This CD contains the first two parts of James Macmillan's `Easter Triduum'. This is comprised of The World's Ransoming - a 21 minutes Cor Anglais and Orchestra work, a 40 minute three movement Cello Concerto and, on another CD, a 48 minute three movement Symphony `Vigil'. Together they are really one huge seven movement 109 minute long symphony in which the thematic material introduced in the first two works or parts is developed and re-expressed in the work actually called `Symphony' at the end, culminating in a 26 minutes outpouring of percussive energy in the last movement.

Together the three works take the listener through the four days between Jesus last meal with his disciples and resurrection on Easter morning.

The first work The World's Ransoming is based on Jesus' command to his disciples at their last meal together to love one another. James Macmillan picks up the possibilities inherent in this command. There is hope, there is danger, there will of course, be betrayal. The work begins with a beautiful but tentative - gently exploring line on the Cor Anglais. After five minutes church music like chords appears from the background - reminding us of the seriousness of the hour - and this is the cue for all sorts of challenges, interruptions and battles to ensue - until the plaintive voice of the Cor Anglais emerges - scarred, but still singing out its tune. It is extinguished by the sound of the banging of nails.

The Cello Concerto is a considerable work. Its religious themes serve as inspiration for a thoroughgoing explorations of the possibilities of interplay between a Cello and an orchestra. The first movement `The Mockery' based on the Roman soldiers mocking Jesus is quarter of an hour of musical jousting. With its church music and medieval pageant like motifs it voices questions about the tensions that are always waiting to break out between faith, State and overbearing religious authorities. In second movement `The Reproaches' conflict is replaced with tenderness, a compassionate, sorrowful cello line complemented by beautiful percussion textures with occasional intrusions by more brutal music hammering home the point that a death is at hand. The composer combines his response to the suffering of Jesus with his response to the killing of 16 five year old children at Dunblane, just as he was writing this music in 1996. The third movement `Dearest wood and Dearest Iron' dares to suggest that the seeds of victory may be being birthed when all outward signs point to defeat. In the final minutes a surprisingly lively cello line is played to the accompaniment of the hammering of the nails, to be followed by near silence.

The music ends with a pause, not a finale, and you should continue listening to the 'Vigil' Symphony on another CD which completes the 'Easter Triduum'.

This is an excellent CD which gets deep inside the intentions of the composer. Macmillan's music resists being placed on a spectrum between easy and difficult. My take on Macmillan is that he is a modernist, but one who places sufficient musical signposts in his works so that the average classical music listener can find their way around. He is the opposite of a `Holy Minimalist' like Tavener or Part, he loves richness, complexity and battles that end in the reconciliation of seeming opposites. His music is not time out from the struggles of life, he immerses us in the struggle, sharing with us his belief that victory is at hand.

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