Tim Mead Archive
BACH: Mass in B Minor – Les Arts Florissants/ William Christie – Harmonia mundi
A well-intentioned, hugely successful interpretation of this timeless work. BACH: Mass in B Minor – Katherine Watson, s/ Tim Mead, ct/ Reinoud Van Mechelen, t/ Andre Morsch, b/ Les Arts Florissants/ William Christie – Harmonia mundi HAF 8905293 (2 CDs), 52:16, 52:47 ****: The B-minor’s keep on comin’. I suppose we cannot be too critical of the efforts, seeing as how one of the world’s greatest masterworks automatically serves as a recording magnet. And when you add names like William Christie to the mix, whose involvement with this work spans decades and goes back to his very youth outside Buffalo, New York, the results will be something to talk about. This indeed proves the case here. Christie’s goal in this recording is to not only present the work as a testament to the Christian faith, which he readily admits it is, but also to provide a humanistic covering to the work, an equally inspiring testament to the human race. With that in mind, his musical aspirations here include some quick tempos—by his own admission—that serve to slightly undermine the fully religious immersion found in this piece, an act of homage to the dance-like elements that he finds in the music. […]
PERGOLESI: Stabat Mater; BACH: Cantatas 54 & 170 – La Nuova Musica/ David Bates, Lucy Crowe (sop.), Tim Mead (ten.) – Harmonia Mundi
A vivid and breathtaking rendition of Pergolesi’s masterpiece strangely saddled between Bach canatas. PERGOLESI: Stabat Mater; BACH: Cantatas 54 & 170 – La Nuova Musica dir. David Bates with Lucy Crowe and Tim Mead – Harmonia Mundi 907589 64:16 (5/5/17) ****: (Lucy Crowe: soprano/ Tim Mead: countertenor) Jean Jacques Rousseau, muddle-headed in so many of his opinions, had surprisingly good sense when it came to music, which was after all his true profession. He voiced an assessment of Pergolesi’s Stabat Mater that has held up well over the centuries, calling it “the most touching expression of sorrow to come from the pen of any composer.” This was, however, already a conventional opinion by this time. Charles Burney writing a bit later in the century, extolled the Italian thus: “His clearness, simplicity, truth and sweetness of expression justly entitles him to supremacy over all his predecessors and contemporary rivals, and to a niche in the temple of Fame, among the great improvers of the art..” (Burney: A General History of Music) It is all the more remarkable that Pergolesi attained this eminence in the 18th century, having expired at the tender age of 26. Whereas Schubert reached the the age of […]
Stereotypes Audio
Cembal d’amour
Pure Pleasure / Speakers Corner
Cedille
