Deutsche Motette (German Romantic Choral Music From Schubert To Strauss) - Choir Of Gonville & Caius College, Cambridge

Delphian’s superchoir reunites after its highly successful recording of Rodion Shchedrin’s The Sealed Angel (Delphian DCD34067), this time for a unique programme of German music from Schubert to Richard Strauss.

Strauss’s sumptuous Deutsche Motette is the last word in late Romantic choral opulence, its teeming polyphony brought to thrilling life by this virtuoso cast of over sixty singers. The rest of the programme explores the vivid colours and shadowy half-lights of a distinctly German music that reached its culmination in Strauss’s extravagant masterpiece. The singing throughout combines a musical intensity and imagination with an understanding of period style, two qualities that are hallmarks of both choirs’ work.

This performance of Strauss's Deutsche Motette has the right quality of rapture...Credit to the conductor David Trendell for eliciting from his combined college choirs, whose youthful freshness to the interpretation which suits the imprecatory nature of Rückert's poem perfectly." --BBC Music Magazine