A 4-CD set with special packaging and a 60-page booklet.
To mark its 20th Anniversary in 2009, NMC Recordings has commissioned The NMC Songbook. Nearly 100 composers, ranging from the country's most highly regarded figures to the younger generation of emerging talents, have each written a song, loosely themed on 'Britain' and scored for single voice or duet and a range of accompanying instruments. Songs are interspersed with instrumental interludes from an arrangement of a galliard by Thomas Morley, specially made for the Songbook by NMC's executive producer, composer Colin Matthews. The songs have been set to text chosen by the composers and cover a vast array of subjects, from traditional poems by Blake and Byron through to a list of the Kings and Queens of England, extracts from a National Trust brochure, chants from the Leyton Orient terraces, a whiskey recipe, and a colorful rant about our consumerist society. The first recording to be made at the new state-of-the-art concert hall at Kings Place, London. |
ARTISTS
Claire Booth, Ailish Tynan, Elizabeth Atherton, sopranos; Susan Bickley, Loré Lixenberg, Jean Rigby, mezzo sopranos; James Bowman, Michael Chance, Andrew Watts, countertenors; Andrew Kennedy, Daniel Norman, Benjamin Hulett, tenors; Stefan Loges, Roderick Williams, George Mosley, Richard Jackson, David Stout, baritones; Andrew Swait, Sam Harris, trebles; Iain Burnside, Andrew Ball, Andrew Plant, Andrew West, Michael Finnissy, Huw Watkins, Jonathan Powell, pianos; Lucy Wakeford, harps; Jane Chapman, harpsichord; Owen Gunnell, percussion; Antonis Hatzinikolaou, guitarCOMPOSERS to name a few… JAMES DILLON, JONATHAN HARVEY, TANSY DAVIES, HARRISON BIRTWISTLE, JAMES MACMILLAN, HUW WATKINS, PETER MAXWELL DAVIES, ALEXANDER GOEHR, GORDON CROSSE, MICHAEL BERKELEY, JUDITH WEIR, JULIAN ANDERSON, MARK-ANTHONY TURNAGE, HOWARD SKEMPTON, ROBIN HOLLOWAY, ROXANNA PANUFNIK, TARIK O’REGAN, THEA MUSGRAVE, MICHAEL FINNISSY, GERALD BARRY, STUART MACRAE, JOHN MCCABE, LUKE BEDFORD, COLIN MATTHEWS |