Hark, Shepherds, Hark, The Madding Crowd, 2007; The Madding Crowd # TMC-002-CD. Obtained from the group’s website, (you may also email to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.).

The Madding Crowd is an English group that specializes in the research and performance of church and country music from Georgian times. Their performance focus is on authenticity, and as such their music embodies an immediacy and earthiness that takes the listener back in time. The sound has a bumptious, rural quality that specifically does not recall performances of polished professionals. In this case, this quality is a good thing.

This CD is a selection from the group’s Christmas repertoire. Historically, the holidays presented such groups a fine opportunity to make music in the church, in West Gallery tradition, and to make the rounds of the village, visiting every cottage to tell the good news in carols. Many of the selections recorded here are taken from an undated manuscript found by the group in a used bookshop, and their research has placed its contents in the vicinity of 1837 Dorset, and many of the carols found within are not known elsewhere.

The selections include "We Singers Make Bold" with its West Country tune, "Hark the Glad Sound" (ca. 1800), "Awake Ye Heavenly Choirs and Sing" (early 19th C), "The Cornish Seraphic Minstrels," "Great Was the Joy Displayed Abroad," the Charles Burney version of "Hark the Herald Angels Sing," "Come Let Us All With Heart and Voice," "O May We All Rejoice," which at times seems almost Handelian, the mid-18th-century "Anthem for the Nativity St. Luke Chapter 2," "Angels From the Realms of Glory" in its Thomas Merritt setting, "Anthem for the Nativity," "When Jordan Hush’d His Waters Still" (ambitious for West Gallery), "Shepherds Rejoice," the lilting 6/8 "A Saviour Sinner," "Glad Tidings, Bright Angels," with its opening "symphony," the titular "Hark Shepherds Hark," "Arise and Hail," the tricky "Me Think I Hear a Soft Still Voice," the Victorian carol "Be Merry All," "Hark Those Hallelujahs Pealing," which spans from the Nativity to the Passion and Second Coming, and finally "While Shepherds Watch’d," here with a different tune setting for every verse, none of which are familiar today.

The Madding Crowd’s instrumental accompaniment consists of fiddles, cello, flute, oboe, clarinet and serpent. From an early brass standpoint, this album’s offering is limited to the participation of the serpent, played here quite capably by Peter Hackston. Happily, this proves to be a lot of serpent, often in prominent lines and sometimes taking the melody. I recommend this recording on the strength of its offbeat, authentic sound, unusual collection of carols, and strong serpent presence.

--Paul Schmidt

Back from Oblivion; Nick Byrne, Ophicleide; David Miller, Piano. Melba Recordings MR 301111 Australia, Recorded at the Australian National Academy of Music (6-8 December 2006)

CD Contents:
Dagnelies: Fantasie Variée
Proctor: Adagio from Ophecleide Concerto
Demersseman: Introduction et Polonaise
Elgar: Romance
Kummer: Variations for Ophecleide
Rachmaninov: Vocalise
Handel: Oh Ruddier than the Cherry
Grieg: Ich Liebe Dich
Klosé: Air Varié
Piazzola: Oblivion

The "rare" Ophicleide is enjoying a renaissance. This is certainly proven by the release of Nick Byrne's wonderful CD. Nota bene: "From Oblivion" is the first commercially released solo recording ever made of this curious and evolutionary instrument! While it seems that the ophecleide could be considered an ancestor of the modern-day tuba, it actually was invented around 1817. So the ophecleide actually is more of kissing cousin to the tuba (Moritz' first tuba was patented in 1835, so was first constructed some years before). Or maybe ugly stepsister. It certainly looks "ancestral" as related to a tuba, appearing to echo the relationship between the keyed bugle and the valved cornet. Because the valved low brass instruments eventually proved to be a better design, many opheclides were soon relegated to storage closets -- except in the hands of only the most ardent fans and virtuosi. Its wider usage was only for a couple decades after 1820, and so maybe the real ophicleide "golden age" is happening right now, when we have an international community of ophicleidists (?), including several modern day virtuosi, such a Nick Byrne. Many of the original 19th-century instruments have been refurbished into playing condition, and some are even for sale in certain Parisian shops. There also are artisans are building new ones.

So, it is authentic for us to be hearing 19th-century romantic music played on this instrument. It is an object from the early part of that era and it played a part in initiating composers, conductors, and audiences to the possibility of a bass brass instrument with facility. Nick notes on his fine website: "Performers, such as English Virtuoso Samuel Hughes and the Royal Italian Opera's (Covent Garden) J.H. Guilmartin, continued to perform on the instrument late into the 1890's."

The name is derived from the Greek "ophis" (meaning serpent) and "kleis" (to cover). Having between 9 and 11 keys, and in a variety of sizes, from the alto (quinticlave) pitched in E-flat or F, to the contrabasses in E-flat or C, "ophicleide" can be considered a family of instruments.

If the ophicleide is a "period" instrument, that period embraces orchestral works of Mendelssohn, Berlioz, Meyerbeer, Italian opera composers, and others. As a chamber instrument or military band instrument, it seems to have made brass chamber music more possible for the first time since sackbuts and cornettos were shelved. Both the orchestral works and the smaller ensembles are represented by some good examples in the CD catalogs. See Nick’s website (address below) for a very complete ophicleide discography.

Back from Oblivion is a first-class production, with gorgeous recording acoustics, and stylish and masterful playing by both Nick Byrne and pianist David Miller. The CD was produced with the support of the Melba Foundation, Australia Council, and arts agencies of the Australian government, allowing for a deluxe product in every respect. It is a pleasurable listening experience and the liner notes are excellent. His website www.ophicleide.com, is the primary destination for learning more about this instrument and its tradition. Nick plays on an 1830 Finke ophicleide in C, and an 1875 C model by Halévy, both, by the measure of this recording, perfectly restored.

The CD is not available on Amazon.com, but Nick suggests cduniverse.com in the U.S. and play.com or crotchet.co.uk in the U.K. and Europe. In Australasia, try melbarecordings.com.au. This is one CD to own and enjoy repeatedly. The first modern solo recording of the ophicleide didn't have to be this superb. We'll have to throw all our ophicleide jokes out.

--- Paul Niemisto

Buxtehude & Co.; Caecilia-Concert; Fiona Russell, cornetto/cornettino; Adam Woolf, tenor trombone; Wouter Verschuren, dulcian; Kathryn Cok, harpsichord/organ; Annabelle Ferdinand, violin. Challenge Records CC72179. Info: www.caecilia-concert.com Recorded November 2006.

Caecilia-Concert’s latest CD presents a program of 9 sonatas, a chaconne, and an aria by Dieterich Buxtehude (1637-1707) and four of his illustrious contemporaries of the North German school: Johann Philipp Krieger (1649-1725); Matthias Weckmann (1619-1674); Dietrich Becker (1623-1671); and Johann Theile (1646-1724). The program represents a musical view of the 17th-century North German collegia musica and the Abendmusiken, which were special concerts presented for merchants, lawyers, and other successful members of society. Inherently secular in nature, this repertoire is highly virtuosic and presents many demands upon the performers. One such interesting challenge, as pointed out in the informative CD booklet, is the use of A# and Bb in the same piece representing two different pitches in the historic temperament. Members of this ensemble ably meet those challenges and more. Their expressive musical lines are perhaps slightly less over-the-top than some cornett and sackbut ensembles, and to my mind, this approach is more enjoyable. The fast-fingers, strong chops, flexible playing aspect of technique is at the top of the game. The performance is flawless. Fiona Russell, perhaps the finest cornett player of her generation, plays a John McCann treble cornett and a cornettino by Serge Delmas. Adam Woolf plays a tenor trombone by Ewald Meinl modeled after an original by Drewelwecz. For a glimpse into the sound-world of 17th-century North German instrumental music one couldn’t do better than this excellent recording.
--- Jeffrey Nussbaum

Music for The Twelve Days of Christmas and The Nativity; His Majestys Sagbutts & Cornetts, 2007; Jeremy West, cornett and bagpipes; Jamie Savan, cornett; Adam Woolf, Abigail Newman, and Stephen Saunders sackbuts; Gary Cooper, organ, virginal, and harpsichord. SFZ Music # SFZ0307. Obtained from the group’s website, www.hmsc.co.uk

Just in time to celebrate its 25th year of existence, His Majestys Sagbutts & Cornetts has released a new CD album of music for the Christmas season, titled Music for The Twelve Days of Christmas and The Nativity. This group of two cornetts, three sackbuts, and chamber organ often joins with other musicians; in this case they have added Stephen Henderson on percussion, Keith McGowan on bagpipes and recorder, and soprano Faye Newton.

Included here are selections in many musical styles, all originally used as part of the European Christmas season from the 12th through 17th centuries. The album begins with 10 tracks relating to the Nativity, followed by another 13 tracks of what the group calls its “whistle stop tour” of each of the 12 days of Christmas.

In the Nativity section, the first track is Anthony Holborne’s galliard As It Fell On a Holie Eve, followed by the visit of the angel to the Virgin Mary as illustrated by the sung Angelus ad Virginem and Jacob Obrecht’s Ave Maria Stella. The angel appears to the shepherds accompanied by an instrumental medley comprised of Holborne’s The Night Watch and Dowland’s A Shepherd in Shade, after which Newton sings one setting of Von Himmel Hoch, with the brass returning the favor with two more settings by Eccard and Schein. The birth pageant begins with Victoria’s Alma Redemptoris Mater à 5 plus soprano and Walther’s setting of Joseph lieber, Joseph mein. There follows a medley of Es ist ein Ros entsprungen in its version by Praetorius, the Melchior Velpius Canon à 4, and the traditional Coventry Carol. The set concludes with Victoria’s Quem vidistis pastores à 6 describing the arrival of the shepherds.

Reaching Christmastide, the selections follow the subjects of the titular song’s twelve gifts. Thomas Ravenscroft’s Hawking for the Partridge is an obvious choice, as is Morley’s Fantasia à 2 La Tortorella if you know that ‘tortorella’ is a little turtle dove. In the same vein the three French hens appear as ‘t Han en ‘t Henne Gekray à 3 and Le Ballet des Cocqs by Praetorius, and four calling birds are in the guise of Symphonia à 4 Supra la Cuc Cuc by Nicolaus a Kempis. At this point one can imagine a mental block worthy of Major General Stanley searching for a difficult rhyme as the group cogitates about a song to go with five gold rings …”Aha! I have it”… and a five-part canon (ahem, ‘round’) ushers forth in the form of Ravenscroft’s Two Rounds in Five Parts. Tripping along comes Lasso’s “Gyri gyri gaga gans” in Audite Nova, which at least has something to do with geese. At this point anyone having breath in them will see Gibbons's The Silver Swan coming a mile away, but sneaking in behind it is the unexpected Suono del Ballo de Cigni by Giacomo Spiardo. John Playford helpfully provides The Milke-maid’s Life and The Milkmaid’s Bob, but one has to perhaps play the track eight times to get the whole effect. Nine ladies dancing justifies Richard Allison’s The Lady Frances Sidney’s Almayne, and one good rationalization deserves another, so Farnaby’s The Lord Souches Maske follows; the energetic character of this piece along with the mirth inducing sound of the rhythmic rommel pot combine to affect some real leaping (but I’m not kidding, listen as the group cracks up at the end of this track…that’s one hilarious friction drum line). Enter the guest bagpiper to follow Morley’s Those That Want To My Pipes Sound with a suitable traditional Welsh folk tune Nos Galan (which provided the melody of today’s favorite "Deck the Hall With Boughs of Holly"), segueing into the closing Bransle l’Officiel of Thoinot Arbeau (which gave us "Ding Dong Merrily on High"), performed here with lots of percussion, although there are not 12 of them drumming.

This is a fine, and fun, addition to the early brass recording canon. The playing is expert and musical, varying from tear-inducing to energetic, and Faye Newton has a nice, clear, early-music type of voice which both blends with the brass, yet rises above them when needed. Of the group’s nearly 20 albums, this has quickly become one of my favorites.

--Paul Schmidt