This apparently artless music is extraordinarily beautiful. My introduction to Finzi, many years ago, was through his orchestral song cycle 'Dies Natalis', to words by the 17th. century mystic Thomas Traherne, and that is really worth seeking out - Finzi had a special skill, as Britten did, in setting words naturally and memorably to music. On this CD, the idiom is the same, with a wistful, slightly melancholy manner combined to lovely musical phrases which linger in the memory. As a bonus, you have Boult as conductor for some pieces, and you will not get better. The others are conducted by Vernon Handley, consistently skilled and reliable in English music, and with absolutely excellent 70s sounds splendidly transferred, this is a very worthy and very lovely disc.