Amici Voices
61:37
hyperion CDA68275
This is a fine showcase for Amici Voices, a group of like-minded young singers, based I suspect around the admirable Helen Charleston, who
Sometimes a shade over-enthusiastic, as in the bass’s Bestelle dein Haus in 106, where in a recording as opposed to a live performance over-dramatising phrases can lead to a coarsening. But Helen Charleston’s In deine Hände is utterly ravishing. And how does Michael Craddock manage to give such a convincing top G when reaching for Paradise and still give a grainy F# on alte Bund at the very bottom? The vocal range is testing in BWV 106 even when done at 415, though I think the arguments (not rehearsed in the liner notes) for doing it at 392 (as with other Mulhausen cantatas where string and wind parts are notated in different keys) are strong on practical as well as musicological grounds.
Two other comments on 106: first, when you are using only an organ bass much of the time, the organ really needs to have more of an an 8’ principal tone. Without it, an 8’ violone is welcome especially when you sing the ‘choruses’ two to a part. With such light scoring as in 106, and the boundaries between chorus and arioso so fluid, I personally prefer single voices: it is easier to match single voices to the very straight sounds of recorders and viols. That is demonstrated clearly by Bethany Partridge’s beautiful soprano line in Ja komm, Herr Jesu.
The eight singers come into their own in the motet Komm, Jesu komm (BWV 229). Here we can hear each individual line clearly, with the sopranos exemplary. Singers of inner parts have to learn to trust that they will be audible without resorting to singing though notes or pushing over bar lines, still less to turning on the vibrato. Just occasionally – often at the ends of phrases when breath is short – that is what happens in all the voice parts and we get a note pushed through the texture, or a weak note accented inappropriately. But when they are all listening to and singing to each other, you can hear the potential for the understated ensemble singing that those who have been trained as ‘soloists’ in the conservatoires find it hard to adjust to, but helps us understand that we need to approach Bach’s vocal lines from behind – singing Bach with a style developed from the motets of Schütz and Schein, and from the Altbachisches Archiv.
BWV 182, Himmelskönig, sei
All in all, this is a good calling card for the group and they should feel encouraged by the way the quality of their performance has been captured, even if there are musicological issues that might have been resolved in the planning with the consequent effect on the performance practice. I was glad to have some details of pitch, instruments and an indication of temperament. The brief liner notes explain the choices behind the programme, but do not attempt to enter the minefield of issues around pitch and instrumentation. We need groups like this to get going – do encourage them and get this CD.
David Stancliffe