Allan Ramsay's The Gentle Shepherd 
Makaris
Olde Focus Recordings FCR924 (newfocusrecordings.com/catalogue/makaris-allan-ramsays-the-gentle-shepherd)

Throughout the 18th century, Allan Ramsay’s The Gentle Shepherd (1729) was a smash hit on Edinburgh and London stages, and continued to be performed by amateur companies until late in the 19th. Robert Burns himself praised the poetry, and the story inspired over 40 paintings. Now, 300 years after the libretto’s publication, Scottish Baroque ensemble Makaris has given us the opera’s very first recording, and it is a delight— brimming with humour, verve, and accomplished musicianship.

This was not only the first Scottish opera but also the first ballad opera, an original libretto set to popular airs and songs of the day. These have no composer in the usual sense; the poet would simply indicate the name of the air to which his words should be sung. For this reason, much of the compositional responsibility fell on the musicians, who operated in a liminal space between oral and written traditions. For this recording Makaris had to create their own arrangements, drawing from a bare-bones score made after Ramsay’s death and digging into archives. They admit to taking some liberties for the sake of bringing the songs alive by choosing unexpected or atypical harmonies. This is all for the better; it springs off the recording so vividly that one longs for a live production.

This recording will appeal to those who enjoy theatre music by Boyce or Arne and works such as the Beggar’s Opera. It might also intrigue those who are familiar with some of the traditional tunes that show up here, in sparkling arrangements and with words added. The Waulking of the Fould is played much the same as it is now in Cape Breton or Scotland, and the O’Carolan’s beloved Sí Beag, Sí Mór is very recognizable, too. 

Ramsay’s work has one more relevant element for Canadian listeners in 2025: one of his motivations in writing and publishing was to champion Scotland’s culture and identity, and he was a vocal opponent of the Union of 1707 (which incorporated Scotland into Great Britain). Now, where is OUR Gentle Shepherd?

John Weldon - The Judgement of Paris
Academy of Ancient Music; Cambridge Handel Opera; Julian Perkins
AAM AAM046 (aam.co.uk/product/john-weldon-the-judgment-of-paris)

This lesser-known masque is a rarity. In an era of prequels The Judgement of Paris is certainly not performed frequently, and never before recorded. It would do well to remember that the story this masque tells is a prequel to Homer’s epic of the Trojan war, the Iliad. 

The Judgement of Paris, an important augury of the Trojan war, appears in Book 24, Verse 22 (ff) of the Iliad. In that event Eris, the goddess of discord, not invited to the wedding of Peleus and Thetis, extracts revenge by tossing a golden Apple of Discord, inscribed, "To the fairest one," amid the wedding guests. This results in a dispute between demigoddesses, Hera, Athena, and Aphrodite as to who the “fairest” is. Aphrodite bemuses Paris into kidnapping Helen of Sparta as the most beautiful mortal woman in the world, carrying her off to Troy. Thus, Eris' casus belli precipitates the Trojan War.

John Weldon (1670-1729) “won” a contest to compose music to William Congreve’s libretto. His succession of short arias are executed masterfully. These all feature eloquently crafted ritornellos and an attractive variety of instrumental writing. Each of the performances by the seven principal characters, chorus and instrumentalists is stellar. The Academy of Ancient Music and Cambridge Handel Opera Company’s period piece helmed by Julian Perkins runs at white heat when Jonathan Brown’s Paris takes the stage. Meanwhile Anna Dennis’ masterful Venus sparkles in every phrase.

Art Choral Vol.6 - Moderne 
Ensemble Artchoral; Matthias Maute
ATMA ACD2 2425 (atmaclassique.com/en/product/art-choral-vol-6-moderne)

Five previous “Volumes” by Montreal’s Ensemble ArtChoral traversed the Renaissance-to-Romantic musical eras. Vol.6, Moderne, offers 11 pieces from the 20th and 21st centuries, their impact enhanced by the CD’s reverberant acoustic, making the 12-member ensemble sound much bigger. 

Two movements from Quatuor Antiphonae Marianae Selectae by Slovenian Ambrož Čopi (b.1973) are engagingly cheerful and rhythmically playful. Unicornis Captivatur by Norwegian Ola Gjeilo (b.1978) alternates reverential solemnity with joyful celebration in a tale of animal death and rebirth.

Three stirring works evoke medieval chant – Præter rerum seriem by Canada’s Andrew Balfour (b.1967), the somber Kyrie eleison from Missa Regensis by Latvian Ugis Prauliņš (b.1957) and, most movingly, the haunting, lyrical O magnum mysterium by American Morten Lauridsen (b.1943). These soul-searching pieces receive appropriately slow, reflective treatment from conductor Matthias Maute. This contrasts with Maute’s very rapid tempi that compromise the noble gravitas of two beloved favourites, heard here in alternative settings – Agnus Dei, Samuel Barber’s own arrangement of his Adagio for Strings and Lux Æterna, a transcription by John Cameron of Nimrod from Elgar’s Enigma Variations.

The CD closes with two austere motets – Pablo Casals’ O vos omnes and Aaron Copland’s Help Us, O Lord (composed as an assignment while studying with Nadia Boulanger). A more fitting ending, I think, would have been the disc’s seventh track – Nyon Nyon by American Jake Runestad (b.1986), the singers propulsively mimicking electric guitars, synthesizers and drums. It’s a perfect encore piece!

Rufus Wainwright - Dream Requiem
Meryl Streep; Anna Prohaska; Maitrise, Choeur and Orchestre Philharmonique di Radio France; Mikko Franck
Warner Classics 5021732500601 (warnerclassics.com/release/dream-requiem-rufus-wainwright)

Rufus Wainwright’s Dream Requiem was surely made for this moment – even though the Canadian composer, pop songwriter and singer wrote it during the throes of COVID. We feel a sense of foreboding right from the beginning, when the narrator tells us, "I had a dream, which was not all a dream.” With that, we are plunged into the nightmare of Lord Byron’s aptly named poem, Darkness. 

A Requiem deals with loss. Yet what’s described is total annihilation. Wainwright artfully transcends the utter devastation by layering sections of the Latin Mass for the Dead into Byron’s apocalyptic poem. Hope comes in the final section, the In Paradisum, when the sublime children’s choir offers the consolations of eternal rest.  

Wainwright’s musical language here is not the most daring. But it is imaginative, personal, and highly expressive. Sumptuous melodies, catchy rhythms, rich harmonies – all inescapably Wainwright’s.

Conductor Mikko Franck calibrates the huge forces for both expressiveness and clarity. Soprano Anna Prohaska soars with the exquisite presence of a divine spirit, while the dramatically charged choir honours Wainwright’s deep connection to the words. 

Actor Meryl Streep catches every nuance in Byron’s text. Her sober narration reins in Wainwright’s heart-on-sleeve romanticism – that is, until the Dies Irae. Streep, as the voice of retribution, tears through it in a frenetic, virtuosic tour de force.  

Wainwright is undoubtedly better known for his singing and songwriting than his classical compositions. But Dream Requiem should be heard.

Electric Fields
Barbara Hannigan; Kati and Marielle Labeque; David Chalmin
Alpha Classics ALPHA 980 (outhere-music.com/en/albums/electric-fields)

By now my editor knows full well just how mesmerised I am by Barbara Hannigan. How – in my eyes – she can do no wrong. He also knows that if there is a new Hannigan recording – as sure as day follows night – I will make a beeline for it and likely find no fault in it whatsoever. The reason? There will be no fault with a Hannigan recording. That’s just the way it is. 

Let’s put aside Hannigan’s prowess as an actor and conductor for now. As an operatic star she is a once-in-a-lifetime kind of artist who does everything right, by any composer, in any repertoire from any era. This is how things go on Electric Fields (or might I say, “eclectic fields”?).

Her soprano instrument is lustrous throughout, whether she is interpreting Hildegard von Bingen (c.1098-1179) – O virga mediatrix and O vis aetrnitatis – or Barbara Strozzi (1619-1977) – Che si può fare – or two works by Bryce Dessner (b.1976). Hannigan also contributes one composition – Che t’ho fatt’io based on a fragment of Latin texts by Francesca Caccini (1587-c.1640).

Admittedly Hannigan shines alongside such star power as the piano-playing heavyweights, Katia and Marielle Labèque, and the wizardry of composer/performer David Chalmin’s ambient atmospheric contributions. But Hannigan’s performance is flawless – again. Each work is a priceless sound-painting. Each phrase has its own tinta; each vocal section a distinctive character. It’s exciting to wonder what comes next. One can only dream.

Christopher Tyler Nickel - Mass; Te Deum
Catherine Redding; Vancouver Chamber Choir; Vancouver Contemporary Orchestra; Clyde Mitchell
Avie Records AV2748 (avie-records.com/releases/christopher-tyler-nickel-mass-•-te-deum)

“Beauty-filled music” – that’s what I called Christopher Tyler Nickel’s Requiem (The WholeNote, Summer 2024), praising Nickel’s “distinctive melodic gift” that consolidated influences from Gregorian Chant to Bruckner, Fauré and Carl Orff. Along with his many scores for film, theatre and TV, the B.C.-based Nickel continues his commitment to sacred texts with Mass and Te Deum, composed concurrently between 2019 and 2024. Around 26 minutes each, they’re modest in scale compared to the 70-minute Requiem and minuscule measured against his seven-hour setting of The Gospel According to Mark.

“I’m always finding the melancholy in things,” writes Nickel. Here, his unusual scoring combines, in addition to strings, the plaintiveness of oboe, English horn, oboe d’amore and bass oboe with the sepulchral sonorities of four horns and tuba in Te Deum, two Wagner tubas replacing two of the horns in Mass. The pervading disquiet is heightened by continually shifting, irregular meters, including measures of five, seven and ten beats.

Nickel supplants Requiem’s stylistic eclecticism with a hyper-emotional, near-cinematic spin on Renaissance modes and harmonies. Mass begins with a plea of desperation in Kyrie, followed by a joyous Gloria, but solemnity reigns throughout the remaining sections. Te Deum is even darker. Canadian soprano, Catherine Redding, soloist in the Requiem recording, adds fervent entreaties to Te Deum’s intense anguish. Clyde Mitchell, conductor of the Requiem CD, draws urgent drama from Vancouver’s Chamber Choir and Contemporary Orchestra in these latest examples of Nickel’s truly “beauty-filled music.” 

Benedict Sheehan - Ukrainian War Requiem
Axios Men's Ensemble; Pro Coro Canada; Michael Zaugg
Cappella Records CR432 SACD (axioschoir.com)

After Russia invaded Ukraine in February, 2022 American Benedict Sheehan received a commission from Edmonton’s Axios Men’s Ensemble, performers of Eastern European sacred music, many of its singers sharing Ukrainian roots. Sheehan was asked, he writes, for “a new composition in honor of those fallen in Ukraine’s struggle for freedom.”

Sheehan’s Ukrainian War Requiem was premiered in Edmonton on April 14, 2024 with the Axios Men’s Ensemble and the tenors and basses of Edmonton’s Pro Coro Canada conducted by Pro Coro’s artistic director, Swiss-born Michael Zaugg.

In keeping with Ukraine’s mixed religious heritage – Orthodox, Catholic and Jewish – Sheehan drew texts from the Ukrainian Memorial Service, hymns of St. John of Damascus, Psalms 50 and 90, the New Testament Gospels and the Latin Requiem Mass. He combined, he says, “a variety of musical influences, including Ukrainian and Galician plainchant (somoilka), Gregorian chant, a Ukrainian Jewish psalm tone (nusach) and an array of original melodies,” as well as Shche Ne Vmerla Ukraïna (Ukraine Has Not Yet Perished), Ukraine’s national anthem.

Throughout the work’s 67 minutes, the richly sonorous men’s chorus sings with fervent urgency in Ukrainian, Latin and English, several choristers contributing solos; the major solos are sung by Ukrainian soprano Yuliia Kasimova and Canadian tenor John Tessier. Based on traditional church modes, Sheehan’s powerful, often heart-rendingly beautiful score is a loving tribute to the Ukrainian dead that deserves to be heard everywhere in remembrance of all victims of all wars.

O Listen to the music of Uros Krek & Else Marie Pade
Danish National Vocal Ensemble; Marina Batic
Our Recordings 8.226924 (ourrecordings.com/albums/o-listen)

This is the ninth release in a series of challenging projects from the Danish National Vocal Ensemble on Our Records. The professional chamber choir scene, especially amongst the Nordic countries, including Canada, is one of the most musically fecund departments in contemporary music. Choirs just seem to be getting better and more capable of negotiating ever newer compositional demands.

The retro graphic on the cover, a clunky ear, suggests that this release is odd. The disc opts to investigate some out-of-the-way developments around the middle of the 20th century. The Slovenian conductor of this ensemble, Martina Batič, has chosen two rarely exposed composers, one a fellow Slovenian, Uroš Krek, and Danish music concrète practitioner Else Maria Pade. 

Krek has a mid-century choral style that is closest to Gerald Finzi in the three English language pieces included, but the subsequent pieces in Slovenian and Latin show several attractive elements of his very solid style.

Pade’s mellifluous style fits well with standard mid-century practices, although she never sounds English. The real curate’s egg on this disc is one of Pade's electronic projects, an immersive environment meant to go around a challenging stratospheric coloratura soprano, baritone, speaking (like zombies) chorus and seven trombones. The electronic background includes assembled sounds. The very brief trombone chords and notes really make this piece. 

Performances throughout the recording are all supremely beautiful.

Shawn E Okpedholo - Songs in Flight
Rhiannon Giddens; Karen Slack; Paul Sanchez; Will Liverman; Reginald Mobley; Julian Velasco
Cedille Records CDR 90000 234 (cedillerecords.org/albums/songs-in-flight)

Shawn E. Okpebholo’s exquisite disc Songs in Flight, strikes me as being an incredibly beautiful – and disturbing – new palimpsest of the American Spiritual. The uncomfortable truth of each song cuts to the quick, deep within the heart. 

Okpebholo's songs repurpose news stories of young boys and girls escaping slavery during the 18th and 19th centuries using the language of poetry. His music turns the narratives into arias sung by lyric soprano Rhiannon Giddens, mezzo Karen Slack, baritone Will Liverman and renowned countertenor Reginald Mobley. Paul Sánchez’s pianism and a forlorn saxophone accentuate the dark atmosphere.

Missing may be the story of Emmett Till, but spirituals about Ahmaud Arbery and Trayvon Martin tell their tragic stories with fervour and operatic flair. In particular the lynching of Arbery is a painful gut-punch and even complements Sing, O Black Mother by Langston Hughes. 

Slavery has deep roots, its history spanning diverse cultures and geographical regions. But the transatlantic slave trade and its institutionalization on plantations has had a profound and enduring impact on the history of the US, leaving an indelible legacy of racial injustice and inequality that continues to resonate today. 

“I said your name / first, choked in wondrous / love. Nothing more holy / than the first farewell. My womb, no longer / habitable. My song / was your first and only home.” – words by Wanda-Cooper Jones, Arbery’s mother on Ahmaud sung by Giddens, send a chill through the spine.

Bach - Un itinéraire
Luc Beauséjour
ATMA ACD2 2912 (atmaclassique.com/produit/bach-un-itineraire/?srsltid=AfmBOoqm5eVKGAQYb1maa7jvfUTKn3Njiks61jsMscFEYtUk2DVg_m3B)

Luc Beauséjour continues to be one of the most internationally respected harpsichord virtuosos and this meticulously assembled Bach programme shows that his playing remains superb. He plays on a sizable Yves Beaupré instrument of 2012 [after Dulcken] using a colourful Kirnberger temperament at the low pitch, A = 415Hz. This gives a somehow relaxed sound, and the tempos are all broad, but there is above all a sense of terrifically wide flow. For once there are not too many actual fugues, but the contrapuntal flow of the pieces is felt broadly with constant subtle expressive eddies and surges in the stream of very connected notes. This is unique playing and the lines are always clearly differentiated. Remarkable how Beauséjour frequently achieves stresses and marcato chords and phrases, on an instrument that is not supposed to be able to produce them, with registration and agogics.

The recording, his first with ATMA after many years with the Analekta label, starts with the Third French Suite, slower than we hear it on the pianoforte lately. The bonus of the disc comes from the early Capriccio on the Departure of his Beloved Brother, one of Bach’s rare affective pieces, showing expressive but subtle grief. The final section picks up with the coachman’s tuneful horn calls. This piece is beautifully felt and notes by Beauséjour make it all the more personal. 

The big Bach redoubt, the Chromatic Fantasia and Fugue, provides the climax of the programme and Beauséjour’s control and clarity really bring it off supremely.

Arc III - Brahms | Schubert
Orion Weiss
First Hand Records FHR129 (firsthandrecords.com/products-page/album/arc-iii-brahms-debussy-schubert)

Joyful music for these troubled times: this release completes a three-album series that traces a journey from the disaster and despair depicted in Arc I and Arc II, moving in Arc III to what American pianist Orion Weiss calls music of “peace, hope, love, ambition, optimism and the divine.” The result is a highly enjoyable recital featuring an attractive mix of rarities alongside established masterpieces for solo piano as Weiss displays his comfort in music written over a span of 160 years. 

The album opens with Louise Talma’s Alleluia in Form of Toccata (1945), sparkling with repeated notes, jagged leaps and offbeat accents. Schubert’s Wanderer Fantasy is given a muscular yet poised reading, never rushed or pushed to extremes. The slow movement’s theme, quoting Schubert’s famous song, is a sombre contrast to the extroversion of the surrounding movements, and in Weiss’ hands the fugal finale is exhilarating in its clarity and rhythmic energy. 

Debussy’s L’isle joyeuse contrasts sultry mystery (listen to the central section at 2:45) with blazing virtuosity, a performance that lives up to Weiss’ description of it as “one of the most evocative and thrilling of Debussy’s piano works.” Dohnányi’s Pastorale on a Hungarian Christmas Song (1920) is another valuable re-discovery, and while Brahms’ darkly dramatic early third sonata may not immediately seem to fit the album’s theme, the ecstasy of the second movement love scene and the F major exuberance with which the finale concludes gain resonance from the music that has come before. 

Ligeti’s etude Arc-en-ciel provides an unexpectedly suitable coda, its interweaving lines beautifully shaped. Weiss’ Yamaha CFX is warmly recorded, and this intelligently programmed album is warmly recommended.

Prokofiev - Sonates pour flute et piano
Ariane Brisson; Philip Chiu
ATMA ACD2 2884 (atmaclassique.com/en/product/prokofiev-sonatas-for-flute-and-piano)

Prokofiev may have once defined a modern classical composer as “a madman making works that his generation won’t understand” but he himself achieved significant recognition during his lifetime, and today, remains one of the most renowned composers of the 20th century.

Among his extensive output are a number of chamber works, including two violin sonatas and one for flute, all of them composed during the Second World War. The first Violin Sonata Op.80 in F Minor was actually the second to be written for that instrument, and is presented here in an arrangement for flute by Ariane Brisson. Brisson performs it with pianist Philip Chiu along with the Flute Sonata Op.94 on this ATMA Classique recording. Brisson was first prize-winner in the Prix d’ Europe in 2014 and Chiu is a JUNO award winner and recipient of the Order of Ontario.  

The Sonata Op.80 was completed in 1946 and was awarded the Stalin Prize the following year. This a dark and intense four-movement work opening with a mysterious Andante Assai which the composer likened to “wind passing through a graveyard.” Together, the two artists comprise a formidable pairing with Brisson’s warm tone aptly conveying the dramatic mood with Chiu providing a sensitive partnership. The strident second movement is followed by a lyrical Andante and a finale with an unexpectedly calm conclusion. 

In comparison, the Flute Sonata Op.94 is decidedly more optimistic in spirit. Completed in 1943, the work is a demanding one, but the two performers easily meet the innumerable challenges with respect to technique and nuance. The score is affable and pleasant from the languorous opening to the sprightly finale demonstrating formidable interaction between the performers, as is the case throughout this exemplary disc.

Échos
Charles Richard-Hamelin
Analekta AN 2 9149 (charlesrichardhamelin.com/en/discography)

Charles Richard-Hamelin has accomplished much during the past decade or so. Not only did the Quebec-born pianist win third prize at the Seoul International Music Competition in South Korea in 2014, but was also silver medallist at the International Chopin Piano Competition in Warsaw the following year. Since then, he has appeared in concert with such orchestras as the Warsaw Philharmonic and the Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony and was described by a Montreal critic as “a national treasure.”

Richard-Hamelin’s newest recording, Échos, is the 11th on the Analekta label and features an appealing programme of music by Granados, Chopin, and Albéniz. The set of eight Valses Poéticos Op.43 by Enrique Granados is aptly named – the music is indeed poetic and evocative, and Richard-Hamelin does it full justice. The playing is elegantly conceived, at all times displaying a keen sense of phrasing.

Chopin’s Allegro de Concert in A Major Op.46 is a bit of a curiosity. Originally intended as a piano concerto, the orchestral part was never written and despite some brilliant pianistic writing and numerous revisions, the work has languished in relative obscurity

Albéniz’ La Vega from 1897 and the Allegro de concierto in C-sharp Major Op.46 by Granados are further proof of Richard-Hamelin’s affinity for Spanish repertoire. He deftly captures the highly impressionist mood of La Vega, while the Concierto radiates freshness and vitality. Rounding out the programme is a selection of eight waltzes by Chopin, a fitting conclusion to a most satisfying recording.

Rainbow
LMNL
People Places Records PPR | 062 (peopleplacesrecords.bandcamp.com/album/rainbow)

Rainbow is the debut release by LMNL, a new experimental collective project led by Canadian multi-instrumentalist performer/composer Jerry Pergolesi. Here Pergolesi plays percussion, trumpet and electronics with Louise Campbell on clarinet and electronics. They both created and facilitated Rainbow,

a 60-minute post-modern ambient treatment of Judy Garland’s Wizard of Oz classic performance of Over the Rainbow, a song whose symbolism deeply resonates within the queer community and beyond. 

Garland’s deconstructed fragments were used to create a notated, text-based score and fixed audio track written for any instrumentation and any number of performers, regardless of their musical style, literacy, and/or performance and improvisational experience. 

From calm to tense, this is music for everyone. Opening and closing held single notes envelope the meditative soundscape. Garland’s vocals resound throughout in short sung repeated “minimalist flavoured” takeout phrases, accompanied at times by instrumental and electronic held notes and lines at different pitches and volumes. The full electronic washes mixed with the clarinet are colourful. Ringing percussion and low held clarinet add intrigue to the vocals. Nice contrasts between tonal and more atonal sections from classical, contemporary, experimental, rock, pop and improvised styles add to the diversity. The vibrating electronics keep the intriguing vocals and music grounded.

Pergolesi’s innovative musicianship creates spectacular electroacoustic tracks. His instrumental playing is supported by Campbell’s lush clarinet sounds. Repeated listening and/or playing along with Rainbow is a memorable experience.

Berio - Complete String Quartets
Quatour Molinari
ATMA ACD2 2848 (atmaclassique.com/en/product/berio-complete-string-quartets)

Serial winners of awards often tend to give something back. Quite often that means donating money to a deserving cause and – to all intents and purposes – being done with it, and that’s not nothing. 

In the case of the much-celebrated Quatuor Molinari, giving something back is a continuation of their collective lives, of the philosophy that has governed every day since 1997 when they first dedicated those very lives to breaking musical ground in “devoting themselves to string quartets of the 20th and 21st centuries.” This endeavour continues with Intégrale des quatuors à cordes, (The Complete String Quartets) of Luciano Berio (1925-2003). 

From the (complete quartets) of R. Murray Schafer, the repertory work of Bartók, Berg and Britten, Gubaidulina and Ligeti, Penderecki, Schoenberg and Webern this quartet – so named after the legendary Canadian painter Guido Molinari – has lit a crackling flame for the avant-garde. Their Kurtág cycle which won them the Ecko Klassik Award (now Opus Klassik) in 2017 is one of many prestigious international awards to adorn their proverbial mantlepiece,

Sparks fly when Quatuor Molinari – Olga Ranzenhofer (first violin and artistic director), Antoine Bareil (violin), Frédéric Lambert (viola) and Pierre-Alain Bouvrette (cello) – take to the stage, challenged by Berio. His work would push musicians with even the most sublime technical skill to the limits, with his love of the theatrical, fascination with the voice, and his constant willingness to engage with art of the past –Monteverdi and Dante – and the present – jazz and electronic music. His unique “future-past” musical sojourns certainly define these seemingly omnivorous works. 

The expressive breadth of Berio’s music is beautifully captured in these sumptuous performances. The dazzling semantic and musical labyrinths concocted by each work demand pyrotechnical skill from the Molinari. The miraculously lucid performance of Notturno is the highlight of this fascinating disc.