Rheinberger / Stuttgart Chamber Choir / Fischer - Sacred Vocal Music - COMPACT DISCS [CD]

This 14-album box contains all the recordings of the complete sacred vocal music of Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy with the Kammerchor Stuttgart under the direction of Frieder Bernius. The complete recording on the CARUS tag, which took more than two decades to complete, was highly praised by the press and won many awards. Now Bernius' masterful interpretations, which unfold Mendelssohn's sense of cantabile melody and differentiated harmony in a high sound culture and colorful, transparent diction, are available in a complete set.

Among the first releases on the Halle recording tag, established in 2003, were Elgar's Symphonies Nos 1 and 2. This recording revisits those works nearly 20 years later, and mark the culmination of Sir Mark Elder's tenure as Music Director The First Symphony was premiered in the Free Trade Hall, Manchester, in 1908 by the Halle and it's Music Director, Hans Richter to whom the symphony is dedicated. It is a work of astonishing musical and structural mastery which was greeted with worldwide acclaim, receiving one hundred performances in it's first year. The musical material demonstrates Elgar's skill at melody and transformation and presents a wide emotional range. By contrast the Second Symphony, with it's deeply personal 'pilgrimage of a soul', initially received a more muted reception. However, it came into it's own after the end of the first world war when the tone of remembrance and tribute possibly reflected the national mood, in what is now considered to be one of Elgar's finest works.

Carus's complete recording with Frieder Bernius and the Kammerchor Stuttgart of Felix Mendelssohn's sacred choral works represents a magnificent act of interpretation and editing. A better recording can hardly be imagined. This edition, which has won numerous prizes and has now been released as a box at a reasonable price, should form part of every CD collection.