Tavener: Akhmatova Requiem

Bryn-Julson; Shirley-Quirk; BBC Symphony Orchestra; Rozhdestvensky; Ross; Nash Ensemble

Composed by: Tavener, John

John Tavener's avant-garde style of the seventies contrasts with the contemplative beauty of his later works, for which he is best known, yet the spirituality and mysticism is still evident. Akhmatova Requiem (1980) sets a sequence of poems written during the Stalinist purges of the 1930s by Anna Akhmatova, describing the terror of having her family and friends arrested and imprisoned, and the lines of relatives waiting hopelessly outside Leningrad jail. To her poems, Tavener added prayers from the Russian Orthodox funeral service, sung on this recording by bass-baritone John Shirley-Quirk. Six Russian Folk Songs (1978) represent, in the composer's words, 'a musical sigh of relief' and a complete contrast to the pain and sorrow of the Requiem; they were written for the Nash Ensemble's 15th anniversary in 1979. The simple settings of these folk lyrics recall the melodic nature of Tchaikovsky's songs. (This release saw previous issue on Carlton Classics’ BBC Radio Classics series.)

Price: $27.98