The polyphonic choral arrangements by Clytus Gottwald, the founder and only director of the Schola Cantorum Stuttgart, are legendary and in the meantime belong to the established repertoire of many professional concert choirs. Frieder Bernius juxtaposed four of Gottwald’s most well-known arrangements for multiple voices of works by Debussy and Ravel, as well two original compositions from Jean-Yves Daniel-Lesur [1908 2002] and Carl Christian Fasch [1736 1800]. Fasch composed his ambitious 16-voice Mass as a cornerstone for the founding of the famous Berliner Singakademie. To be sure, in its extreme use of writing for multiple voices the Mass refers to the great Romantradition of Palestrina from the 16th century, but at the same time makes use of the new possibilities of choral sound pointing towards the 19th century. The Gottwald arrangements of Schumann’s Vier Gesängen after poems by von Eichendorff a world premiere recording round out this CD of discriminating and fascinating repertoire.
| Genre (Fx Pop, Rock, Barn m.m.) | Kor |