Hear selections from new releases with our weekly Choral Featured Album Fridays at 11 a.m. central on the Choral Stream.
This week on the Choral Featured Album, we present Alexander Kastalsky: Memory Eternal, the new album from the Clarion Choir and conductor Steven Fox. Comprising 14 tracks, the record features four works by Russian composer Alexander Kastalsky, including the title work, Memory Eternal to the Fallen Heroes, which was written in 1917 to honor those lost in World War I. Read more about the record below (excerpt from the Naxos website):
In the face of the devastation wrought by the First World War, Alexander Kastalsky conceived a musical service of remembrance for the fallen. A pivotal figure in Russian musical life — he was a student of Tchaikovsky and acclaimed as the founder of a new, national church music — Kastalsky composed a choral-orchestral Requiem, for the concert stage. Simultaneously, he worked on the a cappella version heard on this recording to be sung in Russian Orthodox churches. Following the basic structure of the Orthodox Panihida, or memorial service, Memory Eternal, and the short sacred pieces that end the programme, reveal Kastalsky's masterful use of choral sonority and colour, his weaving of complex polyphonic textures, and his graceful use of ancient chant melodies.
Resources
Alexander Kastalsky: Memory Eternal (Amazon)
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