Amazon.co.uk Review
One of the most gifted composers of his generation, Herbert Howells (1892-1983) once observed how "all through my life I've had this strange feeling that I somehow belonged to the Tudor period"; you can hear something of this deep-rooted quality in his sublime Christmas anthem of 1940,
Long, Long Ago. If the incredibly moving motet
Take Him, Earth, For Cherishing (written in 1963 for JFK's memorial service) remains probably the best-known piece here, the most substantial is surely the intensely personal
Requiem (composed in 1933, but only published 48 years later), material from which resurfaces in Howells's 1938 choral masterpiece
Hymnus Paradisi. Christopher Robinson and his exemplary St. John's forces lend equally sympathetic advocacy to the thrillingly sumptuous
Magnificat and Nunc Dimittis written for St. Paul's Cathedral and the 1956 Communion Service based on material from the unforgettable 1943
Collegium Regale service that Howells wrote for King's College, Cambridge. Throw in fine performances by Iain Farrington of the
Rhapsody No. 3 and
Paean for organ (an instrument of which Howells was an absolute master) and you have a winner of an anthology, extremely well recorded.
--Andrew Achenbach