Apollo’s Fire - Christmas Vespers: Music of Michael Praetorius: Homeliness, heart and plenty of sparkle

Christmas Vespers, The Music of Michael Praetorius
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Artist: Apollo's Fire, Jeannette Sorrell, Apollo's Musettes, Apollo's Singers, Oberlin Choristers, Children's Choirs of St Paul's Church, Michael Praetorius
Genre: Classical
Label: Avie

In spite of this disc’s title, Jeannette Sorrell, conductor of Cleveland’s period instruments band, Apollo’s Fire, has not set out to recreate a 17th-century vespers service.

What she offers is a two-part programme of highlights from Lutheran Advent and Christmas services.

The use of four choral groups – Apollo’s Musettes, Apollo’s Singers, the Oberlin Choristers and the Children’s Choirs of St Paul’s Church – helps generate a spirit of community celebration.

The emphasis is on real-world atmosphere rather than clinical, studio perfection, and the result has homeliness and heart, and plenty of sparkle and Monteverdian blaze, too.

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Praetorius, a giant of Protestant church music, would surely have approved.

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Michael Dervan

Michael Dervan

Michael Dervan is a music critic and Irish Times contributor