Sven-David Sandström's name is not entirely unfamiliar
to regular readers of MusicWeb International. As well as having
featured several times in the last decade in the Seen And
Heard pages - most recently here
- his magnificent Messiah was reviewed here
last year.
This SACD disc contains eight of Sandström's sacred choral
works for mixed a cappella choir spanning a quarter of
a century of creativity. The disc opens and closes with a motet,
respectively Lobet den Herrn and Singet dem Herrn
ein neues Lied, which complete a project of Sandström's,
begun in 2003, to write six motets to the same texts and forces
employed by J.S. Bach in his BWV 225-230. Like much of Sandström's
works, these are virtuosic but instantly accessible and mellifluous.
The use of canonical works as musical inspiration or as a starting-point
- as with Bach's motets, or Buxtehude's cantata BWV 24 for Es
ist Genug, is one of eight special characteristics of Sandström's
choral writing that have been identified by choral director
James Kallembach. These occur repeatedly throughout the works
on this disc - without ever detracting from the general attractiveness
and memorableness of Sandström's music. The other seven,
listed in the liner-notes by Per Bronman, are: non-language
sounds, such as humming - sometimes giving the impression of
accompaniment by double-basses, as towards the end of Es
ist Genug or A New Song of Love - and tremolo, as
in the opening of Singet dem Herrn; theatrical interaction
of vocal groupings - as in the last section of Singet dem
Herrn; extended vocal groups, often employing six voices
instead of the more usual four; "layered repetition of rhythmic
and melodic cells, creating a minimalist-sounding texture" -
as in Lobet den Herrn; the use of extreme tempi or radical
rallentandos or accelerandi - as in Laudamus Te or the
opening of Ave Maria; and extreme tessitura - as in Singet
dem Herrn.
According to Bronman, the Agnus Dei was so successfully
received at its première in Stockholm in 1981 that there
was almost a stampede by the audience to grab the sheet music
from the choir! Regardless of the extent to which that story
is apocryphal, there is no doubt that the expressiveness and
imagination of Sandström's choral music, of which these
works are typical, is outstanding.
From the 1950s to the 1980s the Swedish Radio Choir built up
an international reputation under its musical director Eric
Ericson, a reputation they are consolidating under Peter Dijkstra.
On this disc they once again perform beautifully; the slight
accent they sing with in the songs in English and German is
barely distracting.
The sound quality on this SACD is superlative, even in normal
stereo, and sends a message to the many labels that cut too
many corners. The booklet too is everything one should be: well-written,
intelligent, detailed notes, full song texts and technical information,
limpid layout and a couple of unobtrusive photos. An excellent
disc in every regard.
Byzantion
Swedish Radio Choir/Peter Dijkstra 
[63:50] 
