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Songs of the Sky
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Hindemith
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Gramophone Magazine
September 2009
By Pwyll ap Sion 

The sun shines on these new works by established and emerging composers. Signum Classics' penchant for issuing contemporary recordings which reflect performers' repertoires rather than single composers' works has yielded some interesting matches. This latest offering, featuring chamber combinations drawn from Britten Sinfonia, goes even further. Senior, established and emerging talents are all present on a recording which effectively mirrors the celesial central theme in the abrupt contrasts of light and shade contained within and between the pieces.

"Songs of the Sky" takes its title from Tavener's eponymous song-cycle which ends this collection. Scored for tenor, oboe and piano, and written in response to the 2004 Tsunami disaster, Tavener's settings shift between description and reflection, and are at their most effective when the composer eschews exaggerated moments of rather blatant tone-painting for a distanced, objective approach, as heard in "What is Life" and "Because thou lovest the burning ground".

By contrast, the disc opens with Martland's muscular, visceral Tiger Dancing, played with power and precision by the string section of Britten Sinfonia. Showcased in between the two senior and established figures are the emerging talents of Huw Watkins, Tarik O'Regan and Jason Yarde, all born in the 1970s. Watkins's ability to produce subtly arresting soundscapes in pieces such as Dream has gone relatively unnoticed by critics. A shame, since he is the most important Welsh composer of his generation. The earthy ebullience of O'Regan's North African-inspired Rai in many ways speak for itself, but arguably Yarde's Who Knows the Beauty is the most interesting work on display here. Veering vertiginously between straightforward jazz-inflected passages, lyrical faux-romanticism and highly dissonant, Zorn-like moments of frenetic free improvision, this piece is as changeable as the weather and the sky itself.

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BBC Music Magazine
By Barry Witherden
July 2009
4 stars

Jo Buckley's booklet-notes question the views of 'critics [who] speak of a loss of definition or even a sense of disillusionment' in contemporary music. As this disc demonstrates, while 'serious' music maybe less pure than 50 years ago and there may no longer be a Great Tradition, there is ample evidence of its vitality and the commitment of its exponents.

Martland's Tiger Dancing, variations on a setting of Blake's The Tyger, relies on supple, athletic grace rather than the usual brawn of his Industrial-Minimalist works. Agile phrasing and bright textures make for an inviting opening track. Watkins's thoughtful Dream begins with a gentle melody for piano, cushioned by quiet tones on violin and clarinet, but unexpected and unsettling images soon break in. Rai, an intriguing contrast to the choral music mostly associated with O'Regan, refers to Algerian dance music, but the impact of O'Regan's time in New York is also strongly evident. Yarde is a jazz saxophonist, but jazz is only one of the genres he calls in during his kaleidoscopic consideration of Who Knows the Beauty. The album's title-piece, Tavener's emotional, affecting, almost confrontational response to the 2004 tsunami, displays the spikier turn his music has taken in recent years and is full of remarkably direct evocations of Britten.

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MusicWebInternational.com
By Hubert Culot
May 2009

Steve Martland burst onto the musical scene with his strongly impressive orchestral work Babi Yar (1983), once available on Factory FACD266. He went on composing music characterised by raw energy, sometimes akin to the so-called Dutch Minimalism of Louis Andriessen.
 
Tiger Dancing for string orchestra, based on his setting of Blake’s The Tyger, is somewhat lighter in mood and the music bounces along in the manner of some spiralling hoe-down. It is quite attractive and should be eagerly seized upon by string ensembles willing to expand their repertoire with a new, colourful, rhythmically alert work that could – and should – become instantly popular. It is quite efficiently scored for strings, which is no surprise since Martland had already composed some very fine works for the medium such as his Crossing the Borders (1991) (Factory FACD 366).
 
Huw Watkins’ Dream for violin, clarinet and piano is a short nocturne turning into nightmare. Although the calm mood is eventually restored, nightmarish visions are not completely swept away. This is a very nice piece of music, effectively done and never outstays its welcome.
 
Tarik O’Regan is probably better known for his choral music in which he succeeds in blending tradition with a fresh approach to choral writing. Raï is scored for small mixed ensemble consisting of string trio, flute, clarinet, harp and percussion (two players). The title meaning ‘opinion’ in Arabic also implies folk, folk-pop music with its roots in Algeria. The music again has a clear dance-like character of great appeal, not unlike that of the Martland.
 
Jason Yarde’s name and music are new to me. He is a highly versatile musician equally at ease in jazz as well as in ‘classical’ music. Who Knows the Beauty is scored for saxophone, piano and string trio, albeit with a double-bass instead of the more customary cello. The music unfolds in a series of contrasting episodes, some of them with a clear jazzy tinge. There are many fine moments in this attractive work that might nevertheless be a bit too eclectic for some tastes; I enjoyed it.
 
Tavener’s Songs of the Sky, giving this release its collective title, was composed in memory of the victims of the tsunami of December 2004. It is a rather long setting for tenor, oboe and piano of texts drawn from various sources such as American Indian poetry, Japanese death poems and a Bengali hymn to Kali. The music is characterised by dignified restraint, although one could at times have wished for more contrast. The music is fairly tightly structured with some recurrent themes and motifs strengthening the formal coherence of this long piece. The only weak point is that the final hymn to Kali is too fragmentarily set to achieve a cathartic conclusion. This work, however, is a sincere and deeply felt statement that deserves to be heard.
 
All performances are excellent. The recorded sound is fine - you hardly realise that some of them are live recordings. This seems to be the first release of the Britten Sinfonia’s own label in conjunction with Signum Classics. I just hope that more of this sort will soon be released for the present discs augurs well. 

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The Sunday Times
Martland and Others: Songs of the Sky - Britten Sinfonia 
By Stephen Pettitt
April 26, 2009

Much is as one might expect here from an eclectic disc trying to appeal to a wide, young audience, whose responses might be instinctive rather than thoughtful. So, Steve Martland’s string sextet Tiger Dancing, from his setting of Blake’s The Tyger, duly pulsates; Tarik O’Regan’s energetic mixed octet Raï evokes a John Adams-like sound world; and Jason Yarde’s mixed sextet Who Knows the Beauty is an entertaining, if at times confusing, mishmash of styles. But Huw Watkins’s deceptively innocently entitled Dream, for violin, clarinet and piano, is craftsmanlike music that runs deep, and, for once, in John Tavener’s Songs of the Sky, for tenor (the excellent Charles Daniels), oboe and piano, the composer concerns himself with real substance and personal expression.

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 www.musicalpointers.co.uk
By Peter Grahame Woolf
March 2009

This is an interesting compilation disc to launch another orchestra's Own Label, but not with one of its orchestral concerts. The works are commissioned by Britten Sinfonia and I presume that all the musicians are members of the orchestra or have played with them; that is not clear in the publicity material?

The composers are purposely various - representing the "tumultuous, powerful and ground-breaking" developments of music at the turn of the century, so many listeners won't like everything. I am rather allergic to "powerfully rhythmic, muscular and physical" minimalism, as exemplified by Martland's unrelenting Tyger. I should be more likely to have listened to it again if it were half its quarter hour duration. Watkins' Dream is far more engaging, the hypnotic calm of its reverie disturbed by dramatic intrusions, and all in less than seven minutes. Yes, that's one to hear again and live in concerts.

O'Regan's Raï taps Arab dance music influences attractively. Yarde's take on the elusive beauty takes us into jazz and other musical influences; fresh and enjoyable.

The biggest surprise is Tavener (I prefer his near-namesake with another "r"). I am allergic to his brand of large scale holy minimalism. But this is the piece of his I have enjoyed more than any since The Whale. It is gripping in its pared down concentrated intensity in tackling so daunting a theme as the 2004 tsunami in a set of variations culminating in a hymn to the Goddess of Death... Charles Daniels and Nicholas Daniel are supported by Julius Drake in perfect balance, and other tracks on the disc include notable players, such as Jason Yarde (saxophone) and Joanna MacGregor, to name just two of an illustrious roll-call.

Britten Sinfonia's website promises a Hindemith disc at the end of this month, but I understand it has been delayed till June. Meanwhile, this is well worth exploring.

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Gramphone Magazine – October 2009
Britten Sinfonia 002 Hindemith
By Malcolm Riley

A resplendent representation of Hindemith’s organ oeuvre

This disc positively sparkles! With such intelligent and innovative programming, it is the ideal introduction to Hindemith’s organ music. Since there is insufficient solo organ music to fill a complete disc, the solution is to add Kammermusik No 7, which is effectively the first organ concerto (albeit with an ensemble of wind instruments and lower strings).

The novelty on this disc is the premiere recording of Zwei Stücke. Dating from August 1928 (when Hindemith was still in military uniform), these pieces straddle the dying embers of late Romanticism and the leaner, more contrapuntal aridity of the 1920s. Their shapeliness and colourfulness are striking and worthy of repeated hearings. There is plenty of registrational variety, too, in Daniel Hyde’s nicely judged performances of the three solo sonatas. The seemingly modest new two-manual Swiss Kuhn organ installed in Jesus College, Cambridge, provides plenty of punch and a wide dynamic range. I would have liked a little more definition in some of the melodic lines, for example the 4ft pitch solo in the pedals in the jolly third movement of the Third Sonata.

Hindemith’s impish characteristics are more to the fore in the wind quintet Kleine Kammermusik. This multifaceted work is a model for all would-be composers for this combination. Nicholas Daniel’s oboe-playing is an especial delight, and the third-movement waltz and folky finale are brought off to perfection.

The chapel acoustic is ideal for all these pieces, which are recorded with maximum fidelity. This is a thoroughly recommendable disc.

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BBC Music Magazine
By Calum MacDonald
August 2009
5 stars

It's an unusual and refreshing approach to Hindemith to view him through the prism of his organ music, and the lion's share of the honours on this stimulating disc from Britten Sinfonia goes to the excellent Daniel Hyde. His rhythmic liveliness and innate sense of the structure of each movement is an asset throughout, and the new organ on Jesus College, Cambridge is ideally suited to the lean contrapuntal idiom of the music. The core of Hindemith's organ output are the three sonatas of 1937-40, composed as he was formulating his mature theories of composition in opposition to Schoenberg: the blisteringly inventive First, the lighter, capricious Second, and the bucolic Third on old German folksongs. There have been classic recordings of this triptych by Lionel Rogg and Piet Kee, but Hyde gives the pieces a more exciting contemporary sound and makes us wonder why they aren't heard more often.

The early, romantic-impressionist Zwei Stucke (1918), receiving their world premiere recording, sound like a weird amalgam of Reger and Debussy and remind us how quickly Hindemith developed his mature manner, already on display in the wonderfully deft and witty Kleine Kammermusik for wind quintet of 1923. (The ensemble of human wind-players neatly contrasts with the mechanical breath of the organ.) But the triumph of the disc is the highly exciting account of Hindemith's first organ concerto, the 1927 Kammermusik No. 7, with its brass-heavy chamber orchestra, by turns brazen, beefy and baleful. Throughout, incisive rhythmic articulation and clear delineation of line allows the music's essential vitality - animal as well as intellectual - to come through with maximum impact.

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The Sunday Times
May 2009

This disc comprises the bulk of Hindemith's organ music - the three sonatas written between 1937 and 1940, the Zwei Stucke of 1918, the Konzert fur Orgel und Kammerorchester of 1927 - and adds 1923's Kleine Kammermusik fur funf Blaser for good measure. (There is a 1962 concerto with full orchestra.) The sonatas are attractive, exemplifying Hindemith's harmonic sstem, in which "wring" notes lend piquancy to a discourse much indebted to Bach, and teh third charmingly incorporates folk song. HIndemith's organ wriing is altogether a splendid continuation of tradition, though his bracing combinatino of organ adn chamber enesemble retains its novelty. The wind quintet is Hindemith at his bubbliest.

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