This is the music for a 1998 BBC documentary series recounting the struggles between the forces of modernisation and conservatism within Catholicism over the past three decades, specifically following the changes since John XXIII. In her notes Debbie Wiseman says that she has attempted to portray in musical terms, "the machinations of this metamorphosis… through the medium of what is to me an enduringly powerful religious image - the choir." It may be an obvious approach, but sometimes the obvious is best, and it is hard to see how any other means of scoring could have so resolutely encapsulated through its very sound, resonate with the accumulated wealth of the Catholic musical tradition, the essence of the subject. This is not to say that Wiseman consciously imitates the style of any particular Catholic composer, rather that her score is an evocation of the spirit of centuries of musical development, realised through her own distinctive melodic personality. While Catholicism may claim to have Absolute Truth, this score valuably reminds us that there more to church music than any one tradition, for interspersed with Wiseman's score are four 'ethnic' selections, including praise music from Zambia, and music as performed by the Inter Religious Choir for Cochin. These pieces from outside the western tradition do rather break the flow of Wiseman's more classically orientated writing - and so from a musical point of view might have been better placed in a group and the beginning or end of the disc - but by being integrated into the main body of the score serve to remind us that no one has a monopoly on the 'right' musical way of worship. In the end it is all tradition, and in-grained cultural preferences aside, who is to say that one church musical tradition is of inherently superior worth to another? Nevertheless, it is Debbie Wiseman's music which is the centre of attention, with 35 minutes of the 50 minutes of the album devoted to her score. This music is divided into 17 tracks, the writing demonstrating a seemingly effortless blend of choir and subtle orchestration - solo violin, cello, cor anglais and oboe are prominent. If this is church music, it is so with a sense of drama and tension, music which synthesises the tranquillity of sound of the earlier Roman tradition of Palestrina et all, with a growing sense of musical argument which developed progressively over the following centuries. In screen terms one obvious point of comparison is John Williams excellent score for Monsignor, and against this Absolute Truth more than holds its own. The grandiose title theme speaks of both eternity and the implacable might of the eternal city, a bell resolutely toiling either a summons to prayer, or to account. For there is something spine-tinglingly dramatic here, a reinforcement of the fact that 'Rome' is a temporal authority of enduring power, not to be trifled with or under-estimated. 'Smile of History' is more romantic, almost summoning Miklós Rózsa's nativity music from Ben-Hur, while later thematic material evokes images of the loneliness of command, describing a tension between the avowed aims of Catholicism and the earthly realities of governing one of the most powerful of global organisations. The writing is rich, full and replete with portentous beauty. Debbie Wiseman's solo piano, a trademark of the composer, has a characteristic eloquence on such themes as 'Remembrance', while the choral writing truly suggests an epic scale. The only thing that stops me giving this 5 stars is that, as a CD the score exhibits a certain necessary repetition. It is however, a most rewarding score, and alongside Wilde and Warriors, one of Wiseman's best currently available. Both the performances and the atmospheric sound are first rate. Reviewer Gary S. Dalkin	Reviewer Gary S. Dalkin Reviews from previous months Reviews carry sales links but you can also purchase from:
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