The pieces on this disc have little in common other
than the quality suggested by its title: they are indeed English choral
favourites, beloved of church choirs around the English-speaking world
and used mostly at the service of Evensong, the atmosphere of which
this disc partially attempts to evoke. At least, I imagine that’s the
reason for the moody lighting, all candlelight and shadow, and only
occasionally betrayed by a stray shot of the great West window, behind
which is evidently daylight. It’s an admittedly seductive illusion:
Kings at 4.30pm, with darkness drawing in on a wintry afternoon, and
after Evensong the womb-like warmth of Fitzbillies just a minute’s walk
away for tea and chelsea buns… In order to maintain it the cameras have
had to stay well away from the Chapel’s amazing windows in all their
pre-Reformation glory. Instead we see lots of the hardly less pleasing
fan vaulting, and of course the stars of this show, the boys of King’s,
occasionally intercut with their senior colleagues – and with their
conductor.
No one would ever say that Stephen Cleobury is exciting
to watch. The results he gets with King’s and with the BBC Singers are
the result of his painstaking rehearsal technique rather than spontaneous
insights and exhortations at the music stand. Consequently, the visual
results can be frustrating: the accompanying documentary will tell you
far more about choral conducting than the main event, which boils down
to eye candy for enthusiasts of boys choirs, King’s Chapel and the two
combined.
And why not? They sing the repertoire which (along
with the glories of the English Tudor anthems) are their staple musical
diet and they sing it well, certainly well enough for anyone looking
for the eye candy mentioned above. Cleobury’s rehearsal technique and
musical style, however, does have its disadvantages, and all these performances
are clearly stamped by that style. Tempi are mostly sensible, textures
are mostly clear; the maxim seems to be ‘nothing too much’, and when
so many of these works have a rich expressive world written into them,
exaggeration is certainly dangerous. So too, however, is dullness.
Cleobury’s virtues and defects are shown to greatest
effect in ‘I was glad’. He (quite properly) omits the ‘Vivats’ – for
Coronation use only – and secures precise intonation and some lovely
phrases. The long ‘Peace’ near the end has a wonderfully controlled
swell, but it is no more piano than the climax is the triple f of which
the choir is more than capable. (The same unwillingness to go to extremes
of dynamic compromises the Evening Hymn). How much more the final release
on ‘Plenteousness within thy palaces’ would be if delayed a little.
But that’s not Cleobury’s way, and if nothing else, he gets what he
wants, which are clear, faithful and unexaggerated performances.
An exceptionally carefully balanced recording allows
you to hear far more of the rippling organ triplets in ‘Jerusalem is
builded as a city’ than you could in the Chapel itself. However, here
as elsewhere, the alto line is curiously muted. Who has taken agin them,
I couldn’t say, but they are noticeable by their absence both from the
sound mix and the visual edit. The opening of the coda to the Evening
Hymn has a glorious alto moment: the men of King’s are let off the leash
for a bar and produce a marvellous King’s alto sound that I thought
had gone for good, like a bandsaw through steel plate – but the camera
has panned away and is admiring the moody evening glow. And this is
just one example of many on the disc: the choir is four parts strong,
and a disservice is done when only three parts are audible or visible.
The two organ scholars excel themselves throughout,
but Daniel Hyde is especially impressive in Howells’s ‘Like as the hart’,
which is one of the choir’s more disappointing numbers. The tenors are
too loud for the opening piano marking and the delivery is a touch po-faced
for what must be one of the longest, most yearning lines in all of English
choral music. Text and music demand more here than the cool beauty which
King’s does so well (and is so effective in the Walford Davies and Harris
items); and two trebles make a rare slip, creating a most distressing
effect at the final ‘When shall I come’. The final diminuendo is as
chilling as I’ve ever heard it and Hyde takes all the time you could
wish over his aching, chromatic postlude.
Despite the musical unevenness, this is thoroughly
enjoyable. Now if only someone would do the same for St John’s where
the chapel may be less immediately awe-inspiring but the choir is a
cut above…
Peter Quantrill
Choir of King’s College,
Cambridge, Stephen Cleobury (conductor) 
