Westminster Cathedral Choir
London's Westminster Cathedral is the leading Catholic Church in England. The Benedictine monks who built and owned Westminster Abbey reclaimed part of the marsh around Westminster. Over the centuries, the land has had several uses. The monks operated a market and a fairgrounds there. After the Protestant Reformation in England, the land was used as a maze, a pleasure garden, and as a bull-baiting ring.
Westminster Abbey (by that time property of the Church of England) sold the land for use as a prison. When the prison was retired approaching the turn of the 19th century, the Roman Catholic Church acquired the land in 1884 for a new major Cathedral Church. It is actually one of the newest major churches in London. Its design, by John Francis Bently, is based on early Christian Byzantine architecture, with a strikingly tall bell tower. Its foundation stone was laid in 1895, and the Cathedral was consecrated in 1910. Its interior is not yet completed.
From the initial planning of the Cathedral by Cardinal Herbert Vaughan, music was given great weight in the church's activities. Cardinal Vaughan had been inspired by the Solesmes Abbey's revival of Gregorian Chant and by the accomplishments of the Anglican Church's choral tradition. Music is the largest single item in the Cathedral's budget. It operates a full-time choral school for its choristers. Westminster Cathedral is the only church in the world that celebrates a fully sung Mass every day.
The Westminster Cathedral Choir, among a few others, can credibly be called the best choir in Europe. Sir Richard Terry, the church's first Master of Music, was a devoted scholar of pre-Baroque polyphonic church music and revived choral masterpieces of Tudor-era English composers and their contemporaries on the Continent. He also vigorously championed new composition. Over the years composers of the stature of Ralph Vaughan Williams, Lennoc Berkeley, Gustav Holst, Benjamin Britten, Herbert Howells, William Mathias, and David Sanger have composed for the Cathedral Choir
It made one of the earliest British choral recordings, an acoustic disc cut in 1908. In the compact disc age, it has made a highly acclaimed series of recordings for the British label Hyperion, ranging in repertory from Renaissance polyphony to music of Britten, Poulenc, Langlais, and Stravinsky. It sings concerts and tours as its church service schedule permits, and frequently broadcasts. It joined the Choir of St. Paul's Cathedral (the largest Anglican Church) in 1992 to inaugurate that church's newly-restored organ.
© Joseph Stevenson /TiVo
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Victoria: Ave regina caelorum & Other Sacred Music
Westminster Cathedral Choir, Martin Baker
Klassik - Erschienen bei Hyperion am 01.10.2004
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Maxwell Davies: Mass; Missa parvula & Other Choral Works
Westminster Cathedral Choir, Robert Quinney, Martin Baker
Klassik - Erschienen bei Hyperion am 08.06.2004
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Peaceful Christmas, Vol. 2
Verschiedenes - Erschienen bei Snowy Christmas Records am 26.10.2016
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Francisco de Peñalosa: Masses
Westminster Cathedral Choir, James O'Donnell
Klassik - Erschienen bei Hyperion am 01.03.1993
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Victoria: Missa Dum complerentur & Other Sacred Music
Westminster Cathedral Choir, James O'Donnell
Klassik - Erschienen bei Hyperion am 01.10.1996
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Palestrina: Lamentations for Easter, Book 3
Westminster Cathedral Choir, Martin Baker
Klassik - Erschienen bei Hyperion am 01.03.2007
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
MacMillan: Tenebrae Responsories & Other Choral Works
Westminster Cathedral Choir, Philip Jones Brass Ensemble, Martin Baker
Klassik - Erschienen bei Hyperion am 03.06.2013
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Mortuus est Philippus Rex: Music for the Life & Death of the Spanish King
Westminster Cathedral Choir, James O'Donnell
Klassik - Erschienen bei Hyperion am 01.09.1998
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Palestrina: Missa Dum complerentur & Other Music for Whitsuntide
Westminster Cathedral Choir, Martin Baker
Klassik - Erschienen bei Hyperion am 01.01.2003
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Vaughan Williams: Mass in G Minor – Bingham: Mass
Westminster Cathedral Choir, Martin Baker
Klassik - Erschienen bei Hyperion am 02.05.2005
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Alonso Lobo: Lamentations & Other Sacred Music
Westminster Cathedral Choir, Martin Baker
Klassik - Erschienen bei Hyperion am 27.05.2016
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Miserere: A Sequence of Music for Lent, St Joseph & the Annunciation
Westminster Cathedral Choir, Martin Baker
Klassik - Erschienen bei Hyperion am 30.12.2012
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Resurrexit: The Complete Easter Sunday Mass from Westminster Cathedral (Live)
Westminster Cathedral Choir, Martin Baker, Robert Quinney
Klassik - Erschienen bei Herald am 03.03.2003
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Best Of Christmas, Vol. 1
Weihnachtsmusik - Erschienen bei Snowy Christmas Records am 01.11.2016
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Peaceful Christmas, Vol. 3
Westminster Cathedral Choir, James O'Donell
Verschiedenes - Erschienen bei Snowy Christmas Records am 26.10.2016
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Peaceful Christmas, Vol. 3
Westminster Cathedral Choir and James O' Donell
Verschiedenes - Erschienen bei White Christmas Records am 26.10.2016
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Best Of Christmas, Vol. 2
Weihnachtsmusik - Erschienen bei White Christmas Records am 01.11.2016
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Peaceful Christmas, Vol. 1
Verschiedenes - Erschienen bei White Christmas Records am 26.10.2016
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Best Of Christmas, Vol. 1
Weihnachtsmusik - Erschienen bei White Christmas Records am 01.11.2016
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Peaceful Christmas, Vol. 2
Verschiedenes - Erschienen bei White Christmas Records am 26.10.2016
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo