This famous choir now has a history (albeit a fairly recent one) of putting together programmes likely to have a wider appeal than those devoted to a single composer or to music for the Anglican liturgy: their ‘Agnus Dei’ (1/97) – as has already been mentioned above – was something of a best-seller, and ‘Early One Morning’ (3/98) deserves to be another. This new one takes its title from Stanford’s imaginative and readily memorable setting of The Blue Bird by Mary Coleridge (great-great niece of ST), the second item in a programme that starts with John Rutter’s What Sweeter Music, the placid mood of which it preserves. The various pieces then follow one another smoothly, with scarcely a break in sound or disruption of the pervasive tranquillity. The performances are fine: choral tone and balance sensitively controlled, with forms of accompaniment nicely varied to include harp and strings as well as organ. The record is described as ‘an album of music to pacify the age of anxiety’, and for those to whom that description appeals it will probably succeed very well.
And now I’ll say what I really think (not that that involves disagreeing with any of the above). We know that ‘taste’ (as in ‘good taste’, ‘bad taste’) is now widely considered an antiquated notion and not on any account to be used in connection with the arts; but at least ‘taste’ as one of the five senses still has an accepted meaning. So what kind of taste is it that makes an entire meal of sugar or sugared substances? That is what is offered here, the sugar turning into syrup with boneless wonders by Tavener, Messiaen and Part. The other John Taverner (he of the extra ‘r’) is a different matter, as is Monteverdi, but even these have been dusted with icing-sugar by their placing in line with all the other goodies on the sweet-trolley. Whoever is responsible has forgotten a first principle: that effect is achieved by contrast. Anxieties, for instance, may sometimes be effectively soothed and lulled (and almost everything here is slow as well as sweet), but a little brightness and vigour to cheer and put spirit into the anxious would not go amiss either. Probably no item deserves in itself to be called cheap, but all are cheapened by this kind of programming. In terms of concept (not performance), and in the sense of the word ‘taste’ as suggested above, this is as tasteless a record as has come my way for quite some time.'