Catholic, used to observe on a regular basis. The anthem rapidly achieved currency in cathedrals and church choirs and, with the outbreak of war in 1914, its text gained a special resonance as the casualties from the front mounted. In terms of genre, ‘Greater love’ has a scope and narrative that is redolent of a small cantata, yet, at the same time, the solo material for soprano and bass is, once again, reminiscent of the older style of verse anthem though composed here with a greater sense of continuity and ‘dialogue’ between soloists and chorus. Much of the success of Greater love is predicated on its carefully planned textual and tonal scheme, but it is also the result of Ireland’s greater confidence in handling his harmonic apparatus. Couched in a style redolent of Parry and Elgar (the three-part counterpoint of the ‘turba’, or chorus, is classically Elgarian), it bears
many of the hallmarks of the composer’s late nineteenth-century formative years conflated with that deep sense of nostalgia more familiar from the emotional world of his solo songs. Commissioned by Christ Church, Oxford in 1964, The Twelve was the conception of the Dean, Cuthbert Simpson, to unite the creative work of two of the college’s former alumni, William Walton and W. H. Auden. It was first sung at Christ Church on 16 May 1965 under the choir’s director, Sydney Watson. Shortly afterwards, Walton orchestrated the anthem for the 900th anniversary celebrations of Westminster Abbey, where it was performed on 2 January 1966. After losing interest in religion as a young man, Auden returned to the Anglicanism of his upbringing in 1940. Although his embracing of Christianity remained unorthodox, he nevertheless profoundly valued the principles of love, courage, sacrifice and simplicity in the Christian message as witnessed and promulgated by the Apostles. These attributes form the dramatic first part of the tripartite poem which opens with an arresting oratorical solo baritone (‘Without arms or charm of culture’), a dynamically rhythmic response from the chorus (‘When they heard the Word’) and the more sinister conclusion which reminds us of the disciples’ awful fate (‘One by one, they were caught, tortured and slain’). Auden’s second stanza, ‘O Lord, my God, though I forsake thee’ (an amalgam of paraphrases from the Crucifixion narrative,
Psalm 23 and Exodus), is a more plaintive intermezzo for two soprano soloists, which provides a moment of agonised rumination before, in the third stanza, a dialogue between individual solo voices and chorus (‘Children play about the ancestral graves’) is preludial to a virulent fugue (‘Twelve as the winds and the months are those’), an ebullient, vigorous gesture of eulogy which brings what is essentially a short cantata to a resounding and optimistic end.
© 2025 Jeremy Dibble
Jeremy Dibble is Emeritus Professor of Music at Durham University. He is a specialist in British music of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and has published monographs on Hubert Parry, Charles Villiers Stanford, John Stainer, Michele Esposito and Hamilton Harty. More recently he has edited a book on British Musical Criticism and Intellectual Thought 1850–1850 and a monograph on the music of Frederick Delius as well as essays on Frank Bridge, Elgar and Vaughan Williams. He is also musical editor of the Canterbury Dictionary of Hymnology. Forthcoming projects include books on Charles Wood, Stanford, ColeridgeTaylor and William Alwyn.
1 Edward Elgar
Light out of darkness
Light out of darkness thou hast brought! Within the shadow of thy cross Now burns a light, and we are taught The truer truths of human loss.
Wast Thou a sinner? Thou hast borne The sinner’s sentence and his shame; Thy side was pierced, thy forehead torn, Thy sad heart broken by our blame.
But so a beacon light thou sent To signal thro’ our night of grief; How Love upon his mission went Crowned with sorrow’s sharp-set wreath.
Enough it was we needed thee, Our misery alone did pray And Mercy answered eagerly. And trod for us steep Calvary’s way.
So let us answer sorrow’s cry! The past is dead: search not its grave For hidden faults! The remedy Is ours to seek, to find and save.
Rev. Edward Capel Cure (1860–1953)
2 Charles Villiers Stanford Magnificat
My soul doth magnify the Lord: and my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour. For he hath regarded the lowliness of his handmaiden.
For behold, from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed.
For he that is mighty hath magnified me, and holy is his name.
And his mercy is on them that fear him throughout all generations.
He hath shewed strength with his arm: he hath scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts.
He hath put down the mighty from their seat: and hath exalted the humble and meek. He hath filled the hungry with good things: and the rich he hath sent empty away. He remembering his mercy hath holpen his servant Israel:
as he promised to our forefathers, Abraham and his seed for ever.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost.
As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be: world without end. Amen.
3 Charles Villiers Stanford Nunc dimittis
Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace: according to thy word.
For mine eyes have seen thy salvation: which thou hast prepared before the face of all people;
to be a light to lighten the gentiles: and to be the glory of thy people Israel.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost.
As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be: world without end. Amen.
4 Edward Bairstow Lord, thou hast been our refuge
Lord, thou hast been our refuge: from one generation to another.
Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever the earth and the world were made: thou art God from everlasting, and world without end.
Lord, what is man, that thou hast such respect unto him: or the son of man, that thou so regardest him?
Man is like a thing of nought: his time passeth away like a shadow.
But thou, O Lord, shalt endure for ever: and thy remembrance throughout all generations. Thou shalt arise, and have mercy upon Sion: for it is time that thou have mercy upon her, yea, the time is come.
Comfort us again, now after the time that thou hast plagued us: and for the years wherein we have suffered adversity. Amen.
Psalm 90: 1–2; 144: 3–4; 102: 12–13; 90: 15 (Book of Common Prayer)
Samuel Sebastian Wesley
Ascribe unto the Lord
6 I. Recit.
Ascribe unto the Lord all ye kindreds of the people: ascribe unto the Lord worship and power.
Ascribe unto the Lord the honour due unto his name.
Let the whole earth stand in awe of him. Tell it out among the heathen, that the Lord is king: and that he shall judge the people righteously.
Psalm 96: 7–8, 9b,
7 II. Quartett
O worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness. Sing to the Lord and praise His name. Be telling of his salvation from day to day, his wonders unto all people.
Psalm 96: 9a, 2, 3b
8 III. Chorus
As for the gods of the heathen they are but idols.
Their idols are silver and gold: even the work of men’s hands.
They have mouths and speak not: eyes have they and see not.
They have ears and hear not: noses have they and smell not;
They have hands and handle not; feet have they and walk not: neither speak they through their throat.
Psalm 96: 5; 115: 4–7
9 IV. They that make them are like unto them
They that make them are like unto them: and so are all such as put their trust in them.
As for our God, he is in heaven: he hath done whatsoever pleased him.
Psalm 115: 8, 3
10 V. Chorus
The Lord hath been mindful of us and he shall bless us: he shall bless the house of Israel, he shall bless the house of Aaron.
He shall bless them that fear the Lord: both small and great.
Ye are the blessed of the Lord: you and your children.
Ye are the blessed of the Lord: who made heaven and earth.
11 John Ireland
Greater love hath no man
Many waters cannot quench love, neither can the floods drown it. Love is strong as death. Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness.
Ye are washed, ye are sanctified, ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus; ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into His marvellous light.
I beseech you brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies, a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.
Song of Solomon 8: 7, 6; John 15: 13; 1 Peter 2: 24; 1 Corinthians 6: 11; 1 Peter 2: 9; Romans 12: 1
12 William Walton The Twelve I.
Without arms or charm of culture, Persons of no importance
From an unimportant Province, They did as the Spirit bid, Went forth into a joyless world Of swords and rhetoric
To bring it joy.
When they heard the Word, some demurred, some mocked, some were shocked: but many were stirred and the Word spread. Lives long dead were quickened to life; the sick were healed by the Truth revealed; released into peace from the gin of old sin, men forgot themselves in the glory of the story told by the Twelve.
Then the Dark Lord, adored by this world, perceived the threat of the Light to his might.
From his throne he spoke to his own. The loud crowd, the sedate engines of State, were moved by his will to kill. It was done. One by one, they were caught, tortured, and slain.
II.
Psalm 115: 12–13, 15, 14
O Lord, my God, Though I forsake thee Forsake me not, But guide me as I walk Through the valley of mistrust, And let the cry of my disbelieving absence Come unto thee, Thou who declared unto Moses: I shall be there.
III.
Children play about the ancestral graves, for the dead no longer walk.
Excellent still in their splendour are the antique statues: but can do neither good nor evil.
Beautiful still are the starry heavens: but our fate is not written there.
Holy still is speech, but there is no sacred tongue: the Truth may be told in all.
Twelve as the winds and the months are those who taught us these things: envisaging each in an oval glory, let us praise them all with a merry noise.
Wystan Hugh Auden (1907–1973)
Biographies
Described by Gramophone as ‘one of the UK’s finest choral ensembles’, the Choir of Merton College, Oxford is known as one of the most exciting University choirs in the UK. In addition to singing in the thirteenth-century Chapel during term, an extensive touring schedule has seen the choir perform in the USA, Hong Kong, Singapore, France, Germany, Italy, Denmark and Sweden, and in 2016 the choir sang the first Anglican service in St Peter’s Basilica, Rome, which was broadcast on BBC Radio 3. Merton College Choir has performed with a number of major ensembles, including recent concerts with The King’s Singers, Britten Sinfonia and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. The choir has recorded extensively with Delphian Records; in 2020, its recording of Gabriel Jackson’s The Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ (Delphian DCD34222) won the BBC Music Magazine 2020 Choral Award. In 2023 the choir made its debut at London’s Barbican on Good Friday with a performance of Bach’s St John Passion.
Britten Sinfonia is a different kind of orchestra. It is defined not by the traditional figurehead of a principal conductor, but by the dynamic and democratic meeting of its outstanding individual players and the broad range of their collaborators – from Steve Reich, Thomas Adès and Alison Balsom to Pagrav Dance Company, Chris Thile and Anoushka Shankar.
Rooted in the East of England, where it is the only professional orchestra working throughout the region, Britten Sinfonia also has a national and international reputation as one of today’s finest ensembles. It is renowned for its adventurous programming and stunningly highquality performances, and equally for its record of commissioning new music, nurturing new composing talent, and inspiring schoolchildren, hospital patients and communities across the East of England.
Benjamin Nicholas is Reed Rubin Organist & Director of Music at Merton College, Oxford and Music Director of The Oxford Bach Choir. He has held posts at Chichester and St Paul’s Cathedrals and was Director of the Edington Music Festival. As a conductor, he has appeared with the Philharmonia, the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and The BBC Singers, and has premiered the works of numerous composers including Birtwistle, Dove, MacMillan, McDowall, Rutter and Weir.
Britten Sinfonia’s main touring locations are in London, Saffron Walden, Cambridge and Norwich. The orchestra also performs regularly at London’s Wigmore Hall and appears at UK festivals including Aldeburgh, Brighton, Norfolk & Norwich and the BBC Proms. Its prolific discography features many award-winning recordings. brittensinfonia.com
Choir of Merton College, Oxford
Sopranos
Emma Arthur
Alice Fisher
Tatiana Fraser
Francesca Geldard
Amy Higgins
Kira Lee
Imogen Otley
Maia Pereira
Verity Sawbridge
Áine Smith
Francesca Stevenson
Anna Sutton
Hattie Twigger-Ross
Amalia Wardle
Ciara Williams
Olivia Williams
Altos
Izzi Blain
Olivia Earl
Alice Hilder Jarvis
Antonia McClintock
Naomi Richards
Amelia Ross
Harry Street
Kit Thickett
Anneka Vetter
Tenors
Clement Collins Rice
Ben Crossley
Henry Le Feber Robertson
Louis Morford
Wilkie Robson
Joseph Taylor
Oscar Tovey Garcia
Mark Wang
Basses
Freddy Chelsom
Edward Chesterman
Freddie Crowley
Tom Herring
Katie Le Poidevin
Matthew O’Connor
Nathaniel Otley
Krishnan Ram Prasad
Alexander Smith
Hugo Till
Benedict Verdin
Tristan Wigley
Organ Scholars
Owen Chan
François Cloete
Britten Sinfonia
Violin I
Zoe Beyers
Marcus Barcham Stevens
Fiona McCapra
Ricky Gore
Lucy Jeal
Alex Afia
Minn Majoe
Alicia Berendse
Hannah Bell
Sophie Ryan
Violin II
Claire Sterling
Suzanne Loze
Anna Bradley
Judith Stowe
Marcus Broome
Kirsty Lovie
Eloise MacDonald
Violas
Yukiko Ogura
Bridget Carey
Rachel Byrt
Laura Cooper
Rachel Robson
Cellos
Ben Chappell
Joy Hawley
Chris Allan
Kirsten Jenson
Joy Lisney
Double Basses
Ben Russell
Philip Nelson
Yijia Cui
Flutes
Emer McDonough
Sarah O’Flynn
Piccolo
Sarah O’Flynn
Oboes
Peter Facer
Rees Webster
Vanessa Howells
Clarinets
Joy Farrall
Nicholas Rodwell
Fresca David
Bassoons
Paul Boyes
Connie Tanner
Alexandra Davidson
Lorna West
Contrabassoon
Alanna Pennar-MacFarlane
Horns
Martin Owen
Jo Withers
Eleanor Blakeney
Richard Dilley
William Scotland
Trumpets
Imogen Whitehead
Tom Freeman-Attwood
Emily Ashby
Alto Trombone
Becky Smith
Trombones
Becky Smith
Andrew Cole
Bass Trombone
Joe Arnold
Tuba
Edward Leech
Timpani
William Lockhart
Percussion
Toby Kearney
Iolo Edwards
Harp
Lucy Wakeford
Merton College, Oxford on Delphian Orchestral Anthems: Dyson | Howells | Elgar | Finzi
Choir of Merton College, Oxford; Britten Sinfonia / Benjamin Nicholas DCD34291
For the Choir of Merton College, Oxford’s first collaboration with Britten Sinfonia, Benjamin Nicholas has brought together a collection of sacred works from the first half of the twentieth century. A little-known fact is that these stalwarts of the English repertory were either originally intended to be heard with orchestra, or subsequently orchestrated by their composer or a close colleague. Written for enthronements, coronations and the nation’s grandest choral festivals, these national ‘standards’ are here brought back to life in Delphian’s largest recording to date, their orchestral accompaniments affording them the richness, pomp and majesty associated with their epoch.
‘Nicholas maintains excellent control of his forces in a recording that is sonorously generous and forward in sound ... Britten Sinfonia play a colourful and sensitive role’ — Gramophone, August 2023
Bob Chilcott: Christmas Oratorio
Sarah Connolly soprano, Nick Pritchard tenor, Neal Davies bass; Choir of Merton College, Oxford / Benjamin Nicholas DCD34321
Hailed as ‘a palpable success … and utterly new’ at its premiere performance, Bob Chilcott’s Christmas Oratorio brings the magic, wonder and joy of a centuries-old story to modern-day life. This first recording reassembles the glittering cast of soloists from the premiere: Nick Pritchard’s Evangelist, intimately accompanied by harp and flute, is joined by mezzo-soprano Dame
Sarah Connolly and bass Neal Davies. Benjamin Nicholas’s award-winning Choir of Merton College, Oxford enrich the Christmas story with carols that are sure to become instant favourites. The composer is delighted with the recording, describing it as ‘elegant, well paced and poised … The choir is fabulous – confident and sure’.
‘a mighty undertaking … warm and wholesome’
— Presto Music, December 2023, recordIng of the week
Ian Venables: Requiem; Howells: anthems for choir & orchestra Choir of Merton College, Oxford; Oxford Contemporary Sinfonia; Benjamin Nicholas conductor & solo organ DCD34252
Ian Venables’ Requiem, warmly received at its 2020 premiere with organ accompaniment, is heard here in an orchestrated version made specially for this recording. Conductor Benjamin Nicholas draws parallels between Venables’ work and the familiar English choral sound of Herbert Howells, whose work is also heard here in unfamiliar orchestrated versions – new arrangements of two of his Four Anthems by Howells scholars Howard Eckdahl and Jonathan Clinch, and the first recording of Howells’ original orchestration of The House of the Mind.
‘The fresh-voiced young singers of the Choir of Merton College sing quite gloriously with perfect balance, blend and intonation’ — MusicWeb International, October 2022, RECORDINGS OF THE YEAR
Gabriel Jackson: The Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ
Emma Tring soprano, Guy Cutting tenor; Choir of Merton College, Oxford; Oxford Contemporary Sinfonia / Benjamin Nicholas DCD34222
Strikingly coloured and richly imaginative, Gabriel Jackson’s re-telling of the age-old story of Christ’s betrayal and crucifixion interweaves biblical narrative, English poetry and Latin hymns, culminating in a rare setting of poetry by T.S. Eliot – himself an alumnus of Merton College, Oxford, which commissioned the present work. It is heard here under the direction of long-time Jackson collaborator Benjamin Nicholas, and with soloists and instrumentalists handpicked by the composer.
‘This outstanding recording bursts with energy ... Jackson’s engaging score is richly colourful and his instrumental writing proves a particular highlight’ — BBC Music Magazine, June 2019, choral & song choice
Gabriel Jackson: The Christmas Story
Choir of Merton College, Oxford; The Girl Choristers of Merton College, Oxford; Oxford Contemporary Sinfonia / Benjamin Nicholas
DCD34331
Long associated with the music of Gabriel Jackson, in 2020 the Choir of Merton College, Oxford and their director Benjamin Nicholas won a BBC Music Magazine Award for their recording of The Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ, a work which grounded its narrative of Christ’s suffering and humanity’s redemption in texts associated with the history of the College. The Christmas Story, again with a libretto assembled by the College’s chaplain the Revd Dr Simon Jones, takes the same approach to tell the story of Christ’s birth. Spanning the period from Advent to Candlemas, it mixes biblical narrative with liturgical texts and four specially commissioned poems by members of the College. The new poems are given to the College’s girl choristers (an independent part of its choral foundation since 2016), while the main body of the work is carried by the full choir and by an ensemble of flute, percussion, strings, saxophone and three trombones – the latter recalling the hieratic sonorities of the seventeenth-century works by Schütz and others which Jackson had in mind while composing The Christmas Story.
New in November 2024
The Merton Organ: the new Dobson organ of Merton College, Oxford
Benjamin Nicholas organ
DCD34142
In a golden age of organ-building, Merton College’s new Dobson instrument stands out as exceptional. It is only the third American-built organ sent to the UK since the Second World War, a bold commissioning choice by Benjamin Nicholas and his colleagues in Merton’s recently established choral foundation. From Bach and Stanley to Messiaen and Dupré Nicholas combines flair and intelligence as he presents the stunning instrument he helped mastermind.
‘lithe, supple and pleasingly nuanced performances … Delphian’s characteristically clear, focused and framed recording’
— Choir & Organ, May/June 2014
Elgar: Organ Works
Benjamin Nicholas organ DCD34162
The first recording of Merton’s new Dobson organ, spanning repertoire from Bach and Stanley to Dupré and Messiaen, demonstrated the instrument’s considerable versatility. But behind the contemporary sophistication of its construction and design, this is essentially an English Romantic organ with a big, warm-hearted personality, and this second recording highlights those qualities in music by the composer who pre-eminently shares them. Benjamin Nicholas proves himself a fine Elgarian and an inventive programmer, coupling Elgar’s two original major works for the organ with three transcriptions – including a first outing on CD for the superb arrangement of the Prelude to The Kingdom made by Elgar’s contemporary, the Gloucester Cathedral organist Herbert Brewer.
‘Compelling readings … The recording is detailed with every nuance, every pianissimo and swell, warmly captured’ — MusicWeb International, June 2016
Hymns from Merton
The Girl Choristers and Lower Voices of Merton College, Oxford DCD34322
From their beginnings in 2016 Merton College’s Girl Choristers have gone from strength to strength. For their second recording they bring together a collection of much-loved hymns, celebrating a tradition that has enriched
Christian worship for hundreds of years.
‘an eclectic mix performed with aplomb by Merton’s Girl Choristers and gentlemen in stunning sound’
— Gramophone, September 2023
Merton College, Oxford on Delphian
