Broadway: Mixed Choir a Cappella: Vocal Album

SKU: OU.9780193366015

ISBN 9780193366015. 12 x 8 inches.

For SATB unaccompanied To Music is a jubilant anthem set to a poem by Robert Herrick ('To Music - A Song'). Commissioned by the BBC to mark Stephen Cleobury's 60th birthday celebrations in 2009, the work perfectly captures the exultant mood of the text, extolling the virtues of music.

About Oxford New Horizons

New Horizons showcases the wealth of exciting, innovative, and occasionally challenging choral music being written today. It encompasses the whole gamut of small-scale choral genres, both secular and sacred, and includes pieces for upper-voice and mixed choirs. With titles by some of the most accomplished choral composers active in Great Britain and abroad, the series introduces new repertoire and fresh talent to a broad spectrum of choirs. New Horizons features composers with growing reputations for quality composition reflecting a strong individual voice. The series is continually expanding and should be the first place to look for attractive and performable contemporary choral music.

SKU: BR.CHB-5380-00

ISBN 9790004413814. 7.5 x 10.5 inches. German / Latin.

As director of the Bavarian Radio Choir, Howard Arman has been actively engaged with international Christmas carols through various Christmas-related CD productions in the past years. This has resulted in a number of original arrangements for four- to eight-part mixed choir a cappella, shedding new light on well-known classics such as O du frohliche [O, you joyful], Stille Nacht [Silent Night] and Lasst uns froh und munter sein [Let us be happy and cheerful]. The first volume includes five Christmas carols from the German-speaking regions. They range from simple but harmonically intriguing settings such as Lieb Nachtigall, wach auf [Dear nightingale, wake up] to eight-part sound paintings with bell-like chimes as in O du frohliche and classical double choir settings such as Resonet in laudibus. The second volume includes five Christmas spirituals with English texts, forming a contrast to the solemn and festive character of the first. The choir can prove its swing and jazz qualities here; the stirring arrangements are a gain for classical Christmas concerts, too. Following the tradition of the spiritual, some settings also require soloists, which can, however, also be recruited from the choir if adequate singers are available. The first piece combines the spirituals It's a Birthday and Wasn't That a Mighty Day to form a medley, Ain't That a Rockin' gives a moment of tranquility before the likewise rousing spirituals Mary Had a Baby and Little David conclude the volume. In both volumes, Howard Arman provides a short preface in German and English, explaining the background of each piece and giving advice on performance.

SKU: BT.EMBZ14553

English-German-Hungarian.

Volume II of the collected edition of the choral works of Veress contains seven Hungarian folksong cycles or cantatas, a choral poem in Hungarian and a choral cycle in English. In his first creative period (1929-1939), which he spent in Hungary, Sándor Veress's direct involvement in Hungarian folk music research played a decisive part: his folksong experience gained through personal collecting work found expression in his first period of composition for mixed choir. In the course of the 1960s, after his emigration, he returned on two occasions to the a cappella mixed choir genre: in 1962 he wrote a piece for mixed choir to mark the 60th birthday of the great Hungarian poet GyulaIllyés (Óda Európához - Ode to Europe, based on the poem by Illyés), and in 1967, at the request of the Australian Radio Company, he composed for the 'Adelaide Singers' chamber choir Songs of the Seasons, a seven-movement madrigal cycle making exceptional demands on the performers, to verses by the Australian poet Christopher Brennan (1870-1932).

Der zweite Band der gesammelten Ausgabe der Chorwerke von Sándor Veress umfasst sieben ungarische Volkslied-Zyklen, bzw. Kantaten, ein Chorpoem in ungarischer Sprache und einen englischen Chorzyklus. In der ersten Schaffensperiode seines Lebens (1929-1939), die er in Ungarn verbrachte, nimmt sein unmittelbarer Kontakt zur ungarischen Volksmusikforschung eine entscheidende Rolle ein: Das Volkslied-Erlebnis seiner persönlichen Sammeltätigkeit kam in der ersten Periode seiner Kompositionen für gemischten Chor unmittelbar zur Geltung. In der Emigration, während der sechziger Jahre, kehrte er noch zweimal zur Gattung gemischter Chor a cappella zurück: 1962 komponierte ereinen gemischten Chor zum 60. Geburtstag des großen ungarischen Dichters Gyula Illyés (nach einem Gedicht von Illyés) unter dem Titel Ode an Europa. 1967 schrieb er im Auftrag der Australischen Rundfunkgesellschaft, für den Kammerchor 'Adelaide Singers' einen siebensätzigen Madrigalzyklus (Songs of the Seasons).

SKU: HL.133522

UPC: 884088983567.