A Distinctive Voice

A disk of fairly recent music from Arvo Part, still austere in structure and harmony and not so strictly in his tintinnabulation style but still instantly recognisable as this composer. The disk is entitled Triodion after the longest piece featured and the performers are the choir Polyphony directed by Stephen Layton. The works are mainly acapella with just a few judiciously placed organ contributions from Christopher Bowers-Broadbent on three tracks. Triodion is the sparsest work using ancient mystical Orthodox verses and there are also settings of the formal latin texts Nunc Dimittis and Salve Regina. But more unusually there are pieces setting English words, somewhat bizarrely in the case of the long biblical recitation of names ...which was the son of...and movingly in the case of I Am The True Vine. Also unusually for Part, there is one song that sets the words of Robert Burns rather than a sacred text, My Heart's In The Highlands. This song is also notable for being a solo from countertenor David James. Part was present for this recording and although Polyphony may lack that certain bass heaviness of a Russian choir, they give very professional performances.