Music of Barbara Harbach, Vol.17 – Choral Music I

Reviews

It is good to hear the choral output of Barbara Harbach. Her symphonic output has impressed on multiple occasions in the past, and she brings her experienced hand to the world of the choir with outstanding results.

The recording venue is well chosen: St John’s, Smith Square in London, a church converted into a concert venue located near the Houses of Parliament and a stone’s throw from the River Thames. I know from personal experience of performing there how resonant the acoustic can feel. It needs careful handling from the recording engineers but can sound amazing (try Robert Levin’s long-awaited completion of his Mozart Piano Concerto cycle with the Academy of Ancient Music for a good, recent example). Here, the engineer is the hyper-experienced Mike Hatch, with Richard Price as producer (who also edited and mastered the recording).

The disc is divided into five sections: Scared Music, Advent and Christmas, Lent and Easter, Spirituals, and Secular Music.

The first of the sacred music offerings is Praise Him with the Trumpet (ironically, not an item with a trumpet in it). The dotted rhythm, single note setting of the opening line does have a fanfare aspect to it, though, and the central section, beginning with a ruminative piano solo beautifully played by Timothy Bell, offers respite surrounding affirmations. The text is from the Psalms (No. 150). Apollo Voices of London is clearly a fine ensemble (not to be confused with the similarly UK-based vocal ensemble Apollo 5).

There is something very poignant about restrained settings of the word “Alleluia.”  One need only think of Stravinsky’s Symphony of Psalms. Harbach offers an extended example, for choir and piano with a solo flute adding a sinewy extra line, performed by the excellent Margaret Campbell. It certainly contrasts with the religious zeal and exaltation of The Hills Shout Glad Hosannahs. The choir sounds magnificent throughout, perhaps especially in the telling quieter moments when everything is exposed. Chord balancing is exemplary, and there is never any strain to the upper voices no matter what Harbach throws at them.

Moving to Advent and Christmas (as we are doing, inexorably, as I write this), warmer harmonies inevitably infiltrate. There is only seven minutes in this entire section, a shame as Harbach’s setting of Jonathan Yordy’s text for This Night in Bethlehem, is simply scrumptious. Soprano Mimi Doulton’s little solo is lovely. From music redolent of oven-warmed mince pies, we move to a jazzy number, Sing! Christ is Born!, with piano offering brass fanfare imitations (“Sound the trumpet, sound the horn,” go the words). There is a lovely sense of hope to the words “Spread the word to ev’ry nation”; text is again by Yordy, whose poetic play on synesthesia in Audible Light is most engrossing. Harbach’s setting of Audible Light has a quiet swing to it, as if gently rocking a baby. The suddenly active piano part at the end aids both the feeling of celebration and, indeed, plain old fun.

Lent is traditionally a whole lot less fun than Christmas, and the tenor of Bathe My Soul reflects this. “As in a desert … as in a wasteland,” go Yordy’s words. Harbach’s setting is imaginative, relishing dissonance within a generally tonal ambience. There is almost a bluesy aspect to Of Christ’s Dark Cup (it is a cup of sorrow), with a particularly pernickety piano phrase nagging away over a left hand whose tramping rhythm never varies, as if to remind us of Jesus’ suffering. This is a highly effective Holy Week offering. This track offers a particularly fine example of how Apollo Voices of London maintain perfect balance at fortissimo, and how well the sopranos can control the line.

Pitting the Latin of the Nova Vulgata Sacrorum Editio with Yordy’s English translation (the two languages alternate), Turn Round, O My Soul seems to plumb deeper depths, underpinned by Harbach’s innate lyricism. Only Mary’s Joyful Shout lacks a touch of what is obviously intended to be absolute joy (and surprise, one imagines) at Jesus’ awakening from his previous state of death. The setting is decidedly jolly; the performance sounds just a touch studio-bound (this piece would surely make a great encore at a concert). A flute enters to usher in the final piece in this cluster: In Peace and Joy I Now Depart. I agree absolutely with the booklet notes that there is more than a touch of Renaissance dance to the piece’s “B” section, enhanced by Campbell’s fluid flute. Active though the flute might be, the choir is less so, ushering in a somewhat ritualistic feel.

Certainly, there is a gear change as the program moves into spirituals territory. Harbach’s setting of Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child is perfectly pitched for this repertoire. Louise Clare Marshall is the fine soloist here, every word beautifully enunciated, melismas as smooth as Swiss drinking chocolate. Give Me Jesus is clearly heartfelt both by composer and choir; Harbach’s piano part is highly effective, with strong soprano solos from Mimi Doulton and Joanna Forbes L’Estrange. It is mezzo Marshall and bass Rodney Earl Clarke (no relation) who solo in the extended When I Cross that River. Harbach’s newly composed spiritual should be in the repertoire of every choir that specializes in this music. Expansive, it reaches a rousing climax that implies it is heading towards the filmic, although it never does. Another spiritual of near-Biblical intent is Many Thousands Gone, which includes parts not only for solo flute, but also an elegiac solo cello (performed by Pedro Silva).

Finally, in the secular music section, Harbach’s song Here I Stand beautifully conveys the resolute nature of its protagonist (mezzo Sarah-Jane Lewis, who has a stunning upper register). There is something very cuddly about the harmonies Harbach uses for Intoxicated by the Wine of Love, a setting of Persian Sufi poet Farid al-Din ‘Attar, while the famous poet Sara Teasdale furnishes the words for Sunset: St. Louis, which includes a rather slinky dance-like section featuring Persian-inflected vocal lines.

The premise of Women Composers is simple and proves a point, Harbach lists famous women composers as part of her text. It’s light and frothy. The presence of trumpets and snare drum adds much to America, the Promised Land. It is certainly patriotic and includes an instrumental insert from Harbach’s own Tom and Sally—A Slave to Love. The three trumpeters judge their contribution perfectly, bright but not brash, strong but not overwhelming, complementing and enhancing the text and its sung sentiments.

The segregation of the disc into various fields works very well. Performances are faultless to my ears, and Harbach’s music certainly does not disappoint. Texts and translations (where appropriate) are included, along with annotations. A fine disc.

Colin Clarke, Fanfare Magazine, Issue 47:4 (Mar/Apr 2024)

Five stars: Performances are faultless to my ears, and Harbach’s music certainly
does not disappoint.