Disc Details

Contents

Work Title	Composer
Spells	Richard Rodney Bennett	Listen

Reviews

• The recent issue of Spells, a dramatic cantata for soprano, chorus and orchestra (1975) on the NMC Ancora label stands out. As performed by Jane Manning (the work's dedicatee), the Bach Choir and the Philharmonic under Sir David Willcocks, this large-scae setting of Kathleen Raine's evocative poems is one of the composer's most enchanting works in which his natural lyricism shines through the 1970s modernist language. The recording sounds as fresh and spontaneous as ever in this highly recommended, well-filled disc...
  Paul Conway, Tempo, 01 January 2007
• A welcome 70th-birthday re-release for Bennett’s colourful choral piece of 1975.
  George Hall, BBC Music Magazine, 01 August 2006
• Bennett's picturesque orchestration punches above its weight.
  Philip Clark, Classic FM Magazine, 01 July 2006
• Not the least achievement of NMC has been the securing of rights to important, long-deleted recordings of contemporary music.
  
  [Spells is] an imaginative piece, and Manning, the Bach Choir and the Philharmonia do it proud.
  Stephen Pettit, The Sunday Times, 28 May 2006
• Bennett's Spells is a setting for solo soprano, chorus and orchestra of poems by Kathleen Raine that is wonderfully crafted with a technical facility that hides the organisational subtlety behind it.
  Andrew Clements, The Guardian, 12 May 2006