It has been a long time since I've been stopped in my tracks with a work
by a mainstream composer that is a complete surprise, but a few weeks ago,
on Blue Lake Public Radio, which crosses Lake Michigan from Muskegan and
Grand Rapids on its way to my car radio, I heard something I would have
felt compelled to call the station about, if I had not caught the
announcement, because of its sheer beauty.  It turned out to be Brahms
Four Songs for Women's Chorus, 2 horns and Harp, Op.  17, performed by
the Kansas City Chorale (on Nimbus NI5524).  It may have been hearing this
that precipitated my reading of the Brahms biography I just reviewed here.

Steve Schwartz has a review of another version of this piece, by the
Arnold Schoenberg Choir on Teldec, on his Classical Net site.  I have not
heard it, so I cannot compare the two--perhaps he will--but this is the
third recording by the Kansas City Chorale I've heard and every one is
splendid, to my ears.  (The others are Nativitas and Fern Hill.) They are
a professional choir.  Choral music is not usually one of my chief musical
interests, perhaps because so much of it is church music, but with the
exception of Two Motets, these works are very much earthly songs (Doug
Purl take note, if you are still tuned.)

In addition to the songs with horns and harp, and the motets (Op.  29) the
disc includes Three Songs, Op.  42, Four Quartets, Op.  92, Five Songs, Op.
104, two numbers from Op.  112 and one of the Neuesliebeslieder Walzer.
For me this is a lot of singing to take in at one sitting, but the works
can, of course be heard separately.  I wouldn't fault any of them, but the
one I heard first is still the one I will return to most.  The horns are
legato, the way I like 'em, the dynamics quiet, and the pace leisurely.
The tone tends to be elegiac, as do the texts, by Herder, Eichendorff,
Shakespeare and Friedrich Ruperti, in reverse order.  If the songs were
not so secular I would be inclined to call them heavenly.

Jim Tobin