Critical Acclaim for "The American Spirit"

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March/April 2007

THE AMERICAN SPIRIT • Timothy J. Krueger, dir; St. Martin's Chamber Choir • CYGNUS 004 (76:18) BERGER Skelton Poems. The Eyes of All. EFFINGER 4 Pastorales. KRUEGER Lamentations of Jeremiah. MACDOW-ELL (arr. Somervell) To a Wild Rose. SARSANY Salve Mater misericordiae. SCHLENKER Kyrie. THOMPSON Alleluia

This delicious program was recorded in 2002 and appears to have had its first release in the same year. The delay in its coming to hand for review may be due to a more recent change in distribution arrangements; in any case, the "better-late-than-never" cliche certainly applies here in spades.

Director Krueger writes, "the works on this CD are not overtly patriotic per se; and such a compilation would be out of step with who and what St. Martin's is. Rather, they celebrate the wealth of the American choral tradition, of which St. Martin's is a part." The repertoire is largely 20th century, the bookend dates being 1896 (MacDowell) and 2002 (Schlenker); but within that parameter, the program does in fact present a gratifyingly wide range of both subject matter and style—gentle folksiness in the first of the Effinger Pastorales, piquant tone clusters in the Schlenker Kyrie, harmonized chant in the Krueger Lamentations.

The performances themselves are exquisite—perfect blend, diction, and intonation; unfailingly unanimous attacks and releases. The sonic engineering does them full justice. Oboist Sue Logan (Effinger) and pianist Tamara Goldstein (Berger's Skelton Poems) acquit themselves admirably, as do vocal soloists JoAnn Gudvangen-Brown, M. B. Krueger, and David Farwig in the Schlenker Kyrie— the latter making a more extended and equally distinguished return appearance in the Skelton set.

As Krueger notes, the ensemble had developed a close relationship with composer Jean Berger during the five years preceding his death in May 2002; and I have no reason to doubt that their rendition of the Skelton Poems does, indeed, fulfill their hope of "conforming] very closely to his original conception." Additional praise must be accorded to Mark Sheldon (who evidently shares conducting duties with Krueger) for his scrupulous attention to the dynamic markings in the justly-popular Thompson Alleluia: the gradual crescendo of this work progresses, if you will, logarithmically rather than geometrically, and it's a tempting trap for conductors to flatten out that curve by building too much too soon. It's only in this track that the present release could be said to have any substantial competition; but, in fact, I can't imagine the piece being rendered much more engagingly than it is here.

A couple of variously weighty quarrels with the documentation: the texts of works in languages other than English are given only in translation, not in the original. Interestingly, in Justice et morte, poet John Skelton (1460-1529) renders the same words first in French, then in Latin, and finally in English; the full text is given here, though the reprise of the French section after the Latin one isn't indicated, to this listener's momentary confusion. More troublesome is the absence of any notes on the various works; to speak only of the opening set, I'd never heard (as best I can recall, anyhow) of either Cecil Effinger or poet Thomas Hornsby Ferril, and both are such capable masters of their respective crafts that I'd like very much to have been told something about them.

Warmly recommended nonetheless. James Carson

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