Composer: Jan Ladislav Dussek
Performer: Stefanie True, Helen Charlston, Gwilym Bowen, Morgan Pearse, Academy of Ancient Music, Richard Egarr
Format: FLAC (tracks)
Label: AAM Records
Catalogue: AAM011
Release: 2020
Size: 1.02 GB
Recovery: +3%
Scan: yes
Messe solomnelle in G Major, C. 256
01. I. Kyrie I
02. II. Christe
03. III. Kyrie
04. IV. Kyrie II
05. V. Gloria
06. VI. Qui tollis
07. VII. Quoniam
08. VIII. Cum sancto
09. IX. Credo
10. X. Et incarnatus est
11. XI. Et resurrexit
12. XII. Et in spiritum
13. XIII. Qui locutus est
14. XIV. Et vitam venturi
15. XV. Sanctus
16. XVI. Benedictus
17. XVII. Hosanna
18. XVIII. Agnus Dei
19. XIX. Dona nobis pacem
The world-premiere recording of Jan Ladislav Dussek’s magnificent Messe Solemnelle, written for the name-day of Nicolas II, Prince Esterházy, in the early 1800s. A forward-thinking, adventurous composer, Dussek’s music is becoming recognised as some of the most innovative of its time, and this, his last major work, is no exception. A deluxe edition, this album features a 100-page full-colour book packed with scholarship and full sung texts, presented together with the CD in a hard slipcase. Performed here for the first time since composition over two hundred years ago, the Academy of Ancient Music are directed by Music Director Richard Egarr, a champion of Dussek’s music, and joined by a brilliant cast of soloists: Stefanie True, Helen Charlston, Gwilym Bowen and Morgan Pearse. Recorded from a brand new scholarly edition of Messe Solemnelle created by Reinhard Siegert for Richard Egarr and AAM from Dussek’s autograph manuscript score, this album is a first-rate recording of an important piece by one of history’s most unfairly neglected maverick composers.
Jan Ladislav Dussek was perhaps Europe’s greatest pianist until Beethoven came along, and much of his music involves the piano. He wrote works in many genres, however, including some substantial choral music at the end of his life that, in places, looked forward to Schubert. Consider this Messe Solemnelle in G major, an hourlong work that receives not only its world premiere recording but possibly its first performance in any form; it was discovered by Academy of Ancient Music director Richard Egarr in a Florence library. Physical CD buyers will get a weighty scholarly apparatus, but even online listeners will find an enjoyable work that could easily find its way into the choral repertory. Dussek’s setting of the mass text is impressively varied: he has some splendid fugues, not always in the usual places (try the Kyrie II). The Resurrexit is marked by a big trumpet-and-timpani movement reminiscent of Haydn’s Lord Nelson Mass, and in general, Dussek is closer to Haydn and to Beethoven’s Mass in C major, Op. 86, of just a few years before, than he is to Mozart. There are operatic solos, and for these, one might hope, given the dimensions of the work, for more powerful singing than they receive here. There are non-contrapuntal choruses that have a warm, Schubertian quality even as they maintain considerable complexity. The most impressive example is the final Dona nobis pacem, weaving all of the forces together. The period instruments of Egarr’s Academy of Ancient Music bring the work brilliantly to life even if the choir of 20 is a bit underpowered. In general, this album revives a lost work of real value, and it deserves the commercial success it has had.