Though recorded as
long ago as 1999, this wonderful recording
seems to have slipped through the Musicweb
net until now. I am very happy to repair
the omission with what could be a very
short review: the copy which I am reviewing
was purchased by me and is not a review
copy, the strongest possible recommendation.
McCreesh is a long-standing
master of the scholarly-but-enjoyable
reconstruction. He first came to the
notice of the record-collecting public
with a Venetian reconstruction for the
Virgin label, A Venetian Coronation
1595, music for the enthronement
of the Doge, a CD which still retains
its full-price place in the catalogue
(7 59006 2). After one more such reconstruction,
that of the Burgundian Banquet du
Vœu (deleted but well worth searching
for), Virgin let him slip through their
fingers to DG Archiv, who recorded him
in a reconstructed Venetian Vespers
service, another highly recommendable
recording which, inexplicably, never
seems to have caught on as well as the
other reconstructions (Monteverdi, Rigatti,
etc, now at bargain-price on 476 1868,
2 CDs for around £7-£8 in the UK).
He then turned his
attention to the reconstruction of a
Lutheran Christmas Mass as it
might have been celebrated with the
music of Prætorius (439 250-2,
439 931-2, with a different cover in
some countries) another older recording
which my colleague Dan Morgan has recently
caught up with. I agree with every enthusiastic
word of his
review.
This recording of Schütz’s
Christmas Vespers (463 046-2)
and Bach’s Epiphany Mass (457
631-2, 2 CDs) followed, as did a CD
entitled A
Venetian Christmas, which I
have recently reviewed (471 333-2).
A DVD of Christmas in Rome (Palestrina,
Vivaldi’s Gloria, etc, in collaboration
with The English Concert/Trevor Pinnock,
on 073 4361) completes the series to
date apart from the items contributed
from his various Christmas recordings
to The Baroque Christmas Album
(DG 477 5762). (Are there any more in
the pipeline?)
The Prætorius
and Venetian CDs offer a thoroughly
absorbing experience: sit back and you
can imagine that you are in Saint Mark’s
basilica or some North German cathedral
or ducal chapel. This Schütz recording
offers the same experience, with Roskilde
Cathedral transformed for the occasion
into the Dresden ducal chapel, depicted
on p.19 of the booklet. For further
ideas of the kind of building for which
the music was intended, see the front
of the Prætorius CD at the head
of DM’s Musicweb review or the online
reconstruction of the glorious contemporary
Himmelsburg
chapel at Weimar in 3D.
From around 1600 (Christmas
in Venice) via around 1620 (Prætorius
Christmas Mass) we move on to
around 1664 in Dresden. If the new date
seems suspiciously exact by comparison
with the earlier recordings, it is because
Schütz’s Christmas Story
was published in that year. This gem
of a work is usually performed on its
own – in bygone days it often took a
whole LP to itself – but there is good
reason to believe that it was performed
as part of Christmas Vespers in the
ducal chapel. It makes perfectly good
sense to perform it on its own, as on
the recent budget-price Hyperion Helios
reissue, CDH55310, where it is appropriately
accompanied by Christmas motets by Giovanni
Gabrieli, Schütz’s tutor, whose
style he espoused so fully that some
works attributed to Schütz, such
as Cantate Domino, may actually
be by Gabrieli. It makes better sense,
however, to embed the work in its original
context, the Latin Vespers service celebrated
in Lutheran churches on festivals.
The recording opens
with short organ prelude, an Italian
piece from around 1650, played by Kristian
Olesen on the main cathedral organ.
The CD is almost worth its price for
this instrument alone, a rare example
of a North German type of organ faithfully
restored in 1991 to its original pre-equal-temperament
tuning and, therefore, well suited to
the music of Prætorius on the
earlier disc and that of Schütz
on this. A full specification of the
instrument is given on p.13 of the booklet.
Following the chanted
versicle and response, Schütz’s
setting of the Second Psalm, traditionally
associated with Christmas Vespers, Warum
toben die Heiden, bursts
upon us with full force, two consorts
of nine voices each, accompanied by
two capellas of wind instruments,
full panoply of continuo instruments,
including two organs, and the main cathedral
organ. Is it a bit of a shouting match,
as one reviewer suggested? Yes, but
it is thoroughly enjoyable and it serves
as one of the reminders of Schütz’s
debt to his Venetian masters. The cathedral
is clearly a reverberant location but
the recording team never loses the plot
here or in the congregational hymn which
follows, where the Roskilde choristers
act as surely the most in-tune congregation
ever.
The similarity of the
framework of Lutheran Vespers to the
Roman rite and to Anglican Evensong
reminds us just how conservative a Reformation
Lutheranism originally was – even more
conservative in some ways than the Book
of Common Prayer in retaining Latin
on high days. Luther kept many of the
pre-Reformation office hymns but he
translated them into German and he gave
them to the congregation to sing. Christum
wir sollen loben schon is an adaptation
of the Latin A solis ortus, with
the concepts and the melody simplified
for the congregation. The second hymn
(Gelobet seist du, track 32)
is another of Luther’s pre-Reformation
adaptations.
The setting of the
Magnificat is one of Schütz’s
most elaborate and again demonstrates
his Venetian tuition. A number of Christmas
verses are inserted, a practice which
we know to have been common in Lutheran
usage at the time – as in the alternative
version of JS Bach’s Magnificat
– though we do not know for sure which
interpolations would have been employed
at Dresden. Those chosen here introduce
us to the works of three of Schütz’s
talented contemporaries, Schein and
the two Prætoriuses. (Real name
Schultheiss, but it was fashionable
in the Renaissance and later to sport
a Latin, Italian or Greek name.)
In the Roman rite the
Magnificat is commonly accompanied
by an antiphon but, as these often contained
Marian theology inimical to the evangelical
temperament, they were usually replaced
in Lutheran usage by a motet. (In Anglican
Evensong, they gave way to the Anthem,
a word itself derived from the work
antiphon.) O bone Jesu serves
that purpose here, a piece every bit
the equal musically of its counterparts
in Monteverdi’s 1610 Vespers.
After the Latin Collect
and Blessing – again, in their traditional
place, as in Anglican Evensong – a Postlude
by Scheidt, another of the three famous
Sch’s, Schütz, Schein and Scheidt,
rounds off an excellent recording.
But I am getting ahead
of myself, in that I have not yet mentioned
the Christmas Story, the Historia,
interpolated at the point where we would
have expected the Lesson. Schütz
published this work in two parts, which
has led to difficulties in establishing
the exact text. Modern detective work
has almost fully restored the original,
but the editor, Timothy Roberts, has
resorted to some putative additions
for this recording. Prior to Schütz’s
time the Evangelist in settings of the
Christmas, Easter and Ascension stories
and in the Passion settings had simply
employed chant. (Schütz’s own St
Matthew Passion sounds especially
sparse to modern ears, partly because
of the limited musical role of the Evangelist
and partly as a result of the ravages
of the Thirty Years War.) Schütz
proudly advertised his use of the new
Italianate stylo recitativo in
the Historia.
If it seems that Charles
Daniels might have made a little more
of his role as Evangelist, that may
in part be due to the fact that Schütz
himself was still finding his feet in
this new style and does not give him
much opportunity to express himself,
except on track 20, where he reports
the slaying of the Innocents and quotes
Jeremiah’s affective words on Rachel
weeping for her children. Daniels certainly
makes the most of his opportunities
there without any of the soppiness of
Ian Partridge on the Norrington recording
referred to below.
I was a little disappointed
with some of the other solo singing
– are angels quite as delicate-sounding
as here, or is the recording balance
on track 7 for once to blame? – but,
all in all, the Historia is well
presented. Memories of the rough-and-ready
but charming Vox Turnabout LP performance
(Jörg Faerber?) which was my first
introduction to this music are not completely
erased – in some ways, perhaps, it was
closer to what Schütz’s contemporaries
would have heard than note-perfect modern
recordings. There are also recommendable
bargain versions on Virgin (5 61353-2,
deleted?) and Naxos (8.553514) as well
as the Helios to which I have referred,
all three appropriately coupled, though
none is set in liturgical context.
In the end, it is that
context, so ably provided here, that
sways the balance in favour of the Archiv
version. The apparent deletion of Roger
Norrington’s 1970s Decca Schütz
recordings has brought losses in the
form of the double-choir motets, but
his version of the Historia with
Ian Partridge a rather undernourished
Evangelist is not exactly one of them:
the whole interpretation, once hailed
as fresh, now sounds dragged out in
places by comparison with this McCreesh
version. Felicity Palmer, however, as
Norrington’s Angel outsings Susan Hemington
Jones on the Archiv and Eric Stannard
out-Herods McCreesh’s Neal Davies.
Apart from the minor
criticisms of some of the solo singing
in the Historia, to which I have
referred, the performances are all up
to the very high standards which McCreesh
has established and the recording copes
supremely well with what must have been
a very difficult set of demands. Even
at the ‘busiest’ moments, such as the
psalm and the end of the Historia
(Dank sagen wir alle Gott, track
23) every strand is clear.
The notes are also
up to the usual high standards and the
whole adds up to another highly recommendable
recording for Christmas listening with
a difference. I only wish that DG had
chosen for the brochure cover a colour
reproduction of the Francesco Francia
painting, reproduced in monochrome on
the inside cover, instead of the naïve
drawing, far more suited to the simple
pastoral style of the Ryba or Pascha
Christmas masses, which they have chosen.
That and the childish star on the CD
label detract from an otherwise first-class
production: this is not naïve music.
This CD really has
the lively variety which I found missing
in the last, otherwise recommendable
Christmas recording which I reviewed,
from Bremen Cathedral (CPO 777 238-2).
Assuming that you have already ordered
this Schütz, the Prætorius
and Venetian recordings, how about getting
McCreesh’s Bach Epiphany Mass
(457 631-2, 2CDs) in time for that festival
on January 6th?
Looking forward even
further, how about Schütz’s Easter
Story (Die Auferstehung unsres
Herren Jesu Christi)? Sadly, only
one version of this seems to have been
untouched by the deletions axe, CPO
777 027-2, Weser-Renaissance/Manfred
Cordes, but this will do very well enough:
"impressive and idiomatic performances
of one of Schütz’s masterpieces
and some fine sacred concertos for Easter"
according to Johann
van Veen’s review. But I’d still
look out for stray copies of the Harmonia
Mundi/Jacobs or Sony Classical/Bernius
versions, though the latter is coupled
with another version of the Christmas
Historia.
Brian Wilson
Charles Daniels (tenor, Evangelist, SWV435);
Charles Pott (baritone); Gabrieli Consort;
Boys’ Choir and Congregational Choir of
Roskilde Cathedral; Gabrieli Players (on
original instruments); Kristian Olesen
(cathedral organ)/Paul McCreesh 
