Messe Modale: Upper Voices Music For Mass

Jehan Alain Choral cistercien; Messe modale en septuor, AWV110; O quam suavis est, AWV39; Anonymous Alleluia - Ave Maria (plainchant); Beata viscera (plainchant); Gaudeamus (plainchant); David Davies Gloria; Gabriel Fauré Messe basse; Jean Langlais Missa in simplicitate; Trois Prières; André Messager O salutaris Hostia; Daniel Roth Aim Karin fantasie for flute and organ

The Choir of Buckfast Abbey Matthew Searles director
Charles Maxtone-Smith organ, Lloyd Hampton flute, Maia Carter-Oakley soprano

Ad Fontes AF018

Release Date: July 10th LSOLive/ Ad Fontes
https://www.adfontes.org.uk/

There is a particular alchemy to recording upper voices alone, stripped of the tenor and bass lines that usually anchor choral sound, and Buckfast Abbey's latest release for its house label puts that alchemy to the test with real success. The programme draws together three French masses from a brief but fertile period either side of the First World War—Fauré's intimate Messe basse, Jehan Alain's Messe modale en septuor, and Langlais' Missa in simplicitate—interleaved with Gregorian chants in honour of the Virgin, to whom the abbey church is dedicated. It is a neat piece of programming, tracing a lineage from Fauré's restraint through Alain's rhythmic invention to Langlais' chant-infused spirituality, all recorded in the Abbey's famously generous acoustic.

The singing itself is the chief pleasure here. Just fifteen sopranos and altos produce a remarkably well-blended sound under Searles' direction, the tone consistently lovely and the diction unusually clean for a choir working in such a resonant space. Phrasing throughout is intelligent and unforced.

The opening introit, Gaudeamus, sets the tone beautifully and leads naturally into the Fauré, where Maxtone-Smith's organ accompaniment is a constant delight – delicately registered, full of colour, and never once intrusive, not even in the Gloria, where a heavier hand might easily have swamped the upper voices. Between Fauré's Benedictus and Agnus Dei comes a lovely interpolation: André Messager's O salutaris, its melodic lines unfolding with real fluency and illuminated further by Searles' own booklet notes, which offer genuinely useful context throughout.

The Gregorian interludes are handled with the same care. Alain's Messe modale en septuor is accompanied by flute and strings—an unusual and effective touch, with Hampton's flute emerging as an extra voice within the Agnus Dei, and the engineers have caught a genuinely well-judged balance between all the musicians throughout. Alain's short Choral Cistercien pour une Elevation and his O Quam Suavis Est bridge the gap to his Trois Prières, and here soprano Maia Carter-Oakley is the standout soloist: her account of the Tantum Ergo is exquisite, and the dialogue between voice and organ is handled with real sensitivity on both sides.

The disc closes with Langlais' Missa in simplicitate, followed by Daniel Roth's Ain Karim — a fantasy for flute and organ, its title taken from the village near Jerusalem where, tradition holds, Elizabeth first heard the words of the Magnificat. It makes for an atmospheric close: rhapsodic organ writing gives way to a hauntingly exposed solo flute before the organ re-enters in dialogue. Roth, still active at St Sulpice in Paris, clearly understands the flute's expressive and dramatic possibilities, and Maxtone-Smith draws thoroughly idiomatic French sonorities from the Ruffatti organ throughout. Where the choir sings unaccompanied, the discipline is evident — the ensemble and intonation are both secure.

If there is a caveat, it is one of variety rather than execution: this is a disc built on simplicity, and simplicity, however skilfully achieved, can begin to feel a touch samey across a full sitting. But the individual performances are never less than accomplished, and there is much here worth returning to.