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Track(s) taken from CDA67740

Processional

composer
William Mathias (1934-1992)
published in Modern Organ Music 1 (OUP) in 1964

Jonathan Vaughn (organ)
Recording details: June 2008
Wells Cathedral, United Kingdom
Produced by Mark Brown
Engineered by Julian Millard
Release date: May 2009
Total duration: 3 minutes 19 seconds

Cover artwork: Lux in tenebris (1895). Evelyn De Morgan (1855-1919)
© The De Morgan Centre, London / Bridgeman Images
 

Reviews

‘This is one of those recordings that works its way into your spirit and enriches the soul … glorious, life-affirming and distinctive choral music in superbly polished performances’ (Gramophone)

‘This valuable anthology of Mathias's church music … the performance is marked by a palpable understanding of text and sustained concentration … excellent notes by Roderic Dunnett help enormously to 'place' both Mathias and his music’ (BBC Music Magazine)

‘Mathias fanciers who already have the Christ Church Cathedral Choir or Gloriae Dei Cantores CDs can add this newcomer without significant redundancy … conductor Matthew Owens obtains a creamily blended (but not bland) sound from his 34 singers … it is nice to hear a choral group pay as much attention to meaning and characterization as it does to sound per se. Organist Jonathan Vaughn doesn't overwhelm the choristers and is given a chance to bask in his own light in the Processional and Carillon’ (International Record Review)
Allan Wicks, Noel Rawsthorne, Robert Joyce and John Scott were among the leading exponents who premiered Mathias’s considerable output for organ. Processional—from OUP’s Modern Organ Music, volume 1 (1964) and dedicated to Mathias’s friend, publisher and editor Christopher Morris—is an effervescent, outrageously flamboyant piece. At just three minutes, it has a rhythmic fire and is intricate, at times meditative, and almost obtusely cross-rhythmed (to wonderful brusque effect, more like a Scandinavian toccata). Then half way through it seems to combine French influence, vibrant Britten and even florid Hindemith into an extraordinarily effective melee.

from notes by Roderic Dunnett © 2009

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